The chief minister’s amnesty to hundreds of arrested stone throwing protesters of 2010, ‘Eidi from elders to youngsters’ turned out to be a mirage. Six months later, for many the ‘gesture’ has meant promised deceit and a life of indignation. UZMA FALAK reports from Srinagar.

Booked: Youth being dragged by cops for pelting stones
Booked: Youth being dragged by cops for pelting stones

If the general amnesty to over fifteen hundred detained youth last year in Kashmir would have stayed true to what chief minister Omar Abdullah touted, Mushtaq Ahmad Sheikh should have been home six months ago.

The decision, of granting amnesty, termed as an ‘internal confidence building measure’ by the peacemakers should have stayed true to its apparent motive, to bring about ‘normalcy’, in a region which has seen mass uprisings at the turn of decade. But Mushtaq’s ordeal reveals that the government was yet again playing the game of deceit. Despite amnesty, the sole bread-earner of his family of parents and seven sisters was kept in illegal detention till last week of January, this year.

The year 2011 as portrayed by the government was a year of peace in Kashmir but for many like Mushtaq, who was detained previously during civil protests, the year was no different. Almost a month before the chief minister Omar Abdullah announced the amnesty in August 2011 calling it ‘Eidi from elders to youngsters’ on November 6, Mushtaq was picked up by the personnel of Maharaj Gunj Police Station in Old City while at work as a bus conductor.

Police using force against young protesters in Srinagar

His name appeared in the list of to-be-released youth, but the court documents of his case reveal police fudged his date of arrest. “The date of his arrest has been mentioned in grounds of detention as 9.11.2011 which is a complete fallacy of facts as is also established by the date of publication of list in newspaper wherein the detenue’s name is figuring, announcing the release of young boys who were arrested in regard to alleged stone pelting incidents and the date is 06.11.2011,” reads the document.

The date of his arrest shown by the police therefore was in contradiction to the chief minister’s announcement which was hailed by various quarters in the Indian mainland. The government kept him in illegal custody for nearly six months.

His mother Shahzada says the family was shocked to receive a phone call a day before Eid (amnesty was announced Eid eve), congratulating them over their son’s release. “The list had his name but he wasn’t released. A policeman called me to tell that they have released my son. He was still in custody. They could have done anything to him,” she says.

Mushtaq wasn’t released and an FIR was registered. He was granted bail on December 1, 2011 but to no avail and was kept in illegal detention till 15th of the month. The government detained him under PSA, which allows detention without trial for up to two years. Shahzada gave a statement in the press the very next day refuting the claims. “A policeman called me and told me why I had given a statement in the newspaper. I told him that I just wanted to say the truth that I didn’t receive my son while the list has his name. I need my son.”

In the slackened justice system, buying time is a ‘deliberate strategy’ of the state to maintain the status quo while the families live by false hope. “All this while, I was told that he would be released. All this involves a lot of formalities. I ran around…a lot of paper work. At the end of it all, they tell me he has been slapped with PSA. Why did they waste my time, I could have filed a case outright?” she asks in desperation.

Mir Shafqat Hussain, a lawyer, who represents Mushtaq against the state in court, says a number of youth who were granted amnesty may have been released but their PSA has not been quashed, adding, the CM should be held accountable.

He lends the term ‘revolving door’, used by the Amnesty International (AI) in their report, to explain that many youth who like Mushtaq once fall in the police dragnet become ‘easy targets’ for future detentions. He remarks that Mushtaq may be out of jail but his detention order remains “which essentially means the government can put him behind bars at will, till the court quashes the order. His case would be heard in the court next week.”

In 2010, human rights watch dog, AI’s report: “A ‘Lawless Law’: Detentions under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, documenting how the PSA is used to secure the long-term detention of individuals against whom there is insufficient evidence for a trial, created a huge uproar. It unraveled how the state misuses the law to reinforce their strategies and books hundreds of people each year without charge or trial in order to ‘keep them out of circulation’.

Aged 14 then (according to the report), Mushtaq was earlier arrested on April 9, 2010 on charges of being part of a large crowd that hurled stones at government forces during protests. He was released on bail after eight days in custody but was again arrested while he was sleeping in his house in Old City’s Nowhatta area without charge or trial and was slapped with the PSA.

Pertinently, his case was raised by Amnesty International in meetings with the Chief Minister and the State Human Rights Commission. Despite their assurances that they would look into the case, he continued to remain in detention when finally he was released on 10 February 2011 after which he was detained again in October 2011.

The AI report in the section ‘Successive detention on ‘New Grounds’ explains how the state enjoys a free hand by ordering successive detentions. “Once the High Court has quashed a PSA detention order, the detaining authority continues to hold the detainee by issuing a new detention order on the basis of “new grounds,” which are often made up of extremely vague allegations. This practice appears to be unique to J&K: lawyers defending those detained under similar legislation in other parts of India expressed astonishment that the J&K authorities could issue new detention orders for the same individual based on “new grounds” immediately after a detention order had been quashed by the High Court,” the report mentions.

