PAKISTAN’S AGGRESSION: 1984-1998

Pakistan’s policy with regard to India and other neighbours like Afghanistan, is not determined only by the civilian government. It has always been the prerogative of the armed forces and, more particularly, the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), even during periods of civilian rule.

The ISI is often referred to as a state within a state. The ISI received a boost when it served as the front-line conduit for the training, arming and support of the Afghan Mujahideen during the war against the erstwhile Soviet Union. It was associated with the use of the heroin trade to finance the Afghan Mujahideen’s operations and the present Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, had once told the Washington Post that his top army brass had approached him for approval to use drug money to finance the ISI’s operations against India. The ISI is closely associated with the Taliban movement both in imparting training and in battlefield strategy and operations.

India has always remained a prime focus of the ISI’s activities and with regard to Jammu and Kashmir, the ISI has been pivotal in organising operations of mercenary outfits like the Harkat ul Ansar, declared and subsequently banned, as a Pakistan-based terrorist outfit by the United States of America. Jane’s Intelligence Review in its October 1997 issue carried an article on the Harkat ul Ansar that detailed the organisation’s operations and said "..the complicity of the ISI is more than merely passive. The Harkat ul Ansar owes its considerable arsenal in large measure to the generosity of the Pakistani Government, or, more specifically, its intelligence service.." Instructors in the camps run for the Harkat ul Ansar, some of which were bombed by the United States of America after the attacks on the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, train not only extremist Pakistanis and Kashmiris, but also cadres for operations in Tadjikistan, Bosnia, Myanmar and even the Uighers of Xinjiang Province of the People’s Republic of China. Alumni of these training camps have also been identified with terrorist activities in the USA, France, the Philippines, Egypt, Algeria and elsewhere.

The present ongoing phase of Pakistan’s aggression was initiated in 1984, exploiting the vulnerability of a public bereaved by the passing away of their great leader Sheikh Abdullah and subsequent political uncertainty brought on by leadership squabbles in the ruling National Conference. As the situation deteriorated, civil grievances which are normal in any society but which are open to resolution, were exploited to breed disaffection, with some sections then being brain-washed, armed, financed and instigated into violence. This brutal exploitation of a peaceful people has been marked by over 20,000 killings, the disruption of society and the calculated destruction of basic health, education and economic infrastructure. The blackest mark on this period will remain the mass exodus of Kashmiri Pandits and many Muslims driven by an enveloping fear through use of terror, which was deliberately fanned by those who would see an end to the age old tolerance of the Kashmiri psyche.

A selective killing of prominent persons Hindu, Muslim and Sikh, to spread fear and suffocate differences of opinion, and to paralyse the economy, press, judiciary and administration, since 1989 has been the strategy of the terrorists. Those killed included Mirwaiz Maulvi Farooq,the revered Muslim clerics and Imam of its Jama Masjid or Cathedral mosque, Maulana Maudoodi, a 90 year old scholar, veteran of the freedom movement, former lieutenant of Sheikh Abdullah and among the most respected of the leaders of the Gujar community, Qazi Nissar Ahmed, the Mirwaiz of South Kashmir, Mir Mustafa, a legislator, Lassa Kaul, Director of Doordarshan, Srinagar, H.L. Khera, General Manager Hindustan Machine Tools, Professor Musheer ul Haq, Vice Chancellor Kashmir University, Nazir Ahmed Wani, Member of Kashmir’s Legislative Council and countless other officials and defence personnel. Any person who represented the State’s authority, considered unfriendly to the militant’s cause, or held in esteem by the local people and thus able to influence their thinking towards peaceful resolution of conflict and opposed to militancy and Pakistan’s machinations, became a target.

