by Khurram Parvez
Memory is the most important and the only effective instrument for the subjugated people. People of Jammu and Kashmir have refused to forget all the crimes perpetrated against them since 1947. The present mood across the Kashmir valley has to be understood in the context of our collective memory, which is willing to confront the fourth largest army of the world.
Since 1947 people of Jammu and Kashmir are caught up in an unfortunate uncertainty, caused by the military policy of India. The uncertainty started from the genocide and mass migration of Muslims from Jammu region in 1947. In this episode of mass violence, thousands of people were killed and more than 500,000 people were forced to migrate to Pakistan.
From the beginning of the Indian military arrival in Jammu and Kashmir, India maintained that it is committed to referendum and demilitarization, but over the years it made irreversible changes on the ground. From pampering and promoting Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah in 1947 to arresting and humiliating him in 1953, India flexed its military muscles also against those who were not necessarily anti-India. Since 1947, India’s conduct in Jammu and Kashmir has been extremely militaristic against all those who opposed Indian rule.
However, those who supported India also suffered through this militarism. India’s belligerence and intransigence has increased with every passing day in Jammu and Kashmir, resulting in greater violence and thus making India politically insecure.
Elections have been boasted as an alternative to referendum and as a ‘genuine’ initiative of India to allow democracy in Jammu and Kashmir. The first election in Jammu and Kashmir, in which India got Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah ‘elected’ as the Prime Minister, was a military exercise in which all 75 candidates were elected unopposed. No elections actually took place and the constitution of Jammu and Kashmir was adopted by this unethical Constituent Assembly. Since then it is a well-known fact that all elections were rigged and never fair. It is unimaginable to believe elections in the presence of 700,000 soldiers can be held in a free and fair manner.
Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the then Prime Minister of India, in 2002 while congratulating himself for the elections which resulted in making Mufti Mohammad Syed as the Chief Minister, commented that barring 1977 elections, no election was free and fair. By the admission of Vajpayee and by the conduct of Indian State, which has been witnessed by people of Jammu and Kashmir, we can assume that elections have always been a farce.
For the last 70 years, the Indian armed forces and Jammu and Kashmir Police irrespective of the laws have enjoyed absolute impunity. Nobody was punished for the massacre of Muslims in Jammu region in 1947, or the subsequent military violence in Poonch and Rajouri till 1965, or for killings in Kashmir valley in 1947, or August 1953, when according to Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah more than 1500 people were killed and thousands tortured after his arrest. No punishments were given for the killings and arson in 1965, at Batamaloo, Beerwah, Handwara and many other places or for the recent violence from 1989, in which more than 70,000 people were killed, more than 8000 were forcibly disappeared, thousands were subjected to sexualised violence, torture and much more.
Irrespective of the political party in power, the Jammu and Kashmir government has failed to prioritise justice for people of Kashmir. The rulers wilfully endorse all the actions of the Indian armed forces but when it comes to justice, they claim helplessness.
People of Jammu and Kashmir have witnessed the same ‘helplessness’ of the local rulers despite repeated promises to the people to get back control of the Hydro Power Projects from India.
On the one hand, the Chief Ministers of Jammu and Kashmir are chairing the Unified High Command, which has presence of all the armed forces and intelligence agencies, yet when it comes to the mere removal of an armed forces bunker from any part of the valley, the Chief Ministers have to seek permission of New Delhi. For even allowing the police to file FIRs or conduct investigations against the army in the cases where they are involved in heinous crimes, the Jammu and Kashmir government expresses ‘helplessness’.
Significantly, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti have been very often making public statements requesting Indian government to engage in a dialogue on Jammu and Kashmir dispute with Pakistan and Hurriyat leadership. In their statements, they have also maintained that Jammu and Kashmir conflict is not an issue of under development or unemployment. All these statements have been always disregarded and the local rulers have been made to appear ‘helpless’.
What is strange in all this ‘helplessness’ is that it appears that the office of the Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister is the weakest as compared to any Chief Minister’s offices in Indian states. Also strange is the fact that in theory, it is being claimed the Indian armed forces are in Jammu and Kashmir to assist the Jammu and Kashmir government for maintaining law and order but in practice the local Jammu and Kashmir government is being used as nothing more than a rubber stamp and they have absolutely no control on the armed forces. Neither can they prevent armed forces from committing any crime nor make them accountable for any crimes and nor even remove a single armed forces bunker. Why doesn’t any ruler or ex-ruler in Jammu and Kashmir publicly say that they don’t have powers despite laws and they don’t have control despite position? This careful silence makes them complicit.
Like India, the local government representatives have always stated that violence will achieve nothing and that all issues can be resolved through dialogue. This is a sermon for people and not for the government. They consider the violence perpetrated by 700,000 Indian armed forces and police as necessary. It is this violence that is being resisted by the people of Jammu and Kashmir on the round and without the state violence being shunned, it will be hard to persuade anyone to not resist.
It is the memory of last 70 years of suffering and disempowerment; and the present unrelenting violence of the Indian state, which will not allow anyone in Kashmir to give up without achieving justice. People in Jammu and Kashmir have not forgotten the crimes of armed forces and nor of those involved in giving political sanction for these crimes. Memory is the most powerful instrument, which people of Kashmir have used against oppression and forgetfulness.
Finally, the space for debate and dialogue is very important for the transformation of any conflict, but the people who have choked the space for debate, questioning and politics in Jammu & Kashmir are asking people to invest in the debate. Even though the entire leadership from village to the central level of Hurriyat has been incarcerated and denied any space to meet with the people on the ground, it has not scuttled the political movement in Jammu and Kashmir. Instead of an organised people’s movement, we will be faced with an anarchic people’s uprising. India may succeed in killing or arresting all the people of dissent but the idea of freedom cannot be killed in Kashmir.
Before any other debate, we should discuss the role of the pro-India parties in Jammu and Kashmir in shrinking the space for civil liberties.
(Author is a human rights defender who heads the Coalition of Civil Society, Srinagar. Ideas expressed in the article are entirely personal.)
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