450 people from IOK barred from traveling abroad

ISLAMABAD, Nov 3 (APP): The puppet administration in Indian Occupied Kashmir has prepared a list of over 450 people including businessmen, journalists, lawyers and political activists, who would not be allowed to travel abroad for a particular time period.

According to Kashmir Media Service, the list was prepared in wake of the revocation of special status and downgrading of J&K into two Union Territories through J&K Reorganization Bill passed on August 5 in Lok Sabha. This was to ensure that no influence from Kashmir would be able to travel abroad.

After August 5, authorities didn’t allow people to travel abroad and were stopped at the International Airport in New Delhi. None of them were given any specific reasons on why they weren’t allowed to travel despite valid visas from the country they were visiting and boarding passes given by the airlines.

In past few weeks, political leaders, activists, journalists and lawyers weren’t allowed to fly from New Delhi’s International Airport. One of them is Uzair Ronga, a lawyer and convener of a recently launched political party led by former bureaucrat Shah Faesal who was also stopped from traveling abroad and is currently under detention in Srinagar.

“I wasn’t told anything specific. They just informed after repeated request that my name is on the list and I won’t be allowed to travel. I tried to seek answers, but they didn’t say anything,” Ronga told media. His father Nazir Ahmad Ronga, also a lawyer and pro-freedom activist, is currently lodged in a jail in Uttar Pradesh.

Similarly, two journalists were stopped from traveling abroad in September.

Also, children of a prominent businessman currently under detention in Uttar Pradesh who work abroad, weren’t allowed to land in Delhi and meet their father.

“They simply want that nobody should raise voice about what is happening in Kashmir on any platform in a foreign country,” said Ronga.

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