Geelani’s shutdown call hits life in Srinagar

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Life across the Jammu and Kashmir summer capital was affected on Saturday following a shutdown called by hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani, whom the authorities placed under house arrest to maintain law and order.

The shutdown coincided with the first death anniversary of Tufail Ahmad Mattoo, a boy who died after being hit by a tear gas shell in the old city areas. His death had triggered a vicious cycle of violence in which 110 people lost their lives across the valley. Geelani had appealed for a protest shutdown and a march to the martyrs' graveyard at the Eidgah grounds in the old city area of Srinagar.

“Geelani has been asked not to move out of his house in order to maintain peace in the city. Nobody will be allowed to disrupt the prevailing peaceful atmosphere here,” a senior police officer told IANS. Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah said, “If Geelani sahib wants a readymade audience outside mosques on Fridays, I will not allow that. I won't allow anybody to disrupt peaceful environment in Kashmir. "Geelani sahib is free to go anywhere on other days. Wherever Geelani sahib went on Fridays, stone pelting started.” Shops, other businesses, public transport and educational institutions remained closed in the old city and uptown areas in Srinagar although private transport and three-wheelers plied on the roads here.

Attendance in post offices, banks and government offices was affected because of the non-availability of public transport in the city. However, for scores of taxis and other commercial vehicles carrying tourists to the Mughal Gardens and other tourist resorts in the Valley, it was business as usual and the shutdown call did not have any effect. Contingents of police and paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) have been deployed at sensitive places throughout the city. Reports from other major cities and towns of the valley indicated that the shutdown call had affected normal activities of life there as well. No untoward incident has so far been reported from anywhere in the city.