IAS Officer Kannan Gopinathan Resigns Over Denial Of Fundamental Rights To People In Kashmir // 'It Felt Like George Orwell's 1984': Mehbooba Mufti’s Daughter Iltija

By Dilip -
NEW DELHI—IAS Officer Kannan Gopinathan resigned from government service on August 21 citing denial of fundamental rights to residents of Jammu and Kashmir, and his own inability to speak freely about it, The Hindu reported.  “We got into the service thinking that we can provide voice to people, but then we ended up with our own voice being taken away from us. In a democracy, let’s say Hong Kong or any other democracy, if the Government takes a decision, that is their right. But the response to that decision is the people’s right. Here, we have taken a decision and then we have detained everybody. They are not even allowed to respond to that decision. That is dangerous,” the 33-year-old bureaucrat told the newspaper on Saturday

In a separate interview to ieMalayalam.com the same day, the 2012 batch IAS Officer from Kerala said, “I want my freedom of expression back. I want to live like me, even if its for a day.”
Government servants are prohibited by service rules to criticise government policies publicly. 
Further, in the same interview, he explained at some length why resigning was an important moral step for him. “If you ask me what you were doing, when one of the world’s largest democracies announced a ban on the entire state, and even violated the fundamental rights of the people, I should at least be able to reply that I resigned my job,” he said. 

In an other interview with NDTV, he clarified that, ”...Article 370 or its abrogation is not the issue, but denying citizens their right to respond to it, is the main issue. They could welcome the move or protest it, that’s their right.”  The secretary of Power, Urban Development and Town and Country Planning departments of the Dadra and Nagar Haveli administration was also disturbed by a “lack of response” from India’s civil society to the detention of IAS officer-turned activist from Kashmir Shah Faesal. “Even when a former IAS officer was detained from the airport, there was a complete lack of response from civil society. It seems like most in this country are okay with this,” he rued.. 
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'It Felt Like George Orwell's 1984': Mehbooba Mufti’s Daughter Iltija
Forget Article 370, there will be a debate about it for years and years to come — whether it was legal, whether it was constitutional. I believe people have already filed petitions in the Supreme Court. But what followed after that… this curfew is unprecedented in terms of restrictions. Kashmir was not normal to begin with and now you have taken away whatever semblance of normalcy Kashmiris had. As I’m talking to you right now, it’s tough for me to decide where I need to begin from. 

You ask anyone from my generation, Kashmiris have seen nothing but bloodshed for the past 30 years, with these very short periods of peace. Our lives are broken but Kashmiris have still tried to build a life. You have these entrepreneurs who have set up these amazing restaurants, beautiful coffee shops, with books and libraries and stuff. What’s going to happen to all that. I’ve never felt so repressed in my life. We are being made to feel like outsiders in our own land. We are being made to feel that Kashmir doesn’t belong to us. I came from the Valley, yesterday… you are being stopped after every two minutes with the barricades and spools of wire. It’s unprecedented, it’s inhuman and it’s infuriating. It feels like collective punishment... read more:

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