New Kashmiri Weapon Against India

[Captain03]

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan
WASHINGTON: While the militancy in Indian-held Kashmir has waned, what “India now faces is a different, and potentially more challenging foe here: peaceful campaigners for self-determination, who borrow from Mahatma Gandhi’s rule book of non-violent resistance,” says a report filed for the Wall Street Journal from Srinagar.

Correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov quotes Mirwaiz Umar Farooq as saying, “India is not scared of the guns here in Kashmir – it has a thousand times more guns. What it is scared of is people coming out in the streets, people seeing the power of non-violent struggle.” The number of armed attacks in the valley, meanwhile, has dropped to its lowest since the insurgency began in 1989, according to Indian officials, who state that as few as 600 armed insurgents remain in Jammu and Kashmir. The changing nature of the struggle makes it increasingly difficult for India to portray the conflict over Kashmir as a clear-cut fight between the world’s largest democracy and murderous terrorists, Trofimov points out.

Protesters: The report notes that many among the new generation of Kashmiri protesters say they are happy that the insurgents no longer prowl the streets, demanding shelter and food from civilians, enforcing rigid Islamic observance and attracting army reprisals. Indian officials acknowledge the change in popular attitudes. “People want peace. Nobody wants to be disturbed in the evening - not by the militants, and not by the forces,” says Kashmir’s chief of police, B Srinivas. Still, responding to recent demonstrations, Indian troops have often resorted to lethal force, killing more than 50 Kashmiri civilians. Scores of protesters and politicians have been jailed or placed under house arrest. Trofimov confirms that some half a million Indian soldiers and policemen remain deployed in the state, which has a population of 10 million. Srinagar is dotted by checkpoints, its indoor stadium, cinemas and hotels surrounded by sandbags and converted into military camps. Broadcast media are censored. New restrictions have been added in recent months, such as an order to disable mobile-phone text messaging.

The Wall Street Journal reporter points out that as Kashmir descended into chaos after the Amarnath protests and killings of protesters, India responded with increasingly severe curfews and lockdowns that continue. Omar Abdullah, president of the National Conference party, told the newspaper, “Lives are cheap in Kashmir.” The report notes that despite boycott call by opposition parties, the elections that began last month and will end on December 24 have seen a high turnout. Indian officials view such high participation as a rebuke to Pakistan and Pakistani-backed separatists, but many voters who lined up at the polls Saturday in south Kashmir also turned out at anti-Indian protest marches weeks earlier. Student Manzur Ahmad told the US newspaper, “We vote because this makes our lives easier - but this doesn’t mean we don’t want freedom.” The report concludes that continuing bloodshed may end up reversing Kashmir’s recent shift towards unarmed campaigning.

Great News!!!!
As for the indians who stated that most kashmiris want to be with india because of the turnout of high elections read the last bold sentences
Inshallah Kashmir Will Be Azad

 

[vish]

Oh please... let me put it to you in very simple words...

The status quo will continue. The reason being simple: post-Mumbai, ceding Kashmir is (and will be for a long time) seen as cowering down to terrorism. My countrymen won't allow that.

If Kashmiris are so pro-Independence, why is it that they voted in elections? And voted for people who promised development (electricity, water, schools, etc.)?

I guess I did not read the write-up properly... hence the previous para.

Still, I stand by my assertion that the one thing Kashmiris want is development, and that this over-rules everything else. I only wish 370 would go.

 

[Captain03]

Oh please... let me put it to you in very simple words...

The status quo will continue. The reason being simple: post-Mumbai, ceding Kashmir is (and will be for a long time) seen as cowering down to terrorism. My countrymen won't allow that.

If Kashmiris are so pro-Independence, why is it that they voted in elections? And voted for people who promised development (electricity, water, schools, etc.)?

I guess I did not read the write-up properly... hence the previous para.

Still, I stand by my assertion that the one thing Kashmiris want is development, and that this over-rules everything else. I only wish 370 would go.

the article answers all ur questions
and kashmiris dont want development they want freedom

 

[vish]

the article answers all ur questions
and kashmiris dont want development they want freedom

I doubt if they can get both; the state depoends on the center for most of its finances. Subsidies abound in the Valley.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

“India now faces is a different, and potentially more challenging foe here: peaceful campaigners for self-determination, who borrow from Mahatma Gandhi’s rule book of non-violent resistance,”

I've been making this argument ever since the protests first broke out. Pakistan has won the ideological battle, but it has done so inadvertently through the relative peace that existed for eight or so years under Musharraf.

