Firstpost
  • Home
  • Video Shows
    Vantage Firstpost America Firstpost Africa First Sports
  • World
    US News
  • Explainers
  • News
    India Opinion Cricket Tech Entertainment Sports Health Photostories
  • Asia Cup 2025
Apple Incorporated Modi ji Justin Trudeau Trending

Sections

  • Home
  • Live TV
  • Videos
  • Shows
  • World
  • India
  • Explainers
  • Opinion
  • Sports
  • Cricket
  • Health
  • Tech/Auto
  • Entertainment
  • Web Stories
  • Business
  • Impact Shorts

Shows

  • Vantage
  • Firstpost America
  • Firstpost Africa
  • First Sports
  • Fast and Factual
  • Between The Lines
  • Flashback
  • Live TV

Events

  • Raisina Dialogue
  • Independence Day
  • Champions Trophy
  • Delhi Elections 2025
  • Budget 2025
  • US Elections 2024
  • Firstpost Defence Summit
Trending:
  • Charlie Kirk shot dead
  • Nepal protests
  • Russia-Poland tension
  • Israeli strikes in Qatar
  • Larry Ellison
  • Apple event
  • Sunjay Kapur inheritance row
fp-logo
Masarat Alam Bhat appointed Hurriyat Conference chairman: Architect of 2010 unrest in Valley has spent half life in 'preventative detention'
Whatsapp Facebook Twitter
Whatsapp Facebook Twitter
Apple Incorporated Modi ji Justin Trudeau Trending

Sections

  • Home
  • Live TV
  • Videos
  • Shows
  • World
  • India
  • Explainers
  • Opinion
  • Sports
  • Cricket
  • Health
  • Tech/Auto
  • Entertainment
  • Web Stories
  • Business
  • Impact Shorts

Shows

  • Vantage
  • Firstpost America
  • Firstpost Africa
  • First Sports
  • Fast and Factual
  • Between The Lines
  • Flashback
  • Live TV

Events

  • Raisina Dialogue
  • Independence Day
  • Champions Trophy
  • Delhi Elections 2025
  • Budget 2025
  • US Elections 2024
  • Firstpost Defence Summit
  • Home
  • Politics
  • Masarat Alam Bhat appointed Hurriyat Conference chairman: Architect of 2010 unrest in Valley has spent half life in 'preventative detention'

Masarat Alam Bhat appointed Hurriyat Conference chairman: Architect of 2010 unrest in Valley has spent half life in 'preventative detention'

FP Staff • September 8, 2021, 07:37:39 IST
Whatsapp Facebook Twitter

This comes days after the death of separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who passed away on 1 September due to age-related ailments

Advertisement
Subscribe Join Us
Add as a preferred source on Google
Prefer
Firstpost
On
Google
Masarat Alam Bhat appointed Hurriyat Conference chairman: Architect of 2010 unrest in Valley has spent half life in 'preventative detention'

