Kashmir in revolt

[Kabira]

ON April 24, schoolgirls in uniform rushed out of a higher secondary school, picked up whatever they could lay their hands on, and started hurling the projectiles on police vans. This was in the busy Lal Chowk area the commercial hub of Srinagar. The people have shed fear of the gun and approach security forces and police defiantly. They chased the police vans, booed the policemen and shouted “azadi!”

Nothing like this had been seen before. As Toufiq Rashid, a journalist, who witnessed this, remarked: “Like their teenaged male counterparts these girls seemed not to fear death.” What she added about their desperation and courage is ominous. “Till this issue is addressed heart-wrenching images will keep coming out of Kashmir.”

Any incident, big or trivial, suffices to trigger open revolt. It is reminiscent of the upsurge in 1989-90. If the truth be told, it is because the people never reconciled themselves to India’s rule over them. On May 14, 1948, an eyewitness to the popular mood wrote from Srinagar: “They say only Sheikh Sahib (Abdullah) is confident of winning the plebiscite.” That eyewitness was Indira Gandhi, who advised her father prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru: “Personally, I feel that all this political talk will count for nothing if the economic situation can be dealt with. Because after all, the people are concerned with only [one] thing — they want to sell their goods and to have food and salt.” They had no soul.

What will New Delhi talk about on Kashmir?
Now, nearly 70 years later, this is still Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recipe — vikas (development). It is a convenient one for it suppresses the reality of a rebellious people’s rejection of sops.

This is coupled with conscious self-delusional themes such as Pakistan’s instigation to armed terrorists. These girls, like all others, acted in pent-up rage. They were not terrorists. They were freedom fighters in the classic mould.

India cannot countenance Kashmir’s separation. But it can yet go a long way to grant the substance of azadi to the people and in talks with Pakistan. The Modi government has set its face against conciliation with both. It is out to crush the popular revolt by armed force. The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) hitherto undreamt of entry into the Valley through a coalition with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has emboldened the centre. “Laaton key bhoot baton sey nahi maantey; inka ilaj jootay hai”. This was said in Srinagar last month by a senior BJP minister Chandra Prakash Gupta. He spelt out the implications of this saying in the present context. “They are traitors whether they have come from Pakistan or live here. There is only one remedy for them and that is bullets.” Expression of regret, under pressure, cannot obscure the fact that it truly represented the BJP’s outlook.

Confirmation was provided by an architect of the coalition, BJP general secretary Ram Madhav. Last month, a 26-year-old was tied in front of an army jeep to serve as a ‘human shield’ in order to keep the protesters away on polling day. Ram Madhav justified it: “In war and love, everything is fair” in a war on the people of Kashmir.

Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti was snubbed by Prime Minister Modi when she met him to plead for some conciliatory moves.

There is no common ground on which a government in Srinagar can parley for Kashmir’s rights with New Delhi. The PDP’s pact with the BJP only fuelled popular resentment which had simmered for decades beneath the surface.

In such a situation, pleas for a ‘dialogue’ or ‘talks’ are pointless. What will New Delhi talk about? Like Indira Gandhi in 1948, it feels that the people can be bought with sops. Unless the stark reality of utter popular rejection of Indian rule is accepted and measures devised to satisfy the people’s aspirations realistically, mere talks will not help.

The government of India flatly declared in the Supreme Court, on April 28, that it would “absolutely” not entertain any talks on azadi with the leaders of the Hurriyat. The talks must be within the framework of India’s constitution.

In the by-election to the Lok Sabha from Srinagar, the National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah won, on April 15, by a seven per cent turnout of voters. Militants are active though there are just about 250 of them. A massive military presence cannot snuff them out.

The situation in Kashmir is unlikely to improve as the Modi government is set to quash militancy with brute force in the hope that once militancy is crushed, the people will acquiesce. Pakistan will be told that the Kashmir dispute is “solved”. History shows that such tactics never succeed. They have not, from 1948-2017. As Tacitus wrote: “They created desolation and call it peace.”

The writer is an author and a lawyer based in Mumbai.

Published in Dawn, May 6th, 2017
https://www.dawn.com/news/1331303/kashmir-in-revolt

 

[ohmrlobalobayeh]

India has a professional rape army in the Modern age. <== lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_Kashmir_Insurgency

Background
In the aftermath of the rigged 1987 elections in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, where Islamic parties were prevented from winning several seats in the State Assembly,[9] a popular anti-Indian separatist movement gained momentum in the Kashmir Valley, a territory disputed between India and Pakistan since 1947. To counter the insurgency, India militarised the Valley, deploying a huge amount of troops in the region. Opponents of Indian military occupation in the valley maintain that 600,000 troops are stationed throughout the state, according to which the region possesses the highest ratio of troops to civilians in the world.[10] Since January 1990, Indian forces committed a number of human rights violations against civilians, including mass rape.[11]
Rape as a weapon of war
According to a report by Human Rights Watch in 1993, the security forces use rape as a method of retaliation against Kashmiri civilians during reprisal attacks after militant ambushes.[2][12][13] Most rape cases, according to the same report, have occurred during cordon-and-search operations.[12] Scholar Inger Skhjelsbaek states that the pattern of rape in Kashmir is that soldiers enter the homes of civilians, kill or evict the men and then rape the women present.[2] Scholar Shubh Mathur calls rape an essential element of the Indian military strategy in Kashmir.[14]

