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IDEAS

Dear NYT, This Is Why A Man Was Tied To A Jeep In Kashmir 

Mayank Singh

- Apr 24, 2017, 6:44 pm

SNAPSHOT

It is disconcerting to see how easily the New York Times fell for the Islamist propaganda of the ISI

In 1953, The New York Times supported the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) -led coup that ousted prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran. More recently, it acted as a cheerleader when George W Bush decided to invade Iraq. That the war in search of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) still continues in a different and more vicious form should be food for thought for publications like the NYT. Ironically, while the search for WMDs ended in a whimper in Iraq, it did create physical weapons of mass destruction in the form of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

The New York Times needs to be reminded of the fact that it was perhaps the encouragement provided by its war drums that the US government felt unfettered of democratic niceties while establishing hell holes like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.

To, therefore, subtly allude to Indian atrocities in tying a Kashmiri man to a jeep and parading him through villages reeks of hypocrisy.

It is an acceptable fact that in a conflict situation, which Kashmir undoubtedly faces today, it is prudent to search for the truth in grey. To fall hook, line and sinker for the propaganda machinery created by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) shows that hubris has overruled common sense in such Western media circles.

The NYT's attempt to paint the Indian army as the villain of not only this incident, but also the problem in Kashmir has perhaps unknowingly made it side with Islamist terrorists, aided and abetted by ISI, who have brought misery to the pristine land of Kashmir.

The genesis of the Kashmir problem lies in the colonial chicanery that India was subjected to at the time of its partition in 1947. Undeterred by the legalities of accession of Kashmir into India, the Pakistani army's invasion under the garb of irregular tribals set off a hybrid conflict that has refused to abate.

The dispute is nowhere near a resolution despite India and Pakistan fighting three wars since. In the interim, the Kashmir Valley has been witness to the most brutal ethnic cleansing in modern history since the Holocaust of World War II. The forced migration of 3,50,000 Kashmiri Pandits under threat of murder, rape and pillage, accompanied by the death of thousands of their brethren, remains a scar on Indian democracy.

The conflict intensified in the late 1970s following the ascent of Pakistan's General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who was quick to realise the futility of taking on the Indian army in a conventional war. It was Zia who instituted the policy of "bleeding India through a thousand cuts."

The conflict has escalated gradually ever since.

The present cycle of violence in Kashmir has taken a vicious turn ever since the killing of Burhan Wani, commander of the terrorist organisation Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, by security forces in July 2016.

The introduction of stone throwers into the scene has ensured that the Kashmir Valley has not seen peace since. While any nation would have gone for head hunting when confronted with a primeval mode of warfare, the Supreme Court in India has asked the government to search for alternatives to the pellet gun that security forces have used to disperse violent mobs.

It is in this context that the incident in Budgam occurred, where Farooq Ahmad Dar was tied to a jeep by the Indian army and used as a human shield against stone throwers.

As the propagandists, including The New York Times, have projected Dar as an innocent bystander who fell prey to the deprivations of the military, it would be safe to presume that rather than displaying presence of mind that saved bloodshed, the leader of the army's Quick Reaction Team — which arrived there on an SOS mission to rescue outnumbered election officials and security men — should have opened fire to save them from certain lynching by the mob that had surrounded the polling station.

The officer should be commended for adopting a comparatively non-violent method to combat violence.

Coming from a publication that defends the right of its military to operate misfiring drones, The NYT's argument sounds specious. It would be interesting to hear the US daily's take on former Afghan President Hamid Karzai castigating the US for treating Afghanistan "as [a] testing ground for new and dangerous weapons," following the use of the biggest non-nuclear bomb in the world on Islamic State (IS) militants.

It is high time the West understood that Kashmir is not an indigenous freedom struggle as portrayed by the Inter-Services Intelligence and certain media outlets. Ever since the street violence broke out in July 2016 after the killing of Wani, the flags of the Islamic State are omnipresent in such protests.

The statement of Zakir Musa, successor of Burhan Wani — "Whenever we are fighting with gun or throwing rocks, this should not be for nationalism but for Islam" — epitomises the fact that what Kashmir confronts today is an extension of the battle that IS wages in Syria and Iraq and has offloaded to the West.

The Indian army has displayed remarkable restraint in the face of unbridled provocation from terrorists and provocateurs. Officers have lost their lives after being exposed to terrorist fire by the sudden appearance of flash stone-throwing mobs at encounter sites.

It has maintained the restraint despite the warning by Chief of Army Staff General Bipin Rawat that in "the local population [are] people who have picked up arms, and they are the local boys, if they want to continue with the acts of terrorism, displaying flags of ISIS [Islamic State] and Pakistan, then we will treat them as anti-national elements and go for them."

The restraint can be put into proper perspective when compared to the gung-ho attitude of US forces in Iraq and Syria and the Russian conduct of war in Chechnya. China, which faces a minuscule insurgency in Xinjiang, has imposed draconian restrictions on the Muslim population vis-à-vis their religious practices and symbols.

Since the NYT patronisingly refers to the abysmally low voting percentage in Srinagar, it would be useful to know that even during the parliamentary elections of 2014, while 50 per cent of voters exercised their franchise in the Kashmir Valley, only 26 per cent cast their ballots in Srinagar. Evidently, Srinagar voters prefer caution in the face of warnings issued by terrorist groups before elections in the valley.