Despite well documented evidence to the contrary, Pakistan persists in claiming that it is only providing "moral, political and diplomatic support" to what it calls an indigenous Kashmiri uprising in Jammu and Kashmir. But the truth behind the latest phase of Pakistani sponsored violence has been spelt out in the book ‘Fateh’ the biography of the former Chief of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence, General Akhtar Abdul Rehman. His biographer Brigadier Haroon Rashid states "..The plan which General Akhtar Abdul Rehman had made for Kashmiris movement for independence was to come into effect in 1991. It appears that this plan was made with the struggle for the liberation of Afghanistan in mind, which it was thought would be achieved by spring 1989... However the Kashmir plan was inaugurated in 1984.. The Kashmiris were provided with some arms which were not suitable for the Afghan Mujahideen.

The year 1984, mentioned by Haroon Rashid, is significant as it was in 1984 that an Indian diplomat, Ravindra Mhatre, was murdered in Birmingham(UK) by the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front. Amanullah Khan, Chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), sought refuge in Pakistan and still lives there and conducts his anti-India activities openly. Hashim Qureshi, an associate of Amanullah Khan, now resident in the Netherlands, has in his book "Kashmir: Unveiling the Truth", laid bare the plotting of the murder and the horrors that were to follow in Kashmir. Terrorism escalated in the Kashmir Valley starting in 1989. Pakistan first used the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, with its pro independence ideology, to mobilise a mass movement. The period between 1989-90 was marked by the targeted killing of Government officials, media personnel, members of the judiciary, and members of the minority Kashmiri Pandit (Hindu) community and Kashmiri Muslims who dared question the terror tactics and excesses of the terrorists. One immediate effect, between January and April 1990 was the resignation of the duly elected State government, the massive exodus of nearly 2,50,000 Kashmiri Pandits and over 50,000 Kashmiri Muslims from the valley with the Pandits settling in refugee camps in Jammu, Delhi and other cities in India. The objective of creating terror and mayhem, paralysing the State administration had met therefore with what would have seemed quick success. This in turn led Pakistan to distance itself from those seeking independence, who it had earlier sought to cultivate to instigate disaffection in the State, and increasingly seek to encourage those that favoured joining Pakistan.

A tactic used to telling effect by the militants was to attack the security forces from the cover of crowded market places and civic facilities, so as to have a human shelter or embroil civilians into crossfire. The State’s response inevitably led to clashes with both militant and civilian casualties. The deaths of civilians then became the substance of campaigns orchestrated by Pakistan and the militant groups alleging oppression of the Kashmiris and violation of their human rights by the government. Because in each case of such allegation, government would immediately seek to investigate the truth through its own administrative infrastructure, it was established that while in some cases there might have been overreaction by the security forces working under enormous threat and pressure, other cases were wildly exaggerated. In each case of established excess, legal action against personnel implicated, was initiated by government.

Cordon and search operations to flush out the militants provided militants and their supporters the ground to accuse the security forces of mass rapes. Such was the case in March 1991 in Kunan Poshpora Village of Kupwara District, in which a mass rape of 23 women was alleged. The allegation was enquired into by a team of senior civilian and military officers, on the site of the supposed occurrence with interviews with alleged victims. The allegations were found to be groundless.

A sustained propaganda campaign to highlight alleged human rights’ abuse was used by Pakistan as an instrument to internationalise the Jammu and Kashmir question. The context in which incidents occurred and the environment of violence created by the terrorists was conveniently glossed over. Exaggerated, and often fabricated, instances of human rights’ violations were used as a tool of psychological warfare and were accepted at face value by gullible observers with little or no perspective on the ground situation. In response, and to deal with specific cases of excess, the Government of India strengthened supervision and set up a National Human Rights Commission in 1993, whose functioning has been lauded by all human rights groups with which it has interacted. This is an autonomous commission, free from the dictates of government and staffed by retired judges and eminent persons. After restoration of a democratic government in the State in 1996, the State has set up a similar Commission at the State level under the Chairmanship of a highly respected Kashmiri judge.

On its part the Government and the security forces investigated all allegations of human rights abuses and, where substantiated, punishment was meted out to the erring personnel. It is, however, ironic that the security forces whom the militants accused of human rights violations, continue till today to be deployed to provide security to the leaders of the secessionist and militant groups, whose lives have been threatened because of their resolve to abjure violence in seeking their political ends.

