What the terror balance sheet says

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

India has just missed consciously an opportunity to initiate steps to put its troubled relations with Pakistan on an even keel.

When Pakistan’s Foreign Affairs Adviser Sartaj Aziz landed in Amritsar a day ahead of Sunday’s Heart of Asia conference on Afghanistan there was speculation that there might be informal talks to improve the relationship between the two countries which touched a new low after militants from across the line of control attacked an army base at Uri in Jammu and Kashmir and India retaliated with surgical strikes on terror launch pads on the other side. However, the Indian government said no talks were possible while acts of terrorism continued.

Terrorism figured prominently in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s address to the delegates to the Amritsar conference, who included representatives of a score of countries including the United States, China and Russia. He said it was necessary to end terrorism to foster stability, security and development in Afghanistan and in the region as a whole.

The year witnessed an escalation of militant activity in Kashmir and a corresponding deterioration in the relations between the two neighbours. In the very first week there was a daring attack on an air force base at Pathankot.

In his Independence Day address, Modi raised the issue of Pakistani human rights violations in Baluchistan as a counter to Islamabad’s harping on Indian rights violations in Kashmir.

The killing of Burhan Wani, a young home-grown militant leader, by the security forces led to youth unrest which paralysed life in Kashmir valley for nearly four months.

Eighteen soldiers were killed in the Uri attack which took place during a rotation of units. The surgical strikes, which occurred a few days later, marked a departure from the policy of strategic restraint which the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance governments had followed. It boosted Modi’s sagging macho image but failed to make any appreciable difference to infiltration across the LoC and terror attacks. The year appears set to end as one of the bloodiest in recent years.

The worst year of the decade was 2007. As many as 311 militants crossed into India that year and 121 uniformed personnel were killed and 336 injured in terrorist attacks. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), which collates information relating to terrorism, 164 civilians and 492 militants were also killed that year.

The following years saw a decline in militancy in Kashmir and infiltration across the LoC. Casualty figures of security personnel fell continuously and stood at only 17 in 2012 before starting to climb again.

This year, there has been only a marginal increase in the number of violent incidents but casualties among men in uniform have risen dramatically. On September 30, the toll stood at 63 security personnel killed and 181 injured. The latest available tally is 77 dead, as on November 27.

Parliament was told recently that 105 terrorists from across the LoC entered Kashmir until September 30 this year, as against only 33 last year. This, again, is the highest figure since 2007.

The security forces can perhaps draw some comfort from the fact that this year they have been able to impose heavier penalties on the terrorists than in the recent past. Their toll stood at 119 at the end of September.

Casualty figures at the SATP website show that since 1988 terrorism has taken a toll of 49,315 lives across India, 44,119 of them in Jammu and Kashmir. The number of terrorists killed was 24,101, including 23,121 in J&K. A total of 9,854 security personnel were killed. 7,688 of them in Kashmir. Civilians bore the brunt of the attacks: 17,526 killed, including 14,735 in Kashmir. 

The hope raised by the surgical strike was shattered when three terrorists, wearing police uniform, broke into the Nagrota base in Kashmir last week and launched an attack in which seven military personnel, including two Army majors, were killed. They are believed to have entered India through a tunnel and reached the base travelling 85 kilometres evading army checkpoints.

Retiring Northern Army Commander Lt-Gen DS Hooda said later the Kashmir conflict was a long war requiring a long-term approach. It is just another way of saying it is a problem that requires a political solution. The terror balance-sheet also says the same thing. --Gulf Today, Sharjah, December 6, 2016.

Kashmir’s shadow over SAARC

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

With India-Pakistan relations deteriorating in the wake of violence in Kashmir, now in its eighth week, the fate of the 19th summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, scheduled for November 9 and 10, hangs in the balance.

SAARC, which comprises India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, together account for 21 per cent of the world’s population but only nine per cent of the global economy.

SAARC members differ vastly in size and economic strength. India with an estimated population of 1,330 million and gross domestic product of $2,073.5 billion is much larger than the other seven countries put together. Pakistan, the second largest country, has an estimated population of 194 million and GDP of $270.0 billion. The Maldives with only 371,000 people is at the bottom of the population table. Bhutan with a GDP of $2 billion has the smallest economy, but it attaches more importance to gross domestic happiness than to gross domestic product.

India-Pakistan differences have held SAARC back from time to time in some areas. A common market is one of SAARC’s objectives but Pakistani fear of Indian economic domination has stalled progress in that direction. In 1995, a ministerial meeting decided on the creation of a South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA) as a first step towards the goal of a common market. It was only in 2006 that an agreement in this regard went into effect. A decade later, intra-SAARC trade is still only a little more than the region’s GDP.

A South Asian motor vehicles agreement was negotiated by SAARC officials ahead of the last summit at Kathmandu in 2014 but Pakistan was not ready to sign it. Believing that it backed out as it now attaches economic integration with China more importance than South Asian economic cooperation, India decided to go ahead without it.

The relations between the two countries took a dive early this month when Laskar-e-Taiba chief called for demonstrations when Rajnath Singh visited Islamabad for a meeting of SARC Home Ministers. Rajnath Singh was flown from the airport to the meeting venue in a helicopter and he flew back immediately after the meeting without joining a lunch from which, curiously, even the host, Pakistan’s Home Minister stayed away.

Arun Jaitley stayed away from the SAARC Finance Ministers’ meeting in Islamabad last week, depriving it of much of its importance. Nevertheless, SAARC Secretary General Arjum Bahadur Thapa of Nepal called upon the group to move from SAFTA to South Asian Economic Union.