The low voting percentage can be directly attributed to the omnipresent threat of violence that accompanies elections in the valley. This threat has increased manifold ever since the chief protagonist in the theater of violence — the Pakistani army and its surrogate, the ISI — has felt a sense of resurgence because of economic and geopolitical murmurs in the region.

Chinese investment amounting to 46 billion dollars in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which connects Xinjiang to Gwadar port near Karachi, has emboldened Islamabad to believe that Beijing will ensure the protection of its investment.

This led to Pakistan convincing itself that Chinese presence in the country would deter India from any military action to punish it for its terror activities in Kashmir and other parts of India. This escalation was earlier noted after both countries had gone nuclear in 1998.

The Kargil War was a direct result of the protection Pakistan felt under the nuclear umbrella. Evidently, the Pakistani generals feel the same protection under the perceived Chinese umbrella.

Similarly, Moscow's outreach to the Taliban has convinced the Pakistani army that bereft of Russian support, the legitimate Afghan establishment would not be able to withstand the Taliban. The safety of Pakistan's western frontiers will allow it to shift the army to its borders with India.

India, on the other hand, should be wary of the smugness the Pakistani army might be feeling. The Kargil War and the 2008 Mumbai attacks were a direct result of the Pakistani nuclear blackmail. The Chinese and Russian bonhomie could convince the Pakistani generals to indulge in some malfeasance in India.

It seems Kashmir is witnessing the first signs of this Pakistani confidence. The ISI is now using Islamic doctrine and motivating volunteers for jihad in Kashmir. Islamist websites are promoting the concept of Ghazwa-e-Hind (conquer of India), which they say is the religious duty of a pious Muslim.

Kashmir is gradually becoming a laboratory for radical Islamist ideas.

The West should be apprehensive of the events transpiring in Kashmir and the religious hue being provided to it. It ignored the terrorism warning that India started issuing since the late 1980s to its peril.

One small poser to The New York Times: Does it want Kashmir to be an extension of the Islamic State? In the answer lies the future of the West.

This article was originally published on Fair Observer. You can read the originalpiece here.

Fw: From: Jay Bhattacharjee / My latest article - on the strange meddling by the Supreme Court on vital matters affecting the security operations of the Armed Forces

----- Forwarded Message -----

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From: Jay Bhattacharjee

Sent: Saturday, April 22, 2017 19:35

To: Jay Bhattacharjee

Subject: My latest article - on the strange meddling by the Supreme Court on vital matters affecting the security operations of the Armed Forces

Friends: 

THE SUPREME COURT COURT'S STRANGE ABERRATIONS MAY VITALLY AFFECT 

THE ABILITY OF OUR ARMED FORCES TO PROTECT THE COUNTRY

_____________________________________________________________________

My latest article on this issue was uploaded yesterday.

If things continue in this manner, the Supreme Court will severely impair the operational efficiency of our Armed Forces in combating Pakistani-sponsored terrorism in Kashmir and in tackling major threats in the North-East. The highest court in the land does not seem to be concerned at all about the basic security of the Indian Republic.  

Although I have copy-pasted the essay below (in case you are unable to get to it because you have exhausted your weekly quota of 7 articles), I would urge you to visit the site if you can. 

We live in troubled times indeed. 

https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/judicial-overreach-is-perhaps-the-softest-possible-description-of-the-crisis

Best wishes, 

Jay Bhattacharjee

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

"Judicial Overreach" Is Perhaps The Softest Possible Description Of The Crisis 

Jay Bhattacharjee

- Apr 21, 2017, 3:39 pm

   

SNAPSHOT

A constitutional crisis is not far away if the highest court of the land continues on its current trajectory

It is not pleasant for Indian citizens to watch one of the country's three constitutional pillars conduct itself in a manner that brings it little credit. This is more so since this particular institution, the Supreme Court, enjoyed a spotless reputation for a few decades after the promulgation of the Constitution.

Then came Mrs Gandhi's Emergency in 1975, and the precipitous fall from grace of the apex court began when it delivered its infamous verdict on fundamental rights in 1976 (Additional District Magistrate Jabalpur vs S. S. Shukla AIR 1976 S.C 1207), also known as the habeas corpus case.

After the Emergency nightmare ended in 1977, the Supreme Court clawed its way back to grace with a number of landmark judgements, like the one on the basic structure of the Constitution (Minerva Mills Ltd. and Ors. v. Union Of India and Ors., AIR 1980 SC 1789) and innovations like the Public Interest Litigation (PIL).

In the Minerva Mills case, the Supreme Court evolved and fine-tuned the doctrine of the Constitution's basic structure. It finalised the debate that had been going on in Indian law on this issue and clarified the principles that it had laid down in the Kesavananda Bharati case in 1973.

In the matter of PILs, the Supreme Court started entertaining matters in which the interest of the public at large was involved. In these cases, the apex court can be moved by an individual or a group of persons by depositing a writ petition at the filing counter of the Court or by writing a letter to the Chief Justice of India (CJI). The applications are required to highlight issues and questions of public importance where the court's jurisdiction can be invoked.  Over a few decades, many PIL cases in the Supreme Court became landmarks of Indian legal history.

Our Supreme Court was an international trendsetter in this field and we can be legitimately proud of this. To shed some light on this extraordinary jurisdiction that was conceptualised by our apex court, a writ petition filed at the filing counter is treated like any other writ petition and processed accordingly. In the case of letters addressed to the CJI, they are dealt with according to the court's PIL guidelines. However, it must be recorded here, most sadly, that the Supreme Court has regressed on this issue in the last few years. But that is not the most important problem we need to discuss at this juncture.