Since the ideology favouring independence of Jammu and Kashmir could not be countenanced by Pakistan, the period starting 1990 witnessed the creation of groups determined to install an extremist Islamic regime in Jammu and Kashmir, and to ensure its accession to Pakistan. The major responsibility to execute this strategy was given by Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) to the Hezbul Mujahideen, whose present Supreme Commander, Syed Salahuddin, continues to reside in Pakistan. Other groups that proliferated, primarily to blunt the hold of Pakistan’s opponents in the militancy, included Hezbullah, Allah Tigers, Al Barq, etc. This period witnessed increasing internecine warfare with extremist groups seeking to suppress the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front. The thrust of their campaign was to invoke religion to seize legitimacy. As a result they sought to impose a blinkered version of Islamic tenets at the point of the gun, resulting in the destruction of schools, cinemas, restaurants, and a ban on all forms of entertainment. Women were particularly affected since some extremist groups, defying the very grain of Kashmir’s culture, tried forcibly to confine them to indoors and the veil, akin to what the Taleban have done in Afghanistan, but without success. To teach a lesson some Muslim girls were in fact attacked and injured. This in fact generally alienated womenfolk from the movement, although many had earlier been supportive of the secessionists through organisations like the Dukhtaran-i-Millat.

This period witnessed the media in the Valley constantly attacked by the militants, even though these same elements had been initially supportive of militancy, and demanded that anti-terrorist articles not be carried; government announcements be boycotted; the "martyrdom" of the militants be eulogised, as also the campaign posing as "liberation". Attacks on newspaper offices and printing presses and the killing of eminent journalists and editors became frequent. Among other incidents the ‘Srinagar Times’ was attacked; the ‘Aftab’ was bombed; the editor of Al Safa, Mohammed Shaban Vakil , a respected journalist and leading critic of government, was shot dead in his office. Some journalists from the national publications, who wrote against militancy, had their papers banned from entering the Valley at various times. In short, a determined effort was made to strangle freedom of the press, surely a basic tenet of liberty. Only the BBC was spared somehow.

The effort of Pakistan’s surrogates to establish their ascendancy in the movement reached its peak in October 1993, with the siege of the shrine at Hazratbal, considered the holiest in Kashmir by its people, the administration of which had provided the launching pad for the career of Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah, whose sermons there were the bedrock of his movement for freedom. This was an effort to provoke a confrontation between the JKLF militants and the military by feeding provocative and misleading information to each, so that the shrine would become a battleground, thus simultaneously shaking the foundations of the Sufi tradition of Kashmir, not palatable to the narrow minded, who consider the religious practices therein heretical, decimating the pro-independence JKLF, and bringing the Indian army into disrepute. Simultaneously, the All Party Hurriyat Conference emerged, partly as a defensive mechanism to control internecine conflict, and partly to give political voice to what had degenerated into a violent terrorist campaign with few remaining pretensions of liberty.

The Hurriyat leaders like to refer to themselves as the "true representatives of the people of Jammu and Kashmir". They have sought legitimacy not by public acclaim through the acknowledged process of elections, but through fear as many of their leaders are affiliated with one or the other militant group. The irrelevance of the Hurriyat to the people of Jammu and Kashmir and the situation in the state, became visibly apparent during the elections held in 1996. The Hurriyat leaders conducted a house to house campaign calling on people to boycott the elections. Despite their threats and pleas the people turned out in large numbers to vote in most parts of the state except in some pockets which were known to be in thrall of the militants.

The failures of the Hurriyat internationally and in the Valley led Pakistan’s ISI to create the Shoora-i-Jehad in 1996 as the coordinating authority to undertake both militant and political activities. The move was aimed at ensuring continuing ISI control. The growing disenchantment of the Kashmiri people with violence as a form of grievance redressal, this move also met with little success, and added to mutual distrust and exacerbated misgivings.

