Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah’s Soura Residence Has To Be A Heritage Site

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Heritage Site

Saif Ud Din Soz            Heritage Site

“Sensitized by a journalist Mukeet Akmali’s story in 2018 regarding dilapidated condition of the house at Soura, I asked Mukeet, the other day, whether he had visited Soura house recently. He said he had not.
Thereupon, I decided to visit Soura yesterday (30th April, 2019). When I arrived there, what I saw was a shocking experience of seeing a mound of bricks and stones. The neighbors lamented that the house of historic importance remained neglected for years before it fell to the ground last year.
I told the group of people that gathered there, that, now; there was only one option for a person like me to urge the Archaeological Survey of India to declare the premises as a Heritage site.
The elders in the gathering said that when they were young, they had seen very prominent people frequenting the house.
Then, I reminded them that apart from Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Gaffar Khan, Abdul Samad Khan Uchakzai, Maulana Azad and the luminaries from the other side such as Faiz Ahmad faiz, Mian Amiruddin, Mohammad Din Taseer, Sheikh Sadiq Hassan and others having visited this house.
I also told them that it was here that Pakistan’s emissary Sheikh Sadiq Hassan had met Sheikh Saheb and Gulam Ahmad Ashai to discuss Kashmir’s future!
I further told the gathering that it was a great privilege in my own life to have met Late Sheikh Saheb near the Chinar Tree along with Sahibzada Hassan Shah, (the then Principal M.A.M College, Jammu) and Prof. G.N. Sidiqi in 1966.
The first thing I did on my return was to take up the issue with the Director General, Archaeological Survey of India (Mrs. Usha Sharma) to urge her to declare the premises as a Heritage site.”

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