SRINAGAR, Jammu and Kashmir
Death of a 65-year-old Kashmiri political prisoner has brought into focus the condition of prisoners lodged in various Indian jails under preventive detention.
Ghulam Mohammad Bhat, a longtime prominent member of proscribed religiopolitical organization Jamaat-e-Islami, was one of the hundreds of people detained under a preventive detention law, the Public Safety Act (PSA), in the run-up to revoking special provisions of Indian constitution guaranteeing autonomy to the region.
Bhat, a resident of Kulangam village in Kupwara district, 70 kilometers (43.5 miles) from the capital Srinagar, presented himself before the local police post on July 17. A