As the 1980s ended, the apex court took some inexplicable decisions that eroded its credibility and stature. The most disturbing step it took was to pass the infamous Veeraswami verdict in 1991 (K Veeraswami vs. Union of India and Others, [1991] 3 SCC 655). Through this completely indefensible and flawed judgement, the Supreme Court unilaterally extended the Constitutional immunity (under Article 124) of the higher judiciary, namely judges of the apex court and the High Courts, to an almost blanket protection from the applicability of all Indian laws.

Over time, the Supreme Court added another element to the deadly concoction. It claimed exclusive power to induct and appoint its own members. The nation's elected executive was barred from playing any role in the selection and appointment of Supreme Court and High Court judges. When Parliament enacted the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) Act, 2014, as well as the Constitution 99th Amendment Act, 2014 (amending Articles 124 and 217 of the Constitution), the Supreme Court stepped in promptly to protect its turf.

Sure enough, the apex court in October 2015 ruled against the wishes of the legislature and the executive by striking down the NJAC Act and reverting to the earlier collegium system of appointing higher judges. This is despite the fact that senior lawyers like Fali Nariman who were opposing the Act during the hearing were also categorical in admitting that the collegium system had failed dismally.

This writer assessed the working of the Supreme Court and the higher judiciary in an essay for this magazine in March 2016. Two of the measures that I strongly advocated in the article were that the Veeraswami judgement be abrogated by an act of Parliament and that the collegium system be done away with.

Overruling the Veeraswami judgement is not enough – there has to be a workable and equitable method of sacking judges.

Sadly, all this was nothing but day-dreaming on the part of many concerned observers and citizens like this writer. It is with considerable dismay that we watched the entire system regress sharply. The Supreme Court's functioning became even more inexplicable. Other perceptive writers also wrote extensively for this magazine about the worrying developments. Two essays merit particular attention: One in November 2016 and one earlier this month.

Unfortunately, the scenario on the ground is causing more concern every passing week. Many commentators are criticising the Supreme Court's ill-advised moves to venture into terrain that it really should not. "Judicial overreach" is a term that one gets to read very often these days. It certainly has the necessary gravitas and the requisite tact that are obligatory when commenting on the conduct of the highest court in the land.

In all fairness, it must be emphasised that this phenomenon of judicial overreach has become endemic only because the governing apparatus in this country, both at the level of the union and the states, has proved itself to be manifestly incompetent and venal over many years. This compelled the citizens to seek relief from the judiciary. In some cases, the checks-and-balances framework worked. In the long run, however, it motivated the judiciary to inevitably carve out territorial supremacy at the cost of the executive. In sociology, like in physics, a vacuum cannot exist. Therefore, senior politicians like Arun Jaitley, who lament how the courts are meddling in matters that are rightly the exclusive bailiwick of the government, must clean up their act before they complain too much.

However, a specific judgement of the Supreme Court that is most worrying is the one handed down in July 2016 that effectively withdraws the immunity given to the armed forces under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) when they engage in confrontations with armed insurgents and rebels. Although the verdict was delivered in a case related to Manipur, the biggest worry is how it will affect the armed forces in their Kashmir operations.

Last year's judgement stipulates that every allegation of the use of excessive force that results in the death of an individual caused by the armed forces or the state police in Manipur must be looked into. The registration of an FIR was made mandatory. In practice, the situation has been made bizarre with the state authorities being tasked to investigate acts by the armed forces in a situation where they have been sent only because the local state machinery has failed. The Union of India is now before the Supreme Court in a last-ditch attempt to reverse this extraordinary judgement. A curative petition has been filed after the apex court rejected a review petition filed earlier by the Union Government.

If all this was not bad enough, the Supreme Court has waded into the issue of appropriate methods of combating stone throwers and acid bombers who confront our security personnel almost every day. We have to rub our eyes in disbelief when we read reports about an apex court bench discussing the best tactics that our armed forces and other security personnel should employ to neutralise violent attacks on their lives and limbs.

The questions that are being posed in the public domain by former armed forces personnel on this issue should be reflected on most seriously.

Sample 1: An FIR can now be lodged against an army platoon commander (either a Lieutenant with a number of years of service or a freshly-promoted Captain) whose team has neutralised some terrorists in active combat conditions or a few "militants" in a search operation. In Kashmir, the local anti-nationals will be easily able to mobilise many fictitious "witnesses" to depose against our young officers and/or their enlisted men.

Sample 2: In Kashmir, where terrorists possess some of the most advanced weapons, how can you use legal procedures that are relevant only in peacetime situations?

Sample 3: Now that stone pelters and acid bomb launchers are fully aware of the constraints that our troops are operating under, our soldiers will face more determined opposition.

Sample 4: Among the judges who passed the original order last year or those who are now hearing the curative petition, has anyone done any military service or has any first-hand experience of the combat zones where our armed forces are deployed in protecting our nation?

The answers to these questions are clear and unambiguous. It is now time for the Union Government to take a determined stand and for the highest court to do some much-needed introspection, and to retreat after crossing the Lakshman rekha. The BCCI debacle, the "lal batti" hearings, the Karnan charade and the highway liquor ban are deleterious matters, but India can survive them. Destroying or critically undermining the capabilities of our armed forces to combat terror will be inviting the country to commit harakiri. This is not a hyperbole.