The Kashmiris have also rejected violence as a solution to the conflict - a rebuff to Pakistan's preferred method for addressing the issue, by voting in large numbers to ease their lives. People who vote do not typically want explosions or gun fights going off in their streets.

Pakistan now risks losing the ideological battle if it continues with support for militancy, though it has shown no signs of restarting it after Musharraf, and will likely not after Mumbai. The policy should be shelved for good, and the Kashmiris wishes should be respected.

 

[donrahul]

Pakistan and India cannot let go of the Kashmir struggle. The simple reason being that this will set a precedence and the other warring regions like Balochistan, Khalistan punjab, the NE sister states would rise up in rebellion, where there are segments of people demanding freedom.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Pakistan and India cannot let go of the Kashmir struggle. The simple reason being that this will set a precedence and the other warring regions like Balochistan, Khalistan punjab, the NE sister states would rise up in rebellion, where there are segments of people demanding freedom.

That is an invalid argument that continues to be raised to prevent resolution of the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the wishes of the Kashmiris.

None of the other territories you mention are accepted as disputed between two sovereign nations, as Kashmir is. None of them have specific UNSC resolutions indicating that the dispute should be resolved by allowing the Kashmiris to decide between India and Pakistan.

Solving the dispute along those parameters, as an agreement between two nations, does not raise the specter of fragmentation that you conjured.

Do you consider India to be that weak, that it is barely held together and would fragment so easily?

I do not by any means consider Pakistan to be that weak, even in Baluchistan.

 

[A1Kaid]

Good news I guess, nice to see people finding alternatives to violence to achieve their goals, however all options must be kept on the table.

 

[donrahul]

That is an invalid argument that continues to be raised to prevent resolution of the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the wishes of the Kashmiris.

None of the other territories you mention are accepted as disputed between two sovereign nations, as Kashmir is. None of them have specific UNSC resolutions indicating that the dispute should be resolved by allowing the Kashmiris to decide between India and Pakistan.

Solving the dispute along those parameters, as an agreement between two nations, does not raise the specter of fragmentation that you conjured.

Do you consider India to be that weak, that it is barely held together and would fragment so easily?

I do not by any means consider Pakistan to be that weak, even in Baluchistan.

Agreed. The country is not that weak as I might have told. But Do u think any Politician or Dictator or whoever that is in charge of running the country, be it India or Pakistan would let go off the Kashmir issue? Here I am isolating myself from my Indian Identity and looking at things realistically. Do you think any politician from your country would let go the Kashmir Issue.. under the assumption that there is a plebiscite and I O K and P O K overwhelmingly votes to join India would the leader of GOP graciously let go off d state?
and in a reverse scenario, I can assure you that India is not gonna let it go off either. Precedence of Fragmentation or not, Kashmir issue is not getting solved anytime now..

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Original WSJ article

A New Tack in Kashmir
Peaceful Protest Gains in Separatist Fight​

By YAROSLAV TROFIMOV

SRINAGAR, India -- Lashkar-e-Taiba, the presumed perpetrator of last month's Mumbai attacks, sprang up from the bloody insurgency against Indian rule in predominantly Muslim Kashmir. While the plight of Kashmir has galvanized Islamic radicalism across South Asia, the decades-long armed struggle is waning in the disputed region itself.


India now largely faces a different, and potentially more challenging foe here: peaceful campaigners for self-determination, who borrow from Mahatma Gandhi's rule book of non-violent resistance.

"India is not scared of the guns here in Kashmir -- it has a thousand times more guns. What it is scared of is people coming out in the streets, people seeing the power of nonviolent struggle," says the Muslim Kashmiris' spiritual leader, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key organizer of the civil disobedience campaign that began earlier this year. The number of armed attacks in the valley, meanwhile, has dropped to its lowest since the insurgency began in 1989, Indian officials say.

The former princely state known as Jammu and Kashmir was divided between India and Pakistan since 1947, and has been claimed in its entirety by both ever since. It has long been the main axis of discord between the two neighbors, now both nuclear-armed.

Since the early 1990s, Pakistan's intelligence services trained and financed Kashmiri militant groups such as Lashkar, helping fuel a conflict that has cost 60,000 lives. Mr. Farooq's father was gunned down by suspected jihadi militants in 1990 for seeming too accommodating to India.

Mr. Farooq, who heads the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference, an umbrella group of Kashmiri parties that want independence or merger with Pakistan, has been kept under house arrest. Kashmir's Grand Mosque in Srinagar, where Mr. Farooq usually delivers the weekly sermon, has stood empty for several Fridays, its gates ringed by barbed wire and its perimeter patrolled by troops.