Noted legal expert and Supreme Court lawyer Zaffar Shah says the open FIR system is being abused by the state and combined with the draconian PSA it has a double effect. “Anyone can be arrested and charged with offenses which happened years before. Till the time the person can prove innocence it has done the damage. There are no speedy trails in such cases and it takes time to prove innocence,” he adds.

Mushtaq got entrapped in the ‘revolving door’ since the Amarnath uprising in the year 2008. The police have been arresting and releasing him practically every other week since the Amarnath land row, the family says.

On April 9, 2010, he was arrested more than two months before the civil uprising began that year, and released on bail after eight days in custody but was slapped with the PSA on 21 April.

As a child he was detained, among other prison facilities, at Udhampur Jail and then Kot Bhalwal Jail at Jammu- both of which are regular prisons without any special facilities for detaining children where he was treated with other adult prisoners.

Experts say living in prison or frequently getting incarcerated can tear any person apart into two worlds – the world of confinement and the world of memories from the real world outside. “I think for Mushtaq, one of the immediate manifestations would be the sense of constant hyper-vigilance and suspicious behaviour which might eventually lead to interpersonal distrust,” says psychologist Muzaffar Karim.

Most children, after coming from prison, show difficulty in trusting others and making friends easily. “There is also a strong possibility of psychological distancing which makes one’s investment in emotional relationships very difficult,” he adds.

The crisis for children like Mushtaq who are detained in prisons meant for adults could be graver. Mushtaq’s family says there are noticeable behavioral changes since he was released. “Ye tchu tezaymut (he has become aggressive),” says one of his family members.

The rigid and unyielding discipline of prison, the unwanted proximity to violent encounters and the possibility of being victimized by physical or sexual assaults, the absence of genuine respect and complete disregard for their well being have severe psychological consequences resulting quite often in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, explains Karim.

Despite government of India signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the International Committee of the Red Cross allowing them to monitor conditions in prisons in J&K, reports by civil society groups and statements made by various resistance groups in the region suggest that the condition of detainees has not improved much.

Although the ICRC says the condition of inmates has improved but treatment meted out to Mushtaq while in detention states the contrary.

Mushtaq says he was hit on his head while being shifted to a nearby police station. “I saw my sister from the window of police van. She wanted to briefly talk to me and wasn’t allowed. I pleaded. The police abused me and hit me on the head. The wound had to be surgically stitched and I was CT scanned,” he says.

His sister also alleged that she too was beaten and still has stitch marks on her arm. “I wanted to talk to my brother. The police didn’t allow. My brother resisted and they hit him. I held the rope of the vehicle and they hit me too,” says his sister, Sameena Sheikh.

While in police custody, his health worsened. The family, which doesn’t have an earning hand other than Mushtaq, had to pay for the medicines themselves. His mother managed to get a photocopy of the medical examination papers to keep a proof. “They refused to give me the other medical paper,” says Shahzada, adding “I requested the police so that I could get his stitches removed. We went to a hospital in Rainawari and got his stitches removed. I was given prescriptions and I got him medicines, which I wasn’t even sure reached him properly…,”she remarks. When asked if the family was contacted by any organization working inthe state, the mother of eight children says “no one came to us.”

Boy taken into custody during summer 2010 protests

Dr Alexis Heeb, Communication Coordinator of the ICRC in New Delhi says the conditions of prisoners has improved in the major detention facilities in the region, however it is impossible for his organization to reach out to every detainee.

He says in cases like Mushtaq it is the family which needs to contact his organization adding they don’t generally take up visits to police stations. “If we receive specific information about a detainee in a particular police station we visit the police to check the condition,” he adds.

According to the MoU, the ICRC can interview detainees in private and also assist in restoring family links between detainees and their family members. However, there is no definite number available as to how many people have availed the support in recent years.

Pertinently, following a seminar on Human Rights by ICRC in 2004, the Government of India had asked them to `wind up` its operations in Jammu and Kashmir, a Wikileaks cable had claimed.

Dr Heeb says a “huge number” of people have benefitted from his organization’s activities. “It is always better to be present and work than not working at all (in the conflict-torn region),” he said.

While announcing withdrawal of cases, the chief minister had said that over 100 cases of arson and damage to public and private property wouldn’t be withdrawn. However, a recent report submitted by the home department reveals that the amnesty to over 1500 youth last year was yet to be implemented.

“The cases of 1524 persons involved in 228 cases are being examined and the orders for the withdrawal of cases falling within the ambit of amnesty scheme are likely to be issued in near future,” said the home department’s report.

All this while, since the amnesty was announced, the government chose to remain mum over the non-implementation of the Eid eve amnesty announcement, thus not only distorting reality but also jeopardizing the lives of thousands of youth like Mushtaq. As if the delay was not enough, the state law minister Ali Mohammad Sagar told the media “the relief is expected by December this year.”

The silence that the state maintained over the much-touted amnesty is not new to people in Kashmir.When AI’s report on detentions under PSA revealed the sordid state machinery at work, Omar Abdullah had reacted saying, “Sorry I can’t say anything on it.”

The non-implementation coupled with further delay of the ‘amnesty’has yet again raised questions over government’s policies apparently floated to bring ‘peace’ in the region. The ‘relief’ that is now expected by year-end may yet again prove to be a farce for the already deluded people.

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