Free Mehbooba meets party members; PDP vows to fight against ‘betrayal’

Srinagar: As Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti met party workers day after her release here on Wednesday, her party vowed to fight for the restoration of Article 370 that was abrogated on August 5 last year.

“As you know after one and a half year-long illegal detention, former chief minister and PDP president was finally released last night. Today senior party leaders and workers met her and the process of meetings will continue during the next few days…whatever happened to us was wrong. Whatever was snatched from us illegally and unconstitutionally, we will continue to fight for the restoration of the same (Article 370). We hope we will all jointly strive for the same. Whatever happened was betrayal, we will fight against it,” PDP spokesman Suhail Bukhari told reporters outside Mehbooba’s Gupkar residence where she was meeting the party workers.

He said the PDP president was released ahead of a Supreme Court hearing as there was no ground to justify her detention.

“There was a writ petition in the Supreme Court against her illegal detention the hearing of which was held two weeks back. And the next hearing was two days later. Now, the government did not have much ground to defend the illegal detention,” he said.

Mehbooba had released an audio message on Twitter after her release late last night where she had termed August 5 a ‘black day’.

“All through this time, the black day of August 5 kept wounding my soul. The people of Jammu and Kashmir have also suffered like this. None of us can forget the insult of that day…we have to get back what the Delhi snatched from us in an undemocratic and illegal way,” she had said in the message.

Incidentally, Mehbooba’s daughter was running her Twitter account during her days of detention.

“As Ms Mufti’s illegal detention finally comes to an end, Id like to thank everybody who supported me in these tough times. I owe a debt of gratitude to you all. This is Iltija signing off. فی امان اﷲ May allah protect you,” Iltija had tweeted after Mehbooba’s release.