The rest of Srinagar, Kashmir's tense capital city, has been under curfew for days. Fearful of mass demonstrations against Indian rule and controversial elections, troops blocked the roads. Every few hours, small clashes broke out with stone-hurling teenagers.

Fading Attacks

Earlier this year, unarmed protests organized by Mr. Farooq and other separatist campaigners rocked Kashmir, causing the downfall of the state government as demonstrators thronged the roads waving green banners of Islam and chanting "Azadi" -- "Freedom."

Militant attacks, once a daily occurrence that drove out 300,000 Kashmiri Hindus, have become much less frequent. Indian officials say as few as 600 armed insurgents remain in Jammu and Kashmir.

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key organizer of a Kashmiri civil-disobedience campaign that began earlier this year, is now kept under house arrest by Indian troops. Here he leads a 2007 protest in front of his ancestral home.

The changing nature of the separatist struggle makes it increasingly difficult for India to portray the conflict over Kashmir as a clear-cut fight between the world's largest democracy and murderous terrorists. Unlike Lashkar's jihadis, unarmed protesters in Kashmir can muster sympathy from sections of Western, and Indian, public opinion.

"It's justified when you kill a militant, but it's not justified when you kill a demonstrator," says Kashmir's leading pro-Indian politician Mufti Muhammad Sayeed, India's home minister at the peak of the Kashmiri insurgency and Kashmir's chief minister in 2002-2005.

Many among the new generation of Kashmiri protesters say they are happy that the insurgents no longer prowl the streets, demanding shelter and food from civilians, enforcing rigid Islamic observance -- and attracting army reprisals. "It's good that the militants are gone. What we need is to fight for our freedom in a peaceful environment," says 22-year-old farmer Tanha Gul from the town of Pulwama south of Srinagar, who says he has participated in every demonstration in his area.

Indian officials acknowledge the change in popular attitudes. "People want peace. Nobody wants to be disturbed in the evening - not by the militants, and not by the forces," says Kashmir's chief of police, B. Srinivas.

Still, responding to recent demonstrations, Indian troops often resorted to lethal force, killing more than 50 Kashmiri civilians. Scores of protesters and separatist politicians have been thrown behind bars or placed under house arrest. Indian officials say these detentions are necessary to preserve public peace, and that the troops have to use force to maintain law and order.

Some half a million Indian soldiers and policemen remain deployed in the Indian-administered part of Jammu and Kashmir, home to 10 million people. (About 5 million people live in Pakistani-held Kashmir.) Indian laws grant troops in Kashmir almost total immunity from prosecution, including in cases of civilian deaths. Srinagar, once India's prime tourist destination, is dotted by checkpoints, its indoor stadium, cinemas and hotels surrounded by sandbags and converted into military camps. Broadcast media are censored.

New restrictions have been added in recent months, such as an order to disable mobile-phone text messaging -- a key method of mobilizing protesters -- on cellphone networks that operate in Kashmir.

The event that sparked these protests, bringing Kashmiri civilians into the streets, was a decision last May by the state government to transfer land near the Amarnath to a Hindu religious organization. This land near the shrine -- a cave in which an ice stalagmite forms every winter -- has been used for years to shelter pilgrims. But large tracts of the region already are requisitioned for army and police use, and the formal transfer stoked fears of a widespread land grab.

Snowballing Protests

In June, snowballing Kashmiri protests over the issue prompted Mr. Mufti Muhammad's People's Democratic Party to withdraw from the state government. The following month the collapsing state government revoked the land transfer decision. As federal rule was imposed, fresh riots broke out in Jammu, the predominantly Hindu part of the state.

While the plight of Kashmir has galvanized Islamic radicalism across South Asia, the armed struggle is waning in the disputed region.

At the peak of Kashmir's peach and pear season, Hindu protesters in Jammu blocked the only highway linking the valley with the rest of India. With the fruit harvest -- the valley's key export -- ******* away, Kashmir's fruit growers' union called for opening an alternative trade route -- through Pakistani-held Kashmir. Defying curfew orders, on Aug. 10 thousands of fruit growers and separatist activists marched towards the cease-fire line. The protest column was met with gunfire from Indian forces. Fifteen marchers were shot dead, including a prominent separatist.

As Kashmir descended into chaos after these killings, India responded with increasingly severe curfews and lockdowns that continue. Often they come without prior warning or formal announcement, as in Srinagar over the past weekend.

"Common people like me are made to suffer continually," says Ghulam Rasool Sailani, a milk merchant who has been sitting at home in Srinagar, unable to trade, over the past three days. "It's hard. Our losses are huge because our incomes are so low."