• Judiciary 
• AFSPA

 

 

 

Fw: Who Lost Kashmir?

----- Forwarded Message -----

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COVER STORY

21 April 2017

Who Lost Kashmir

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by 

Rahul Pandita

Five inconvenient truths about an over-Islamised Valley

"They found five litres of semen inside Neelofar's body while conducting her postmortem." The boy who says this is about 16 and lives in Kulgam in South Kashmir. He says he was told this at a 'conference' in his village recently. The teenager is convinced of this ludicrous claim about Neelofar Jan, one of the two women found dead in a rivulet in Shopian in South Kashmir in May 2009. After allegations of their rape and subsequent murder by security forces spread thick and fast that summer, there was widespread unrest in the state. In the din raised by the separatist machinery, the truth did not seem to matter at all. The probability of the two women having drowned was rejected. It did not matter that from 1995 to 2008, ten other people had drowned in the same rivulet (from 2010 to 13, three more did). It did not matter that on orders of the then Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, a police officer tried to make a horse cross the rivulet from the same spot, but was unable to: the animal was too afraid to try. It did not matter that an independent team of doctors from Delhi's All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) performed a second autopsy on the two bodies and ruled out rape, establishing their death as asphyxia as a result of ante-mortem drowning. Later, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a chargesheet against six Kashmiri doctors and others, including the brother of one of the deceased, for fabricating evidence. One of the doctors, the CBI found, had fudged the vaginal swab samples to falsely show that the women were raped.

Eight years later, not only is the lie intact, it has grown in its brazenness. The boy from Kulgam explains the five litres of semen by saying that the security forces kept raping Neelofar even after her death.

This is what the Indian state is dealing with in Kashmir and it has almost no clue on how to counter its distortion factory which is turning young men into radical Islamic extremists. "In Europe they have a lone wolf; here we have to deal with pack of wolves," says a senior police officer. Nine months after the current crisis was unleashed in the Valley in the wake of militant commander Burhan Wani's death, the situation has deteriorated to such an extent that in several parts of South Kashmir, the civil administration has collapsed. There are reports that in some areas, armed terrorists are roaming about freely. Several videos of theirs have surfaced in the last few days; in one, two of them are singing a song about how a green flag will be unfurled over the Red Fort in Delhi and how revenge for Bangladesh will be taken by creating a Muslim nation in Kashmir. In other clips, some local leaders and a few prominent people are seen reciting anti-India and pro- Islamic slogans with guns aimed at them. The grim situation has prompted the state police chief to issue an advisory to his men asking them to avoid visiting home for the next few months, especially those whose homes are in South Kashmir.

In North Kashmir's Bandipora, Abdul Rashid Parray, a prominent former militant who had turned pro-government (an Ikhwani in local parlance), was shot dead on April 16 by armed militants who turned up at his house. "Two of my friends from our neighbourhood accompanied two masked militants," says his son, Fayyaz Ahmad, "Upon recognising their voice, my father opened the gate, only to find that we had been deceived. They took him inside and shot him."

Security agencies say that the recent violence has been orchestrated to create fissures in Kashmir that New Delhi will find difficult to contain. By the late 90s, after a decade of bloody conflict in India's northern-most state, it had become clear that the armed insurgency had failed. In the mid 2000s, Kashmir had reached a stage where separatists had become irrelevant. But after the late 2000s, the situation turned volatile again. This time, though, the separatists played the game in a different way. They pitched the battle in Kashmir as a Palestinian intifada of sorts, where violent stone-pelting mobs were passed off as peaceful protestors. In the last few years, this has now been coupled with attempts at creating an impression of indigenous militancy, fuelled not by foreign terrorists who would launch suicide attacks in Srinagar, but by young Kashmiri Muslim men like Burhan Wani.

It would be too simplistic to say, as recent television news stings suggest, that all stone pelting happens because men are paid money. Of course, cash is involved. But it is also happening because boys in Kulgam have been radicalised. The radicalised boys, like the one in Kulgam, look at pictures of bearded militants on their mobile phones and are inspired to grow similar beards and become 'mujahids', fighters for an Islamic cause.

Can the unrest still be called 'a freedom movement' for an independent state when its fighters are getting more vocal about establishing the rule of Islam?

The new war in Kashmir is being fought on streets as much as on smart phones. In Pakistan, hundreds of fake identities have been created on social media to spread disinformation about Kashmir and further radicalise the youth. "We know of several such centres run in Pakistan. One is run by Lakhvi [Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, Pakistan-based leader of Lashkar-e-Toiba] in a compound near Adiala jail in Rawalpindi," says another senior police officer. He and others who are dealing with the situation on the ground say that New Delhi has no blueprint to counter this propaganda. "Imagine how many mobile phone users we have in Kashmir and how quickly a certain video gets circulated. And what is our response? We just shut off the internet," he says.

But why have we reached this stage? Senior police officers who have dealt with militancy in Kashmir for long say that the Centre grew too confident too soon. "It is like a tuberculosis patient who is on multi-drug therapy meant to be taken for two years. After one-and-a-half years, the patient thinks he has been cured and stops his medicine. The disease returns," says one of them. All of them are in agreement that it is because of the state's own complicity that Kashmir has been brought to the brink of anarchy.