Separatist leader and chairman of the Jammu Kashmir Muslim League Masarat Alam Bhat is once again making headlines after multiple sources reported that he has been appointed as the chairman of the hardline Hurriyat Conference. This comes days after the death of separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who passed away on 1 September  due to age-related ailments. Alam, the architect of civilian unrest in the Valley in 2010 which left more than a hundred people dead, has spent about half his life in jail in “preventive detention”. Alam holds the unenviable record of having been detained under the harsh Public Safety Act (PSA) 36 times.  To keep him in jail, successive state governments slapped PSA on him from time to time. Alam, who was charge-sheeted by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in October 2019, is at present lodged in the Tihar Jail. So who is Masarat Alam Bhat? A militant-turned-political leader, Alam’s political career as a separatist started in 1996. He was a top commander of the pro-Pakistan militant outfit Hezbollah, and after his arrest and release, joined the separatist Muslim League, as per Indian Express. After joining the Muslim League, he rapidly became popular and rose through the ranks to become the party chief. In 2003, when the Hurriyat Conference split into moderates and hardliners, Alam joined the Geelani-led faction. He was briefly appointed general secretary of the Hurriyat Conference when several of its leaders were arrested. He is known as a close confidante of the late Geelani. The Hurriyat Conference came into existence in 1993 with 26 groups, including some pro-Pakistan and banned outfits such as the Jamaat-e-Islami, Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front and the Dukhtaran-e-Millat. It also included the People’s Conference and the Awami Action Committee headed by Mirwaiz Umer Farooq. The separatist conglomerate broke into two factions in 2005 with the moderate group being led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and the hard-line headed by Syed Ali Shah Geelani. So far, the Centre has banned the Jamaat-e-Islami and the JKLF under the UAPA. The ban was imposed in 2019. A former student leader, Bhat, resident of Zaindar Moholla in Srinagar, has served several years in jail at different intervals since the onset of militancy in 1990. Both, in 2008 and 2010, the Kashmiris pelted stones, waved Pakistani flags and shouted pro-militant slogans. Both those times, significantly, armed insurgents were invisible in the background — one of whom was identified as  Masarat Alam Bhat — who emerged as a key driver of the unrest in 2010. It subsided with his arrest and multiple detentions over the years. Alam went to Biscoe, the Valley’s leading missionary school, and went on to become a graduate. Alam’s former classmates told The Week that he was an early rebel. “In his first successful agitation, he led a group of boys who demanded permission for Friday prayers,” one of his classmates told the magazine. “The school authorities had to budge.” In a 2010 interview with journalist Dilnaz Boga, he said infamously been quoted as saying that he has been “a stone thrower since my childhood because stones were the only source of resistance before 1990”. He said Gujjars in Rajasthan had thrown stones to push their demands for reservation in jobs. When Alam became the “most wanted” separatist in 2010, the coalition of the National Conference and Congress was in power. He got bail when the PDP-BJP government was in power. For Alam, there is no difference in the two alliances’ agendas. “They want to defeat the nation of Kashmir,” he told Scroll.in. Ashiq Bukhari, the senior superintendent of police who led the operation that resulted in Masarat’s arrest post the 2010 stone-pelting incident, said it took the police months of hard work to track him down. Now retired, he said his team got Rs 10 lakh the police had put on Masarat’s head. “Omar (Abdullah) gave us an extra Rs 15 lakh from his own pocket,” he told The Week. Bukhari was Srinagar police chief in 2010. Alam’s wife, Zahida, has been living with her parents since Alam’s arrests. Her elder brother, Muhammed Salim, was part of the Kashmir militancy and was killed by security forces in 1996. Zahida told HuffPost India “I never had to think twice before consenting to this marriage. I have always been proud of him. We all are.” His separatist politics have been very clearly stated from the beginning, he has never minced his words. In an interview with Indian Express he had said that “Kashmir is under occupation, and there will be no debate or discussion on that.” With inputs from agencies

Tags
NewsTracker Hurriyat Conference Masarat Alam Bhat
End of Article
Latest News
Find us on YouTube
Subscribe
End of Article

Top Stories

Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment

Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment

From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal

From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal

Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?

Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?

Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike

Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike

Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment

Charlie Kirk, shot dead in Utah, once said gun deaths are 'worth it' to save Second Amendment

From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal

From governance to tourism, how Gen-Z protests have damaged Nepal

Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?

Did Russia deliberately send drones into Poland’s airspace?

Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike

Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages: Qatar PM after Doha strike

Top Shows

Vantage Firstpost America Firstpost Africa First Sports
Latest News About Firstpost
Most Searched Categories
  • Web Stories
  • World
  • India
  • Explainers
  • Opinion
  • Sports
  • Cricket
  • Tech/Auto
  • Entertainment
  • IPL 2025
NETWORK18 SITES
  • News18
  • Money Control
  • CNBC TV18
  • Forbes India
  • Advertise with us
  • Sitemap
Firstpost Logo

is on YouTube

Subscribe Now

Copyright @ 2024. Firstpost - All Rights Reserved

About Us Contact Us Privacy Policy Cookie Policy Terms Of Use
Home Video Shorts Live TV