Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Apr 7: The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti’s daughter Iltija Mufti today accused the Regional Passport Officer, Kashmir and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of misleading the judiciary on her passport issue.
Addressing a press conference here, Iltija accused the RPO, Kashmir, Davinder Kumar, and the CID of misleading the judiciary.
“The passport issued to me is a two-year passport that is conditional and it is mentioned clearly that it is valid only for the UAE,” she said.
Iltija said she was an “Indian and a law abiding citizen”. “But, even to issue the two-year passport, the Official Secrets Act has been invoked against me. This Act is usually invoked for espionage,” Iltija said.
“Am I a fugitive? Am I Nirav Modi, am I a terrorist, anti-national that I am being punished? If I talk about the Central Government, is it like talking against the country? What is my fault?” she asked.
“I am not a fugitive or a conman like Kiran Patel who was treated as a VVIP,” she said and alleged that she was being treated like a hardened criminal.
She asserted that she would continue to fight her case in the court despite “pressure to withdraw her petition”.
She claimed that the CID told the court that it was not stopping her passport and “not violating any of my fundamental rights”. “The right to travel abroad is a fundamental right and I am being deprived of that right,” Iltija said.
“This is happening to me because I am the daughter of a former Chief Minister. I am not entitled to a passport because Mehbooba Mufti is my mother,” she said.
Iltija asked if there was any FIR registered against her or if there were any charges against her that she was being “deprived of this right”. “What is my fault? If this is happening to me, you can imagine what is happening to common Kashmiris,” she said.
Accusing the CID of “playing a very bad role and criminalising basic things such as passport issuance” in Kashmir at the “behest” of the Centre, Iltija said Kashmir is on “auto-pilot mode, silent mode” after the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019 as people “do not have the freedom to raise their voice and they are jailed if they say something”.
She also asked “why has the CID submitted an adverse report in a sealed cover?”. “If you are so confident about your report, then why did you have to invoke the Official Secrets Act? Why do you not want the document to come out in public domain?” Iltija asked.
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