AS THE CENTRE struggles to make sense of the war in Kashmir, the time has come to ask hard questions about the nature of resistance in Kashmir and why things have come to such a pass. Open spoke to several people directly involved in fighting militancy in the state. Here are five points they make that should be borne in mind:

Missing the true picture

Several articles have appeared speaking of the alienation of Kashmiri Muslims and arguing that political discontent there needs to be addressed. These opinions, no matter how sincere, fail to offer any way forward to achieve this. Undoubtedly, like both Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi have emphasised, Kashmir needs to be handled within the realm of insaniyat (humanness) and jamhooriyat (democracy). But how do these play out when the commander of a terrorist organisation is killed in an encounter with security forces and widespread protests break out in the Valley? What does one expect from the Army when it is engaged in fierce gun battles with terrorists and civilians ambush them with stones and, in several cases, even help terrorists escape? Also, can the unrest in Kashmir still be called 'a freedom movement' for an independent state when it is clear that its fighters are getting more vocal about establishing the rule of Islam? In a recent video message, Hizbul commander Zakir Musa addresses stone pelters, urging them to be clear about what they are fighting for. "My brothers should not fall in the trap of fighting for an independent nation. Nationalism and democracy are forbidden in Islam. So our fight should not be for an independent Kashmir, but for the supremacy of Islam, so that Sharia is established here, the rule of Allah is established here," he tells them. Forget the essayists and filmmakers and academics; speak to any youth in Kashmir today, and he will tell you that he is fighting for the dominance of his faith. "Our challenge is not that 1,000 youngsters want to be martyrs; our challenge is to not allow them to be martyrs," says a police officer.

The uneasy ruling alliance

The coalition between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the People's Democratic Party (PDP) is unnatural. Right from its inception, the PDP has been espousing soft secessionism and is seen in cohorts with separatist elements in the Valley. In fact, the former Research & Analysis Wing chief, AS Dulat, has written in his memoir that in 2003, the then Prime Minister Vajpayee had refused to share a dais with the PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti at a public rally because of her links with the Jamaat-e-Islami and the Hizbul Mujahideen and the support she received from them in the 2002 elections. Uncannily, it chose the same election symbol (pen and inkpot) that the Muslim United Front (a conglomerate of pro-independence parties, including the Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir) used in 1987. Soon after forming a government with the BJP in 2015, Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, the late PDP leader who was Chief Minister at the time, ordered the release of Massarat Alam, a radical Islamist who had been in jail since 2010. He also had plans to release Qasim Faktoo, the Hizbul Mujahideen militant and husband of separatist leader Asiya Andrabi. On April 16th, soon after his release, Alam organised a big reception for his mentor and hardline separatist leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who was returning from Delhi where he shifts in winter. In a huge rally that passed by the Director General of Police's office in Srinagar, the crowd shouted: "Pakistan se kya paigaam, Kashmir banega Pakistan" (What is the message from Pakistan? Kashmir will turn into Pakistan) and "Jeeve, jeeve Pakistan" (Long live Pakistan). The rally boosted the spirits of youngsters who had grudgingly accepted that azaadi is a mirage. It was around the same time that the legend of Burhan Wani was created, helped by journalistic reports from Delhi that declared him the new face of militancy in Kashmir. In the chaos after Wani's death, a few Indian parliamentarians went to Geelani's door to beg for an audience, which was refused.

Many fighting the insurgency point out how successive governments have nurtured newspapers that peddle anti-India and pro-separatist propaganda

Police sources say that after it came to power, the PDP put tremendous pressure on them to go easy on stone pelters. In many instances, those who had been booked for serious violations were freed after PDP's intervention. "Every day, someone would visit me, asking me to set free and drop charges against one man or another," says a police officer in South Kashmir.

The current crisis highlights the alliance's unnaturalness in stark terms. While the BJP Government at the Centre has been asking the media to downplay a video of CRPF soldiers being heckled and hit by stone pelters, BJP activists and supporters have made it go viral on social media. The PDP and its supporters, on the other hand, have put out another clip on social media—of a man tied to an Army jeep being paraded through villages.

The myth of 1987

It is also important to shatter misbeliefs about the timeline of secessionism in Kashmir. It is widely thought that the armed insurgency in 1989-90 was a result of the election rigging of 1987. While it is true that this acted as a catalyst, it is crucial to understand the nature of the political front that fought those polls under the banner of Muslim Muttahida Mahaz (Muslim United front). The Front made it clear that its aim was to establish 'Nizam-e-Mustafa' (rule of the Prophet) in Kashmir. The Jamaat's founder, Maulana Syed Maududi (1903-1979), always urged his followers to see Islam as Nizam-e-hayaat (a code of life) and to struggle for Islamic rule. Democracy was seen as 'haraam' or unIslamic. The Jamaat in Kashmir severed its ties with the outfit in India and Pakistan and became an independent entity in 1953. The same year, one of Maududi's earnest admirers, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, became a full-time member of the Jamaat. The Kashmiri Jamaat's rejection of India and its focus on Islamism formed the core of the separatist movement in Kashmir. As Yoginder Sikand writes, as early as in 1980, the Jamaat declared Indian forces stationed in Kashmir to be an 'army of occupation' and appealed to the Kashmiri Muslim youth to 'throw out' the Indian occupiers and establish Islamic rule in the state. In 1987, the candidates who fought elections under the Front's banner included Geelani and a Jamaat teacher, Mohammed Yusuf Shah, whom we now know as Syed Salahuddin, chairman of the Pakistan-based United Jihad Council.

