When I wrote I was intimidated, Now Geelani has come around to concede

Though I was not alone in arguing against the continued and pro-longed strikes  and loss of precious lives in clashes between the stone pelters and the security forces, I was however, given a preferential treatment of intimidation.

Now, when Sayed Ali Geelani has publicly confessed that stone-pelting has, instead of being of any help only brought huge physical losses to the people, and that it needs a re-think, I honestly feel relieved  from a traumatic experience-I was passing through during last five or six months.

And with the confession of  Geelani the debate on stone-pelting must end because so far all those who supported stone-pelting and tried to justify it, derived their strength from Geelani’s support to the tactic.

 Interestingly, there have been supporters for both views - those who argued that stone-pelting was symbolic of the resistance sentiment and must, therefore, continue; and those who believe that the act itself goes against the very interests of the people , and, thus, it must end.

 However, the actors (stone-pelters) and the people who hold  opposite views were at the receiving end with stone-pelters becoming victims of state and the people holding views against stone-pelting –target of sponsors of stone-pelting and  both  remained somewhat caught in a maze of confusion.  There were yet others who supported stone-pelting for very narrow political reasons even though they too had little doubt about the end-result of such  confrontations. 

##ad_2##Now it remains to be seen how those intellectuals and political activists and commentators who have gone great lengths in justifying the act are able to reconcile with Geelani’s confession. Have they any idea of how many people suffered grievous injuries and some even fatal ones because of stone-pelting – the most  gruesome being  a bus turning turtle at Shopaian killing three and injuring many others and the  recent example being that of a poor SRTC driver who was wounded in stone-pelting in Baramulla and finally succumbed to injuries at SKIMS Soura only a few days back.

How many of these people have bothered to understand the trauma of a mother and father whose 11-day-infant died when some stone-pelters were trying to enforce shutdown in Baramulla past summer? And of the 117 people who fell to police and paramilitary forces’ bullets provoked by the incidents of stone-pelting last year, how many came from the immediate or even distant families of our so-called intellectuals who supported stone-pelting?