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Er Rashid calls hunger strike on Nov 28, slams Centre for ‘bulldozing rights’
Before celebrating Constitution Day, Er Rashid urges the ruling dispensation to answer “how can the majority in Parliament be used to bulldoze and dilute the preamble of the Constitution
Chief spokesperson of Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) Inam Un Nabi on Thursday released a letter from incarcerated member of Parliament from Baramulla, Er Rashid, addressed to the Lok Sabha Speaker, in which he announced a one-day symbolic hunger strike on November 28 inside Tihar Jail to protest the “bulldozing of constitutional rights of the people of Jammu & Kashmir.”
In the letter, Rashid wrote, “The people of India are genuinely proud of the Constitution their elders gave them,” further adding that “but it felt like mocking both the Constitution and ‘We the People of J&K’” when he learnt that a Kashmiri-translated version of the Constitution was released by the President “when the constitutional guarantees and rights of Kashmiris have been bulldozed and tampered.”
The letter further reads that “Their elected MP has been jailed, their state has been broken into pieces and their liberty and rights have been curtailed,” arguing that such gestures “mean very little to those who truly believe in upholding the real spirit of the Constitution, including Kashmiris.”
Before celebrating Constitution Day, Er Rashid urges the ruling dispensation to answer “how can the majority in Parliament be used to bulldoze and dilute the preamble of the Constitution.”
Er Rashid warned about the direction in which the country is being pushed. “If the current government continues to justify bulldozer justice, custodial killings, demolishing houses, removing the CJI from the panel to nominate the Chief Election Commissioner, putting thousands of Kashmiris in jails, misusing central agencies against Kashmiris and strengthening draconian laws like UAPA, this would be giving Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar sleepless nights in the eternal world especially at a time when political parties, both in power and opposition, take an oath to uphold the Constitution.”
To convey this message, Rashid said that he would be observing a symbolic hunger strike in Tihar Jail on 28th Nov 2025.” AIP has said the letter represents “The honest conscience of an elected representative being denied his constitutional space” and reflects the deep wounds carried by the people of Jammu & Kashmir.