The limitations of restraint

Security forces, especially paramilitary forces like the CRPF, work under high stress in Kashmir. Look at the case of those CRPF soldiers whose video of restraint in the face of abuse and assault went viral. The soldiers had been travelling for four months, helping the state conduct elections in Uttar Pradesh and Manipur. On the morning of April 9th, the polling station they were deployed at in central Kashmir came under heavy attack by a mob. As protestors smashed an Electronic Voting Machine (EVM), the presiding officer fled to save himself. The eight soldiers picked up the EVM and began walking towards another polling station, when some of the mob followed them. Similarly, another video of a man tied to a jeep by an Army officer has created a furore. The Army has so far not offered any version of the circumstances, but unofficial channels have maintained that the officer had responded to an SOS call from a section of paramilitary soldiers who found themselves surrounded by a violent mob. To deter locals from firing at his vehicle, he strapped a Kashmiri to the bonnet. While the officer's act has found overwhelming support from army veterans, a few of them like Lieutenant General HS Panag, former GOC-in-C of the Northern Command, have criticised it saying it affects the credibility of the forces. "The Army has followed the law of the land in Kashmir and such an act upsets our success story," he says.

But security personnel in Kashmir say it is unfair to expect them not to defend themselves from violence. "I know these things are politically incorrect to say, but tell me, who are the people who get injured with pellets? Well, barring a few exceptions, undoubtedly those who engage with security forces, throwing stones at them that are meant to kill," says a police officer.

The state's complicity

Many fighting the insurgency in Kashmir say they sometimes feel that all government institutions in the Valley are acting against the interests of the state. They point out how successive governments have nurtured newspapers and other media in Kashmir that peddle anti-India and pro-separatist propaganda. The advertisement budget of the J&K government has risen from Rs 28 crore to Rs 45 crore this year; this does not include a separate publicity budget of the state tourism department. Many journalists have been given state accommodation and transport. A police officer points at an article published in a daily Urdu newspaper. "This is written by Ghulam Rasool Shah alias Rafiah Rasool, the former chief of terrorist outfit, Jamiat-ul-Mujahideen, and is based in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The editor of this newspaper has been provided with Z-plus security by New Delhi. What does this mean? This means that the state itself is nourishing the roots of jihad in Kashmir," he says.

Sources also reveal how Jamaat teachers and supporters have been inducted as teachers at government schools over the past 27 years. During the Emergency, the Kashmiri leader Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah had banned over 125 schools run by the Jamaat in the Valley. In 1977, the Jamaat created a separate organisation, Falah-e-Aam Trust, to run these schools. In 1990, at the peak of militancy, these schools were shut again. But from then onwards, on the intervention of senior government officials, their teachers were absorbed in state-run schools. According to sources, several fake lists were created to facilitate recruitment of Jamaat supporters. It required only a certificate from a local Jamaat functionary that these people were working as Jamaat school teachers. It is believed that till now, over 2,000 persons have been provided government jobs (whereas the number of actual teachers was only about 400). In 2009, immediately after he took over as Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah signed one such order, clearing the recruitment of 440 supposed Jamaat teachers for government schools.

In 2011, some school children complained about a picture in an Urdu textbook meant for Class I. In it, the Urdu letter 'zoi' was used along with a picture of a policeman to represent the word 'zaalim' (cruel). The police lodged a report, but were then asked to go slow on the investigation; it had been revealed that it was the deputy director of academics of the education board who had selected that illustration. The same official was later made the secretary of the state's Cultural Academy. "When I was a student in Kashmir University, I realised certain departments encourage students to write their papers and dissertations on Jamaat on topics like 'Maududi ki soch (the thinking of Maududi)," says a Kashmiri journalist.

With the situation in Kashmir deteriorating, politicians are still beating around the bush, refusing to look into the deep roots of Islamisation in the Valley. In an interview to The Indian Express, Tassaduq Mufti, the PDP candidate for Anantnag, said that "direct questions" needed to be asked about why so many youngsters were being killed and injured in firing. Direct questions need to be asked, alright, but perhaps Mufti could begin by asking his own party.

What is the way ahead? "We need to clear the ground on a war footing. And once we do that, we have to make sure that we do not give an inch of political space to the separatists," says a senior police officer.

At a café in Srinagar, a journalist takes out his mobile phone. Someone has sent him a picture of three forlorn students in an empty classroom. One of the benches has a tag that reads: 'Roll number 1: killed in CRPF firing'. Behind him is 'Roll number 7', who cannot study because he has lost his vision. Such propaganda is rampant in Kashmir and much of it is made in Pakistan. "See, think of a cow. What does a cow do? It moos, he says. "Similarly, it is Pakistan's very nature to help creating trouble in Kashmir. But at least the Indian state should not shit in its own backyard."

 

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Fw: THE IRON IN OUR SOUL / Major Gaurav Arya (Veteran)

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Author: Major Gaurav Arya (Veteran)

Soldier. Nothing else. View all posts by Major Gaurav Arya (Veteran)

 

THE IRON IN OUR SOUL

AuthorMajor Gaurav Arya (Veteran)Posted onApril 13, 2017

 

By 5^th April, most people had packed their woolens. The sun shone brightly, and the air in Srinagar had a nip, with a hint of pine. I tucked myself in for a well-deserved sleep. The last 24-hours had been hectic and my body is not what it used to be. I crave rest, and a slight change in temperature wakes up broken bones, brutally. I again, by sheer force of habit, turned to Chapter XXII, "Of the Last Fight and the Death of Hector". Iliad has always fascinated me; Zeus, Agamemnon, Paris, Priam, Hector and Achilles, especially Achilles who was immortal. Or so he thought.