With India and Pakistan at loggerheads, speculation is rife over whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend the November summit. Reports in a section of the Pakistani media have indicated that he might stay away although so far no one of consequence in India has suggested such a step is contemplated.

Modi made a personal investment in improving relations with India’s immediate neighbours when he invited the leaders of SAARC countries to his swearing-in as Prime Minister in 2014 and all, including Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, promptly turned up. Several setbacks followed but he demonstrated his readiness to walk the talk with an unscheduled stop at Lahore on his way home from Afghanistan to greet Sharif on his birthday.

The current wave of unrest in Kashmir began when protests erupted over the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani by the security forces. At least 67 persons were killed, over 6,000 injured and more than 100 blinded by pellets as youths defied the curfew. Pakistan launched a campaign against the human rights violations and India responded by raising the issue of rights violations in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Baluchistan for the first time.

Even as Modi and Chief Minister Mehmooba Mufti, whose Bharatiya Janata Party and People’s Democratic Party which are partners of the coalition that rules the state, began efforts to restore peace in the troubled valley, Nawaz Sharif deputed 22 diplomats to internationalise the issue. Under the Shimla Pact signed after the 1971 war which resulted in Bangladesh’s formation, the two countries are committed to resolve issues, including Kashmir, bilaterally without outside intervention.

Some course correction may take place sooner or later since Sharif, as the host, and Modi, as the leader of the largest member country and one who began his prime ministerhip with a commitment to friendship in the neighbourhood, have much at stake in the success of the SAARC summit. -- Gulf Today, Sharjah, August 30, 2016.

New flare-up in Kashmir

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

Ten days of violence touched off by the killing of Burhan Wani, a 22-year-old Hizbul Mujahideen commander, by security personnel have thrown Kashmir valley into another phase of turmoil.

At least 40 persons were killed and about 3,000 injured during the protests. Police pellets hit more than 100 persons in the eye, resulting in blindness.

As I write, many areas are still under curfew and internet services remain suspended. Newspaper offices have been raided in an action reminiscent of the days of Indira Gandhi’s Emergency rule.

Security forces eliminated Wani in a planned operation. His home-town was cordoned off ahead of the funeral but about 40,000 people gathered to pay him homage and his comrades gave him a 21-gun salute.

Wani’s seven-year career in terrorism was not too bloody. He is said to have picked up the gun after humiliation by the police who stopped and abused him and his brother while on a joyride on a friend’s new motor bike. The brother, who was working for his Ph.D. degree, was killed last year.

Wani was wanted in four cases of shooting, none of which was fatal. Although Hizbul named him its commander, he was a home-grown militant. He did not go to Pakistan for training and he did not show signs of religious indoctrination.

The sense of outrage the valley witnessed on his death was of a kind not seen for a long time. The police response was so grossly disproportionate to the situation that the victims drew sympathy even from Kashmiri Pandits who had fled the state after terrorists targeted its members in an earlier phase of militancy.

In a statement, the Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti condemned the killings and the use of pellets as a means of crowd control. It said the attacks on property left behind by Pandits were not what the Muslim majority wanted but were the work of miscreants seeking to take advantage of the situation.

Pradeep Magazine, a journalist belonging to the community, wrote: “Today, when I see that horrifying image of the young girl blinded by the violent response from the security forces, I want to respond with love, warmth and compassion to all those who have suffered in this long-drawn conflict that does no credit to either side.”

The state of Jammu and Kashmir has been subjected to contrary pulls and pressures from the dawn of Independence. Its Hindu maharaja toyed with the idea of an independent state while Sheikh Abdullah’s National Conference, which led the movement against his rule, favoured accession to India. Pakistan claimed it in the name of its Muslim majority. A raid by tribesmen equipped by Pakistan, forced the maharaja to accede to India and the people rallied behind Sheikh Abdullah who took charge of the administration.

India raised the issue of Pakistani aggression in the United Nations but the West frustrated its hope of justice by equating the aggressor and the victim. Sheikh Abdullah went to the UN to defend accession to India. Pakistan produced PN Bazaz, leader of the Pandits organisation, to endorse its view that a Muslim majority state should go to it.

Sheikh Abdullah’s arrest and removal in 1953 following reports that he was seeking independence for the state with US support pitted his followers against India. They kept the plebiscite demand alive until Indira Gandhi reinstated him as Chief Minister in 1975.

A 1965 Pakistani bid to engineer an uprising using infiltrators failed due to lack of local support. Under the Shimla Pact, signed after the 1971 war which had resulted in Bangladesh’s emergence as an independent nation, India and Pakistan undertook to resolve all outstanding issues, including Kashmir, through bilateral talks.

The 1990s witnessed a rash of terrorism directed from across the border and calls for “azaadi” resounded in the valley. Prime Minister AB Vajpayee began a healing process which continued for a while under Manmohan Singh before things went out of control again.

India has deployed a large number of troops in the state and the army has invited charges of excesses. However, in this month’s events the central and state police forces appear to have played a major role.

Wani belonged to the fourth generation of post-Independence youth. According to veteran journalist Prem Shankar Jha, who is the author of two books on Kashmir’s recent history, his killing was a self-defeating exercise. He believes Wani could have been weaned away from the path of violence and used to communicate with the angry youth.

Communal elements on both sides of the India-Pakistan border tend to view J and K as a piece of real estate. Enlightened administrations must recognise that the problem is one involving hapless victims of history. In the final analysis a lasting solution can arise only through a political process, not through clash of arms. -- Gulf Today, Sharjah, July 19, 2016.