SRINAGAR, Jan 1: A militant-turned politician in occupied Kashmir on Wednesday blamed Sheikh Abdullah, the founder of the long-ruling National Conference, for the explosion of anti-Indian feelings in the held state.

“Had Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah not converted the Plebiscite Front (PF) into the National Conference (NC) in 1975, there would have been no militancy in Kashmir,” said Mohammed Azam Inquillabi.

Sheikh Abdullah, who died in 1983, is regarded as the most influential leader Kashmir has had.

He headed the PF, which spearheaded a political struggle to hold a plebiscite across the whole of Kashmir to let the people decide if they wanted to be part of India or Pakistan.

Abdullah gave up the struggle for a plebiscite after entering into an accord with India in 1975, when he changed the party’s name to the NC, which has ruled the held state for most of the past 25 years.

“We would all have been part of the Plebiscite Front and there would have been no militancy or armed anti-Indian struggle,” said Inquillabi, who in the early 1990s headed a pro-Pakistan group, Operation Balakote.

“Until 1975 we were part of a political struggle and it was only after the accord that we choose to take to arms,” he said, referring to 1989 when the armed struggle was formally launched.

He said Kashmiris had “bitter experience” of Indian democracy “as even the elections they chose to contest were manipulated”.

Anti-India parties had formed a conglomerate in 1987 under the banner of the Muslim United Front (MUF).

However, those polls were allegedly rigged by the NC and those associated with the MUF were detained and tortured.

“Kashmiris had no choice but to take to guns.” —AFP