I again grieved for noble Hector and kept down the book, with a silent prayer of thanks to Homer. They say I live in the past. Maybe.

It was at 3 am that I started shivering. I got up and put another blanket on top of the one I had been using, and convinced myself to go back to sleep. I rarely have dreams. That night was no different. But for some reason I was uneasy. I tossed and turned, resisting the desire to resurrect Hector at an unearthly hour. Sleep won, and I drifted back to those dark and smoky depths, which are much of what I see when I sleep.

I woke up to snow. Kashmir has always been an unreliable friend.

Srinagar is an urban mess, accentuated by decades of neglect. Kashmir's rulers have always abused their state, in the worst ways possible. And what they have nurtured is strife, victimhood, alienation that has little basis in fact, and a second-generation of stone pelters who know no other trade. Kashmir no longer produces poets, philosophers, artists and civil servants. It just produces progressively regressive iterations of Farooq Abdullah and Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

I spoke to everyday Kashmiris, weary of strife and terrorism, who wanted nothing more than to secure a future for their children. They said that sometimes, the simple act of children going to school or a son coming back from college becomes an excuse for celebration.

I spoke to Jawans of Central Police Organizations (Indian Army is not operationally deployed in Srinagar), and could sense a deep pain. They are routinely humiliated by two-penny stone pelters and not permitted to retaliate. I asked a Jawan why criminal elements continued to pelt stones on them, and not the Army. His answer was straightforward. "The last time they pelted stones on Army and tried to interfere in an operation, the Army shot three of them dead. We don't have that luxury. Unshackle us for a few hours, just a few hours, and that will be the last day of stone pelting in Srinagar," he said, with suppressed anger.

And then there were those CRPF officers, huddled together in front of the TV on the cold evening of 6 April, eagerly waiting for some anchor to pay respects to their 75 brothers who were martyred in Dantewada. At 11:45 pm, the senior officer got up telling his juniors, "Lets go, guys. You know its not going to happen".

He looked at me sadly and said, "We were wrong to hope. Soldiers are expendable."

The visit to 92 Base Hospital at Badami Bagh Cantt was flooded with memories. It was here that I was brought to, evacuated actually, from HAWS (High Altitude Warfare School) in 1996 when my breathing almost stopped. The army doctors here are miracle workers, past masters of dragging back war wounded soldiers from the brink of certain death. They performed a miracle and saved Comdt. Chetan Kumar Cheetah. "He is a soldier. Yes, he is a soldier", said a senior army medico, repeating it so that I understood. He was giving the ultimate compliment that one Fauji can give another.

My worst fears were confirmed when I was told that Maj. Satish Dahiya breathed his last here. "Stone pelters delayed the evacuation. We could not save him", said an army medico, fury simmering just beneath the surface. "These stone pelters need to be sorted out, nice and proper", the good doctor said. In Indian Army parlance, "sorting out" is a wide-ranging term. It can mean any measure of pain inflicted, including death. I was not surprised. The doctors here are lifesavers. But they are also soldiers. As we stood quietly inside the ICU, I realized that all doctors were wearing combat uniform (jungle camouflage) with ranks.

One OPD ward was full of CRPF and Jammu & Kashmir police personnel. Normally, you do not see personnel from other forces in army hospitals (except Navy and Air Force), since all CPOs and police organizations have their own tie ups outside. On asking the reason, I was told that in the past, when locals found out that a CRPF jawan or a policeman was admitted in a civil hospital, they would assault him inside the hospital. There have been cases of locals assaulting jawans inside ICUs.

92 Base Hospital is an Indian Army hospital. There are serious looking men with Kalashnikovs outside. The injured are safe here.

Farooq Abdullah says that we are losing Kashmir. I don't know if we are losing Kashmir but we are certainly losing our patience. While our soldiers are shedding blood, the Kashmiri separatists and politicians are selling whatever bits and pieces of Kashmir they can find.

Kashmir does not need a healing touch. That bus has left long back. What it requires is immediate surgery. I am not a doctor but I understand that surgery requires the spilling of blood. So be it.

As a first step, the Hurriyat must be made irrelevant, immediately. No one elected them to power. India is a democracy and the only way to power is through the people. If the Hurriyat do not represent the people, whom do they represent? Let the Central Government cut of all their funding and security. Let them roam the streets of Srinagar like normal people. Let them buy their own medicines and their own flight tickets. We spend about INR 100 crores a year on the Hurriyat and other separatists. Lets stop this now. The Central Government must also immediately stop speaking to the Hurriyat. There must be massive outreach to the common man on the street. Some of the alienation is real, while a large part of it is synthetically manufactured. Nonetheless, it must be addressed. And it must be addressed without the Hurriyat.

Declare President's Rule in Jammu & Kashmir. The Governor will call the shots. We need someone who is ruthless, yet balanced, someone whom the people respect. He has to be a former General of the Indian Army and also someone with vast knowledge of Kashmir and its people; perhaps an ex-GOC of XV Corps. It is beyond my pay grade to recommend names. The distance between Company Commanders and Corps Commanders is as large as that between Earth and Jupiter. I will keep my peace. But those who are plugged into Kashmir know what I am speaking about.