The extremist ideology of groups like the Hezb ul Mujahideen and their open insistence on Kashmir’s accession to Pakistan, finally made Kashmiri’s realise that Pakistan had neither their freedom nor their interests at heart, but had been cynically manipulating them to fulfil its own territorial ambitions. The increasing criminalisation of the militant groups contributed further to Kashmiri disenchantment and fear. The philosophy of tolerance and co-existence, embodied in the culture of Kashmiriat, had become the prime target of the extremist groups, and was seen to be in danger of being submerged in a frenzy of fanaticism.

By the end of 1993, however, it became more clear that, after nearly five years of violence, the Kashmiris were thoroughly disillusioned. With the decline in numbers of Kashmiri youth willing to be indoctrinated and trained as terrorists, Pakistan took recourse to sending in battle-hardened mercenaries from Afghanistan, Pakistan and other countries, including many veterans of the Afghan war. They came under the banner of the Harkat ul Ansar and Lashkar e Tayyaba to bolster the fighting ability of the pro-Pakistani militant groups. Their disregard for the Kashmiri psyche, and their depredations in the Valley, further strengthened the resolve of Kashmiris against violence and against the Hurriyat and its constituents who had willingly invited these foreigners into what the people had been led to believe was a Kashmiri movement to right political wrongs. With facts coming through more and more through propaganda, and peaceful resolution of the siege at Hazratbal, with the civil and military authorities working closely together to ameliorate the difficulties of the people contributed, with other developments to a perceptible change in mood, with increasing numbers of people returning to work with government and security agencies in restoring order.

In 1994 the Mirwaiz of South Kashmir, Qazi Nisar Ahemd, was killed in Anantnag. His widow and the local people blamed the Hezb ul Mujahideen, and processions and demonstrations condemning the militant group and Pakistan took place in the town. In the same year the Harkat ul Ansar kidnapped Kim Housego and David Mackie, two British tourists. The action was widely condemned by the people of Jammu & Kashmir leading to the militants capitulating and their release.

In 1995 mercenaries of the Harkat ul Ansar and the Hezb ul Mujahideen led by a Pakistani national Mast Gul, seized another revered shrine in Charar e Sharief resulting in the mindless destruction of both the shrine and the surrounding township. Mast Gul was given a hero’s welcome in Pakistan and paraded through the streets by the Jama’at e Islami the mentor of the Hezb ul Mujahideen. The Harkat ul Ansar issued press releases stating that its cadres had been in the shrine which further aggravated the divide between the centuries old Kashmiri ethos of harmonious co-existence and the extremist orthodoxy being sought to be imposed by the pro-Pakistani groups.

Also in 1995 the Al Faran, a front for the Harkat ul Ansar, kidnapped five foreign tourists and beheaded one of them, a Norwegian named Hans Christian Ostro. In light of widespread public disapprobation, the Hurriyat was constrained to condemn this act of wanton killing. The hostages remain untraced till today. Surprisingly, the hue and cry in countries abroad was muted. One American made a daring escape from his terrorist captors and was rescued by a vigilant team on a government helicopter. His adventure was largely ignored by foreign media. John Donald Chiles does not appear to have been interviewed in print or on the electronic media.

The period 1993-96 thus witnessed a changing mood in the Kashmir Valley against militancy and towards seeking some solution to the crisis. The media became more vocal in its criticism of the activities of the militant groups and the "guest militants" as the mercenaries were called by the Kashmiri militant groups. The release through judicial process of prominent jailed suspected militant leaders like Shabir Shah and Yasin Malik, the formation of political fronts by former militants disillusioned with Pakistan and militancy, and the revival of political activity by known and established parties in the face of threats from Pakistan, the Hurriyat and the mercenaries, bolstered the mood in Kashmir. The restoration of the democratic process was seen as a way out after years of violence. Pakistan made desperate attempts to prevent these developments but to little avail.

Responding to the changed public mood, the Government of India organised Parliamentary and Assembly elections in 1996 in Jammu and Kashmir. The large participation of the people in the elections despite calls for boycott by the Hurrriyat and Pakistan, despite threats from the militants and mercenaries and the continued targeted killing of political activists and the Kashmiri Muslims holding different views, was a clear manifestation of the desire of the Kashmiris for peace. The Kashmiris voted back to power with a two-third majority, their own old party, the National Conference, with Dr Farooq Abdullah at its head. Some sections of the foreign media gave undue weight to the presence of security forces needed to maintain order in the face of terrorist threats to disrupt the Parliament elections. This criticism was, however, more subdued with the Assembly elections following Parliament elections, with an even bigger voter turnout.

