Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front chairman Mohammad Yasin Malik has declared that his opening of office in downtown Srinagar on Sunday was part of his plans to "motivate youth for resistance through politics rather than guns." He says his inspiration in enrolling the youth of Kashmir for political resistance developing for our cause was Edward Said, a Palestinian–American literary theorist and an outspoken advocate of Palestinian cause. Said was a strong champion of the cause of Palestinians.Yasin Malik’s opening of office in densely populated Bohri Kadal in downtown Srinagar, regarded as a stronghold of the Mirwaiz family, triggered violent protests. "JKLF is not a banned group. It has ceased to be a terrorist group. Now we are a political movement and the opening of office should be read in the context of our larger mission,” Malik told Hindustan Times over phone after having spent the night in his new office in Bohri Kadal.
Yasin Malik, who was among the first group of terrorists to launch secessionist violence in Kashmir in late 1980s, had renounced violence and use of guns in May 1994. Since then he claims to be following the Gandhian ways. Regarding Sunday's clashes, he said that "some elements frustrated by the response our rally received, resorted to mischief of disrupting it, which people foiled."