Give back the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) its honor. They must have the right to defend themselves. This force needs urgent respite. It is forever in operations. Kashmir to Naxal Operations, North East to Election Duty, Counter Insurgency Operations to Disaster Relief there is a never-ending cycle of extreme pressure.

Hand over Srinagar to Indian Army immediately and put the entire Kashmir Valley under AFSPA. For 10 days, cut off the Valley completely – no Internet, no mobile or landline connectivity, no flights, no TV or radio, no road traffic (incoming or outgoing) and no postal service/ couriers. Then start "housekeeping". Don't touch the innocent. Don't spare the guilty. You have the names and addresses of all those who waved the Pakistani flag and pelted stones. Get the boys to pay them a visit.

Send arrested stone pelters to prison for a year, but never within the state. Nagaland has 11 prisons. Send one stone pelter to each prison. In that entire prison, he will be the only Kashmiri. The language, food, climate; everything that helps identify him, as a person will be absent. Select states that have absolutely no similarity with Kashmir in any manner, where even Hindi is not frequently spoken. States like Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Tripura, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Andaman & Nicobar must be chosen. A hundred prisons must be chosen and a hundred stone pelters must be imprisoned there, just one prisoner for one prison. They will have all the human rights they want – food, rest, recreation etc. No one will be mistreated or even touched. But a Kashmiri in a Nagaland prison may as well be on Mars.

The Kashmiri youth who humiliate soldiers do so because we permit it. They know that the CRPF will not retaliate, unless the provocation is extreme. There is also the matter of the Supreme Court ruling that make it mandatory for filing of FIRs for encounter deaths by armed forces, even in disturbed areas under AFSPA. The Central Government must somehow prevail upon the Supreme Court to overturn this ruling. You cannot fight enemies of the state constantly worrying about how you will have to stand in court, as the accused.

While the Special Operations Group of the Jammu & Kashmir police is doing a stellar job, the regular police have their own challenges. There are regular charges of harassment and fleecing of the populace. Police also stand compromised because they live in the same neighborhood as the stone thrower and the terrorist. They live in constant fear of their lives and that of their families.

India must have an "Enemy of the State Act", that ensures, among other provisions, that once a person is declared enemy of the state, the property in the person's name belongs to the government. Using this act, the properties of all leaders of Hurriyat Conference must be attached and then auctioned, the funds used for welfare of soldiers.

There have been talks of trifurcation of J&K into Jammu, Kashmir & Ladakh. This is something that must be pursued with vigor. About Article 370, there are disparate views, each more extreme than the other. Those in defence of the article know even less about it, than those who would abrogate it. The government must put its best legal brains to come up with a solution. Pakistan has already initiated the process of declaring Gilgit-Baltistan as its fifth state, all this due to Chinese pressure and CPEC.

The point I am making is elementary. If we want to be a super power, now is the time to start acting like one. Let's be practical. Soft states are not invited to sit at the high table of the United Nations Security Council. Human Rights are important, but they are not the reason that the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. Lets not make these rights the cornerstone of our national philosophy. The five permanent members of the UNSC are perhaps the worst human rights violators on earth. And they are the ones who get to point fingers at India's so-called "excesses" in Kashmir. Russia and China have murdered millions of their own citizens and sent many more to death camps. America has waged more wars than all the other nations on earth combined. England and France have the worst colonial records, marred by plunder and slavery.

To fight terrorists in Kashmir and elsewhere, we use platoon weapons. We use AK47's, Rocket Launchers (84 mm Carl Gustaf) and Light Machine Guns. We do this so that collateral damage can be restricted. This is our ethos.

When Pakistan carried out Operation Zarb-e-Azb to eliminate terror in North Waziristan and its tribal areas, this is what Pakistani forces used – F-16 fighter jets, Apache helicopter gunships, 203 mm & 155 mm artillery guns and cannon-mounted armored personnel carriers.

And Pakistan brazenly accuses us of using disproportionate force in Kashmir.

We must support Balochistan. Let our embassies have annual seminars on 27 March across the world. This day, Pakistan invaded and occupied a free country and made a proud people slaves. We must educate the world on how Pakistan is indulging in genocide, mostly prodded on by China. The Indian Government must also fund infrastructure for Baloch identity, internationally. Let there be a Balochistan House in twenty major world cities, manned and operated by Baloch people. The responsibility of these Baloch "embassies" will be to educate the country's government and local population about Pakistan's shenanigans.

Balochistan must have a Government in Exile in New Delhi, all paid for and protected by the Indian Government. We should divert our funding of Kashmiri separatists to the Baloch. Our largesse is for our friends, and not for traitors. Once this is done, Kashmir will no longer be the raison d'etre of Pakistan's existence. It will have just too much on its plate.

Kashmir will not find peace because we want it to. It will find peace when we start respecting ourselves.

Kashmiri separatist youth slapping and kicking a soldier is not just demeaning to the uniform. It speaks of a greater malaise, that of a nation unsure of itself. It is not important that we are right. What is important is that we act. Act with finality, precision and when required, with the heel of the soldier's boot.

Those Kashmiri youth were not insulting our soldier. They were insulting our country. They were committing treason. And we were unable to safeguard the honor of our soldier. This is the soldier we expect will die for us. We have failed him. Let this be the last time. Let us speak together as a nation, loud and proud. Let us roar with all our might.

The punishment for treason is death.

Major Gaurav Arya (Veteran)

#MajorGauravArya #IndianArmy #adgpi # #TheIronInOurSoul

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