Since the installation of the elected Government in October 1996, there has been significant change in the situation in Jammu and Kashmir. Life has, more or less, returned to normal in the capital Srinagar. Markets are open, festivals and marriages are celebrated in the age old manner with song, music and dance, tourists are coming back to the Valley, trade is beginning to flourish again, the houseboats are no longer idle, winter sports and cultural programmes have been held and the process of reconstruction of the infrastructure has begun. Leaders formerly aligned with the Hurriyat like Shabir Shah have formed new political parties and have begun to talk in terms of participation in the elections, though with reservations. Umar Farooq revived his slain father’s Awami Action Committee. Differences have cropped up between him and the Hurriyat, and he organised separate meetings, without consulting the Hurriyat, to commemorate the tragic day of his father’s assassination by the militants. His meeting drew large crowds and the Hurriyat was compelled to go along with him.

Parliamentary elections were held in again in February/March, 1998. There was overwhelming participation in the Valley despite calls for a boycott by the Hurriyat and by Pakistan, and dire threats from militant groups against voters, candidates and electoral officers. The period had been preceded by targeted attacks against political workers. In the elections, the local Jammu and Kashmir government staff manned polling booths, and officials did not require to be called in from outside the State; there was overwhelming participation despite inclement weather. One significant if little noticed aspect was the participation, as candidates, of people like Muzzaffar Beg, a Supreme Court lawyer, who had always represented the Hurriyat, and the widespread participation of youth in campaign rallies and the election process. Elements from within Hurriyat affiliated groups are believed to have quietly supported the candidates even as the Hurriyat officially boycotted the election. A close aide of Shabir Shah, Naeem Khan, who had broken with Shah, spoke in favour of the democratic electoral process. Such sentiments were also expressed to the media by ordinary people in Jammu and Kashmir who crave a return to normalcy. The Hurriyat call for strikes failed. There were no reports of coercion and almost no untoward incidents, save a few stray cases of violence.

Internecine squabbles continue within the Hurriyat. Syed Ali Shah Geelani of the Jama’at e Islami was made the Chairman of the Hurriyat in place of Umar Farooq, a development that drew an adverse response both from Umar Farooq and many other constituents of the Hurriyat because of Syed Ali Shah’s known predelictions on Kashmir’s accession to Pakistan. Separately, G.M. Bhat the leader of the Jamaat e Islami claimed that the Jama’at did not believe in violence and that the Hezbul Mujahideen was not the armed wing of the Hurriyat - a claim disputed by Syed Salahuddin the Pakistan based ‘supreme commander’ of the Hezb who claimed that the Hezb was the armed wing of the Jama’at-e-Islami. Bhat’s attempts to move the Jama’at-e-Islami away from violence earned him the ire of Geelani’s supporters.

On the militant front, there is growing evidence that Kashmiri involvement in the militancy has ceased. Violence does recur sporadically, but is now largely the work of mercenary groups comprising Pakistanis, Afghans and others operating in the Valley under the Lashkar e Tayyaba and the Harkat ul Ansar. This has given a new dimension to the nature of militancy. Pakistan’s role in sponsoring terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir is well documented by the international media, independent observers and even the US State Department. The latter has identified the Harkat ul Ansar as a terrorist outfit operating from Pakistan. Some functionaries in Pakistan have shed all pretence and senior Ministers of the Government and a Stat eGovernor have openly visiting the training camps of outfits like the Lashkar e Tayyaba endorsing their calls to ‘jehad’ against India. Virtually discomfited in the Kashmir Valley, the ISI has sought to move terrorist operations to Poonch, Rajouri, Doda and Udhampur sectors, with the objective of targeting Hindus in the hope of inflaming communal passions and inciting communal conflict. No such backlash has occurred.