Hizbul threatens to disrupt Republic Day celebrations

NEW DELHI: In yet another case of recorded messages from the international phone calls received by the Supreme Court lawyers on Monday, the Pakistan-based terror group Hizbul Mujahideen threatened to disrupt the Republic Day celebrations in Delhi.

It gave a call to the Kashmiris to leave the Valley and rush to Delhi and raise the ‘Kashmiri flag’ on Wednesday to protest the abrogation of Article 370. Another message by the same outfit blamed the Supreme Court for “injustice to Kashmiris” by doing nothing on the revocation of the special rights given to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370.

A number of calls have been made to advocates in recent weeks provoking the people of J&K to target Republic Day. The calls were reportedly issued by Sikhs For Justice (SJF) chief Gurpatwant Singh Pannu, where he was first heard asking supporters to “block” Prime Minister Narendra Modi and remove the tricolour from Delhi on January 26.

In the previous calls, the banned outfit had warned Supreme Court judges to refrain from hearing the case regarding the PM’s recent security breach in Punjab. At least 1,000 such anonymous calls were received from the UK just before the SC hearing commenced, exposing a calibrated move to unsettle the investigation into the compromise of PM's security. In the audio call, Pannu was also heard claiming responsibility for the incident.