Asked whether the UPA government went for selective

execution of death row convicts by hanging Guru, Omar said it will have to be proved to Kashmiris and to the world that the execution of Afzal Guru is not a "selective" one. "I had a sense that Afzal Guru would be executed sooner rather than later. Generations of Kashmiris will identify with Afzal Guru. You will have to prove to the world that the death penalty is not used selectively. The onus rests on the judiciary and the political leadership to show that this wasn't a selective execution," he said. The Chief Minister while agreeing that there were people who believe that Afzal's trial was flawed said there were enough voices in the rest of the country also who feel the same. Omar said if the Centre wanted to protect itself from allegation that Afzal's hanging was political than legal, it will have to answer questions on other death row convicts. "There are others on death who are also implicated in attacks on democracy. If Chief Minister of a state not a symbol of democracy? Is a former Prime Minister not a symbol of democracy? Of course, he is," he said referring to the death row convicts in the cases of assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh. Omar also said that many questions needed to be anwsered. "The words used in the Supreme Court judgement are difficult to explain ... The judgement talks about satisfying collective conscience. You don't hang someone to satisfy collective conscience but to satisfy the legal requirements," the Chief Minister said. On Guru's family not allowed to meet him, Omar said, "I cannot reconcile myself to the fact that his (Afzal) family was not allowed to see him before he was killed or executed. That to my mind, on a human level, is the biggest tragedy of this execution." The Chief Minister also questioned the rationale of informing Afzal's family through post saying the reliability of the medium itself was questionable. "If we are going to inform someone by post that his family member is going to be hanged, there is something seriously wrong with the system," he said.(MORE)