By Muzaffar Raina
Former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and her party members were on Saturday stopped inside a Poonch forest and prevented from meeting the families of the men allegedly tortured to death by the army last week.
Mehbooba staged a sit-in on the forest road in protest, and her People’s Democratic Party colleagues and supporters fiercely resisted the police. But they were bundled into vehicles and sent back.
Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief Ravinder Raina had, however, been allowed to visit the village, Topa Mastandara, and meet the families on Thursday.
On Friday, former chief minister Farooq Abdullah of the National Conference was allowed to meet the survivors of the alleged army torture at a hospital in Surankote, Poonch.
Local people said they were not being allowed to get any closer to Topa Mastandara than Bafliaz, a township 10km from the village.
Mehbooba and her team too were stopped at Bafliaz but she refused to relent and set off on foot along a difficult forest route. She said she had been given the green light for the visit on Friday evening.
But a large police contingent, armed with concertina wire, stopped her a short distance from Topa Mastandara. Her supporters chanted slogans against “political terrorism”.
This story was originally published in telegraphindia.com. Read the full story here .
