'Referendum Against Oppression': Jailed MP Engineer Rashid on His Win from Baramulla

New Delhi: Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) leader Sheikh Rashid Ahmad aka Engineer Rashid has described his victory from the Baramulla Lok Sabha seat as a “referendum against all sorts of oppression against the people of Jammu and Kashmir”, The Telegraph reported.

Engineer Rashid contested the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Tihar jail. He was arrested in August 2019 under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). He defeated National Conference vice-president Omar Abdullah and People’s Conference president Sajad Lone. He polled 4,72,481 votes, more than the votes (4,41,578) garnered together by Abdullah (2,68,339) and Lone (1,73,239).

Rasheed’s party put a statement after his victory: “Thanking the masses of North Kashmir, jailed AIP (Awami Itehaad Party) leader Er Rasheed has called his victory a people’s victory and a referendum against all sorts of oppression against the people of J&K.”

Soon after his victory, Rashid spoke to his lawyer and assured the people of Jammu and Kashmir that he would continue to represent the masses “who have been suffering at all fronts since decades”.

“Let the Modi government and everyone who matters understand the difference between the silence of the graveyard and real peace… The result is an opportunity to introspect and revisit the policy of controlling Jammu and Kashmir through remote control devices and accept the ground realities,” the party quoted him as saying.

The newly elected MP underlined that Kashmiris were not enemies of India nor proxies of any other country but by “creating false and fake narratives they are being portrayed as villains which is unacceptable”.

He appealed to political parties to bury their differences now that the elections were over and called them on to unite for the cause of Kashmir.

“Kashmiris deserve to be listened to at all levels by other stakeholders not as beggars but as citizens and main stakeholders of Jammu and Kashmir. Let us all forget our personal egos and understand that the sufferings and aspirations of Kashmiris are much bigger than our personal agendas,” he added.

The AIP leader, who joined politics after quitting the government service in 2008, was the first mainstream leader from Jammu and Kashmir to be booked under the UAPA. Since 2019, the law has been invoked to incarcerate thousands of Kashmiris, including journalists.