The summers of no end

Even as the Hurriyat stands clueless after yet another summer of bloody sacrifice, Srinagar and New Delhi, both, have kept all the settings in place for yet another Amarnath, another Shopian, another bloody summer of 2010

The Core by Nawaz Gul Qanungo 

Kashmir Times | January 4, 2011

Late last November, the state government decided to remove a battalion of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) from the Srinagar city. It meant removal of 1,000 troops from the city. Ten bunkers were also to be removed in addition to the 16 that had already been removed since October 5, after a summer of mayhem with over 110 unarmed protesters and bystanders dead at the hands of the police and security forces during strong anti-India agitations. Later in the day, Omar Abdullah told a Delhi-based television news channel that the process of demilitarisation in the valley was actually scuttled due to the violence in the valley during the whole summer. “The Hurriyat needs to realise that the politics of violence is not going to take us anywhere,” he said. “We can bring normalcy only if peace prevails.” A brutal clampdown on public protests had ensured a month of relative calm in the valley. And this was what Abdullah claimed had given him the leeway to finally go ahead with the step.

Abdullah was turning logic over its head. The sheer magnitude of militarisation that breathes down the throat of a common Kashmiri makes the removal of a battalion or two looks almost like a joke. To call it “demilitarisation” is not just out of place but a plain lie. Kashmir is more militarised that Iraq and Afghanistan put together, according to unofficial estimates. There are no definite official figures.

It is, however, the “violent” protests that have rocked the valley over the major part of the last three years that are a more compelling reason for the state government to push for anything it may find sellable to the public, including any degree of “demilitarisation” it can achieve. Even if it seriously wants to go for such measures, it finds it almost impossible to push successfully for it. Something like the recent spat between Abdullah and the army doesn’t help either. On the contrary, it has not just brought out in the open the sharp differences between the state government and the security establishment but even exposed the state of functionality between the two.

In the aftermath of an encounter in Srinagar which led to the killing of three men – who were claimed to be militants by the police and innocent civilians by their families – the army claimed that the encounter had taken place because of the removal of troops from the city. The army in a release said the Abdullah government was “compelled to give in” (to the removal of bunkers) and that it could have “pleased a few hardline separatists and their ISI handlers” but had compromised the security situation. A frustrated chief minister had to speak to the prime minister before the army came out the next day with an apology.

However, what’s come out worse from the Abdullah government – and this remains at the core of its failure in dealing with, and on behalf of, the valley – is the lack of political will to engage New Delhi and keep it pushing towards a pro-people peace policy, especially when the valley seemed to be limping towards some sort of calm.

It first wasted a chance, after the installation of the Abdullah government in the January of 2009 when the valley had just come out of the strife of the Amarnath land row. That the agitations were contained through incredibly brutal, and fatal, measures with an election thrown in under ludicrous security restrictions should have been reason enough for any sane mind to know where such “democracy” would lead to.

The test in the Shopian double rape and murder case of 2009 was another similar story of incompetence. Kashmir was a place where the ruler could be “misled” by his associates in such critical cases. Here was the state of the governance out in the open, just in case someone took the chief minister a tad seriously. Then came the CBI, exhumation et al. But the less said about it, the better. Today, the victims of Shopian stare at the prospect of conviction. Shopian has not just come to be perceived as yet more proof that there was no justice for a common Kashmiri, it has exemplified the farce that the state is capable of in Kashmir. However, the period of calm that followed Shopian was yet again wasted with no initiative taken by the state government to address the root cause of strife in Kashmir.

The government never seemed to recognise the necessity of demilitarisation and action on the revocation of draconian laws like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, Disturbed Areas Act or the Public Safety Act. Over the last summer, in fact, the Public Safety Act has been used by the state with impunity booking even a minor once under it. The killings have continued as easily for the state as they have always been. The small, negligible measures of “demilitarisation” remain just a miserable face-saver for the government when in reality the process should have been robustly pursued by it on war footing since day one. And there are no signs of this changing in any manner. Even as the Hurriyat stands clueless after yet another summer of bloody sacrifice, Srinagar (or call it Jammu for the winter) and New Delhi, both, have kept all the settings in place for yet another Amarnath, another Shopian, another bloody summer of 2010.