According to Seema Kazi, the motive of rape in Kashmir is no different to the rapes which were committed in Rwanda and the Balkans.[15] Kazi opines that rape in Kashmir is a cultural weapon of war and the rape of Kashmiri women by Indian security forces, in the context of a predominantly Hindu state repressing a Muslim minority population, functions as a tool of subordinating Kashmiri men and the Kashmiri community at large.[16] She also states that rape is used to demoralize the Kashmiri resistance and that there have been documented cases of soldiers confessing that they were ordered to rape women.[17][18]

Professor William Baker stated at the 52nd United Nations Commission on Human Rights that rape in Kashmir was not the result of a few undisciplined soldiers but an active strategy of the security forces to humiliate and intimidate the Kashmiri population.[19] He cited as evidence his interviews with several rape victims who were raped by soldiers in front of their families, including husbands and children.[20] An Amnesty International report in 1992 stated that rape in Kashmir was a systematic attempt to humiliate the local population during counter-insurgency operations.[21]

Notable cases of rape by Indian security forces
The following is a list of some of the notable rape cases, committed by Indian security forces, in the conflict.[30]

• Jamir Qadeem (1990): On June 26 1990, a twenty-four year old woman from Jamir Qadeem was raped during a search of her neighbourhood by the BSF. Police in Sopore registered a case against the BSF in July of that year.

• Anantnag (1990)

• Chhanpora (1990): On March 7, CRPF raided several houses in the Chhanpora locality of Srinagar. During the raids a number of women were raped. The 'Committee for Initiative in Kashmir' which visited the Valley between March 12 to 16, 1990 interviewed the victims. Rape victim Noora (24) was forcefully dragged out of her kitchen by 20 men from the CRPF and raped, along with her sister-in-law Zaina. The rape victims also witnessed two minor girls being molested.[31]
• Panzgam (1990)
• Trehgam (1990)
• Kunan Poshpora (1991): On February 23, 1991, a unit of the Indian army launched a search and interrogation operation in the twin villages of Kunan Poshpora, in the Valley's Kupwara district. Soldiers repeatedly gang-raped many women, with estimates of the number of victims ranging from 23 to 100.
• Pazipora-Ballipora (1991):[14] On 20 August 1991 soldiers carried out mass rape in this hamlet, which is only a few kilometres away from Kunan Poshpora. The number of rape victims in this case varied between eight to fifteen or more.
• Chak Saidpora (1992): On October 10, 1992, an army unit of the 22nd Grenadiers entered the village of Chak Saidapora. Several army soldiers gang-raped between six to nine women, including an 11 year old girl and a 60 year old woman.[32]
• Haran (1992): On July 20, 1992 women were raped during an army search operation. One victim, interviewed by Asia Watch and PHR, reported being gang-raped by two soldiers in turns. Another victim in the same incident was raped by a Sikh soldier while another stood guard.[33]
• Hyhama (1994): On June 17, 1994, seven women were raped by troops of Rashtriya Rifles, including two officers Major Ramesh and Raj Kumar in the village Hyhama.[34]
• Gurihakhar: On October 1, 1992, after killing ten people in the hamlet of Bakhikar, BSF forces entered the nearby village of Gurihakhar and raped women. One woman, interviewed by Asia Watch, tried to hide her daughter's identity as a rape victim by describing herself as the rape victim, to protect her daughter from public humiliation.[35]
• Kangan (1994): A woman and her 12 year old daughter were raped by Indian security forces at Theno Budapathary.[36]
• Wavoosa (1997): On 22 April 1996, several Indian armed forces personnel entered the house of a 32 year old woman in the village of Wavoosa. They molested her 12 year old daughter and raped three other daughters, aged 14, 16 and 18. Another woman was beaten for preventing the rape of her daughters by soldiers.[37]
• Doda (1998): A fifty year old resident of the villlage Ludna in Doda district told Human Rights Watch that on October 5, 1998 the Eighth Rashtriya Rifles came to her house, took her and beat her. She was then raped by a captain who was a Hindu and said to her: "You are Muslims, and you will all be treated like this."[38]
• Bihota (2000): On 29 October 2000, there was a cordon and search operation in Bihota by the 15 Bihar Regiment. during which one woman was picked up and taken away to a camp. The following day twenty women went a long with a few men to get the woman released. However, the women were detained for four to five hours and sexually assaulted.[30]
• Pahalgam (2002)
• Zachaldara (2004)
• Shopian (2009): Two women, Asiya and Nelofar Jan, were allegedly abducted, raped and murdered by Indian troops between 29 and 30 May at Bongam in Kashmir's Shopian district.
• Gujjardara-Manzgam (2011)