Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Kashmir’s oldest and most unwavering pro-Pakistan secessionist, passed away on Wednesday. He was 92.

Geelani spearheaded to his very end the hardline faction of the Hurriyat Conference. With him gone, an epochal chapter in Kashmir’s contemporary history of uncompromising political separatism may have closed.

One of the few secessionists who also contested elections, Geelani was thrice elected to the Assembly of the former Jammu and Kashmir state between 1972 and 1987. Some reports had said that he formally quit the leadership of the Hurriyat in mid-2020, but Geelani never gave up his call for secession from India and merger with Pakistan.

Geelani had been ailing for years and post the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019, had fallen remarkably quiet. Last week, the Geelani family reportedly pulled down a board that marked out his Hyderpora residence on the outskirts of Kashmir as headquarters of the Hurriyat.

Restrictions on movement have been imposed in the Valley and Internet suspended after his death.

His two sons, a university teacher and a medical doctor who spent many years in Pakistan, have stayed away from overt participation in the Hurriyat or espousing their father’s cause.

Rumours of Geelani’s death have often circulated in the past, each time triggering panicked security arrangements for fear of widespread civic outpouring and disruption. Now that he has been announced dead, reports from the Valley suggest an upping of preventive security measures.

Geelani wanted to be buried at the “martyrs’ graveyard” abutting the Idgah in downtown Srinagar, but it is likely that his final resting place will have to be close to his residence in Hyderpora.