One of Mr. Sailani's regular clients was Mohammad Yacoub Jaan, a 35-year-old father of three. On Aug. 24, as he carried home a metallic milk container, Mr. Jaan encountered three policemen a few yards from his doorstep. As they beat Mr. Jaan with bamboo sticks for violating the curfew, the milk spilled from the container and soiled the officers' uniforms, according to Mr. Jaan and neighbors who say they witnessed the incident. They say an enraged officer opened fire with his assault rifle, shooting Mr. Jaan through the throat and the side.

Hearing the shooting, Mr. Jaan's relatives rushed outdoors. As Mr. Jaan's 65-year-old father Ghulam Qadir tried to plead with policemen to stop beating his son, they shot at him too, the witnesses said. He was instantly killed. "After that, everyone just scattered away, their caps falling into the drains," recalls Mr. Jaan's wife, Asmat. Mr. Jaan, who remains paralyzed, says no representative of the authorities has contacted him since the shootings.

Mr. Srinivas, the Kashmir chief of police, says that curfews and other restrictions are needed to prevent greater violence. "I don't want the peace-loving people of Srinagar to be disturbed by rogue elements," he says in an interview. As for allegations of abuse, he adds, investigations are under way.

Anger Over Disparity

Some pro-Indian Kashmiri politicians have been angered by the disparity they say security forces have shown when dealing with Hindu protests in Jammu and the Muslim demonstrations in Kashmir. "Lives are cheap in Kashmir," says Omar Abdullah, president of the National Conference party and India's former federal minister of state for external affairs. "I'm still struggling to understand how the same chain of command had two completely different approaches to crowd control."

Kashmir's information secretary, K.B. Jandial, says there was no disparity, and that every individual incident has to be considered separately.

Mr. Abdullah's party, the biggest in the previous legislature, is currently battling for the right to form the next state government in elections that began last month and end on Dec. 24. Even though separatist parties have called for a boycott, the turnout so far is among the highest on record. Indian officials view such high participation as a rebuke to Pakistan and Pakistani-backed separatists.

But many voters who lined up at the polls Saturday in south Kashmir, for example, also turned out at anti-Indian protest marches weeks earlier. In the town of Tral, 20-year-old student Manzur Ahmad said that he was voting for an incumbent candidate because, in recent years, the lawmaker had managed to curb the harassment of local youths by government forces. "We vote because this makes our lives easier - but this doesn't mean we don't want freedom," he said.

In the village of Samboora, residents said that Indian Army troops went from house to house on Saturday morning, rounding up families and taking them to a polling station. As a reporter drove into the village Saturday afternoon, an army vehicle with several soldiers stopped by the walled compound of Ghulam Mohammad, pulling the 59-year-old retiree onto the road. Seeing a foreign reporter, the soldiers jumped into their vehicle and quickly drove off. "They asked me why I'm not voting, and I said that's because I don't like any of the candidates," Mr. Mohammad said moments later. "They said, if I don't vote, I'll be sorry later."

In another south Kashmiri village, Koeil, a similar police effort to round up voters degenerated into clashes with stone-throwing youths. As a reporter arrived on the scene, dozens of police officers charged along the main street, firing tear-gas volleys. Many policemen also picked up rocks and hurled them into villagers' homes, breaking windows.

"My boys are irritated. They just want to let them know we're here, to scare them," the district senior superintendent of police who oversaw the operation, Ali Mohammad Bhatt, said when asked about the window-breaking. "Ultimately, if you restrain your force and don't kill anybody, your job is done," Mr. Bhatt added.

Half an hour later, Indian forces in the village opened fire at the protesters, killing a 20-year-old student and seriously injuring three others, including a 14-year-old boy whose arm and intestines were pierced by high-velocity Kalashnikov bullets. "Once you take the law into your hands, the forces or police have to take action," the Jammu and Kashmir information secretary, Mr. Jandial, said when asked about the shootings.

As for allegations of voter coercion, he said he wasn't aware of any: "If ever there is a coercion, it's on the part of people pressing for a boycott."

Continuing bloodshed may end up reversing Kashmir's recent shift towards unarmed campaigning. Sitting on the porch of a shuttered store near Srinagar's Grand Mosque, two former insurgents bristled with anger this weekend. Then, one of them, Iqbal Sheikh, spat on the ground and said: "When the small kids who throw stones are met with bullets, many people want to take up guns again."

Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at yaroslav.trofimov@wsj.com

A New Tack in Kashmir - WSJ.com

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Agreed. The country is not that weak as I might have told. But Do u think any Politician or Dictator or whoever that is in charge of running the country, be it India or Pakistan would let go off the Kashmir issue? Here I am isolating myself from my Indian Identity and looking at things realistically. Do you think any politician from your country would let go the Kashmir Issue.. under the assumption that there is a plebiscite and I O K and P O K overwhelmingly votes to join India would the leader of GOP graciously let go off d state?
and in a reverse scenario, I can assure you that India is not gonna let it go off either. Precedence of Fragmentation or not, Kashmir issue is not getting solved anytime now..

I agree with you that ensuring physical control of territory to the nation that wins the vote of the Kashmiris will be a challenge, but any such challenge cannot be addressed unless the two sides at least agree to discuss resolving the dispute.

Right now India refuses to even call Kashmir a dispute.

My opinion for a long time has been a referendum in AK and Kashmir Valley - the two comprise a much smaller part of the territory of the original J&K princely State. The NA's with Pakistan, and Jammu and Laddakh with India would not be contested.

The loss of territory for either side would not be large in case of the Kashmiris giving an unfavorable verdict.

 

[donrahul]

A more possible solution is let the current LOC be the International border! Or to let the border stabilize for a period of another 2 - 3 decades (without militancy) to let the people see the development happening in both the countries and then decide on which country to ascend to. sounds like a hare brained scheme, but this gives the people an opportunity to observe India and Pakistan's role in developing the state and then decide on choosing the economically viable one.

 

[Vinod2070]

The high turnout is a slap on the face of the separatists.

They always clamor for poll boycott. They got their answer.

What could not be won by bullet and by terror would not be won over the table. Plain and simple.

 

[Awesome]

It seems like the Kashmiris have gone Jinnah style on the Indians.

This is a lot more effective than armed militancy. Violence begets violence. I support it!

 

[Neo]

Peaceful protest new Kashmiri weapon against India​

* Kashmiri protesters say they are happy that insurgents no longer prowl the streets, demanding shelter, food from civilians​

WASHINGTON: While the militancy in Indian-held Kashmir has waned, what “India now faces is a different, and potentially more challenging foe here: peaceful campaigners for self-determination, who borrow from Mahatma Gandhi’s rule book of non-violent resistance,” says a report filed for the Wall Street Journal from Srinagar.

Correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov quotes Mirwaiz Umar Farooq as saying, “India is not scared of the guns here in Kashmir – it has a thousand times more guns. What it is scared of is people coming out in the streets, people seeing the power of non-violent struggle.” The number of armed attacks in the valley, meanwhile, has dropped to its lowest since the insurgency began in 1989, according to Indian officials, who state that as few as 600 armed insurgents remain in Jammu and Kashmir. The changing nature of the struggle makes it increasingly difficult for India to portray the conflict over Kashmir as a clear-cut fight between the world’s largest democracy and murderous terrorists, Trofimov points out.

Protesters: The report notes that many among the new generation of Kashmiri protesters say they are happy that the insurgents no longer prowl the streets, demanding shelter and food from civilians, enforcing rigid Islamic observance and attracting army reprisals. Indian officials acknowledge the change in popular attitudes. “People want peace. Nobody wants to be disturbed in the evening - not by the militants, and not by the forces,” says Kashmir’s chief of police, B Srinivas. Still, responding to recent demonstrations, Indian troops have often resorted to lethal force, killing more than 50 Kashmiri civilians. Scores of protesters and politicians have been jailed or placed under house arrest. Trofimov confirms that some half a million Indian soldiers and policemen remain deployed in the state, which has a population of 10 million. Srinagar is dotted by checkpoints, its indoor stadium, cinemas and hotels surrounded by sandbags and converted into military camps. Broadcast media are censored. New restrictions have been added in recent months, such as an order to disable mobile-phone text messaging.

The Wall Street Journal reporter points out that as Kashmir descended into chaos after the Amarnath protests and killings of protesters, India responded with increasingly severe curfews and lockdowns that continue. Omar Abdullah, president of the National Conference party, told the newspaper, “Lives are cheap in Kashmir.” The report notes that despite boycott call by opposition parties, the elections that began last month and will end on December 24 have seen a high turnout. Indian officials view such high participation as a rebuke to Pakistan and Pakistani-backed separatists, but many voters who lined up at the polls Saturday in south Kashmir also turned out at anti-Indian protest marches weeks earlier. Student Manzur Ahmad told the US newspaper, “We vote because this makes our lives easier - but this doesn’t mean we don’t want freedom.” The report concludes that continuing bloodshed may end up reversing Kashmir’s recent shift towards unarmed campaigning.