[Reader-list] Why Kashmir Erupts?

[Nazneen Anand Shamsi]

Dear all,

I came across this rather interesting piece on Kashmir, written by A.G
Noorani. I say -interesting- because despite his acute analysis,
despite his display of archival wealth, and despite his good
intentions, Mr.Noorani, refuses to acknowledge the slaughter of
Kashmiri Pandits by Muslims and their eventual flight.

May be this was just an oversight  or maybe he did it purpose but
nevertheless I hope all those who have not had the opportunity to read
it  will benefit from it.

Best

Nazneen Anand Shamsi
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Frontline
Volume 25 - Issue 19 :: Sep. 13-26, 2008
INDIA'S NATIONAL MAGAZINE
from the publishers of THE HINDU



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ESSAY

WHY JAMMU ERUPTS

A.G. NOORANI

Is New Delhi about to repeat Nehru's blunder of 1953?

CHANNI ANAND/AP

Protesters in Jammu throw stones at policemen on August 26.

THE Jammu province of the State of Jammu and Kashmir has a regional
identity with a rich past and a composite culture. It has produced
scholars, artists, poets and writers of high distinction. After 1947,
the Sangh Parivar foisted a communal identity on it precisely at a
time when Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah, the foremost leader of Jammu and
Kashmir State with a Muslim majority, moved for its accession to
India. He was attracted by its secular ideals symbolised by Mahatma
Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. Gandhi said at a prayer meeting on
November 28, 1947: "You see Sheikh Abdullah with me… [who] although a
pucka Muslim, has won the hearts of both [Hindus and Sikhs] by making
them forget that there is any difference between the three
[communities]…. Even though in Jammu recently the Muslims were killed
by the Hindus and the Sikhs, he went to Jammu and invited the evil
doers to forget the past…." (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi; volume
90, page 123).

There were Muslims in the valley who were opposed to the accession;
there were forces in Jammu who resented the transfer of power from a
"Hindu" Maharaja to a "Muslim" leader. The Maharaja's son, Karan
Singh, resented that "Dogra rule had in effect been replaced by
Kashmiri rule".

In October 1987, Jammu erupted in fury when Farooq Abdullah, at Rajiv
Gandhi's behest, ended the Darbar Move by which the government
functioned alternately from Srinagar and Jammu every six months. It
was not communal but regional self-assertion. But, in August 2008, it
was not Jammu but the communal forces there that took to the streets
under a false regional garb. The issue of allotment of land to the
Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board (SASB), a legacy of the former Governor
S.K. Sinha's communal agenda, was badly handled by Chief Minister
Ghulam Nabi Azad for his own ends in a manner that offended Muslim and
Hindu feelings.

But while in the valley the people led the leaders and the campaign
was spontaneous, in Jammu the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) acted
after preparation and in pursuit of its resolution of June 30, 2002,
for the break-up of the State into three parts. New Delhi's brutal
clamp-down in the valley on August 24, following mammoth and unarmed
rallies, is in glaring contrast to its kid-glove treatment of Jammu.
It is a replay of what happened in 1953 when Nehru confided to his
friend B.C. Roy, Chief Minister of West Bengal, on June 29: "It is
difficult to speak openly about the injurious results of this
movement. It has made the Kashmir problem far more difficult than it
ever was. Before this movement was started, I had little doubt in my
mind that the final decision about Kashmir would be in our favour,
however long it might take. But this movement has upset all my
calculations and weakened our position in Kashmir terribly. I am for
the moment talking about the Kashmir Valley only. As you know, the
people in the Valley are over ninety per cent Muslim. The reaction of
the Jammu Praja Parishad movement on them has been very great. They
have become frightened of the communal elements in Jammu and in India
and their previous wish to be attached to India has weakened. Indeed,
at the moment, all the hostile forces against us are dominant in
Kashmir…. The whole difficulty has been about the Valley of Kashmir
and we are on the point of losing it because of the Praja Parishad
movement.

"Psychologically we have lost it and it would be difficult to get back
to the older position. You will appreciate how it has distressed me to
see the hard work of several years washed away by this movement. In
the ultimate analysis, we gain Kashmir if we gain the goodwill of the
people there" (emphasis added, throughout; Selected Works of
Jawaharlal Nehru; volume 22, pages 203-205). In 2002, the RSS admitted
that in 1952 it had "agitated in the name of Praja Parishad". Nehru
tried to "control" the situation by arresting Abdullah on August 9,
1953, and inflicted a wound that has still not healed. Is New Delhi
about to repeat that mistake in 2008?

Three factors must be borne in mind – the preparations behind the
Jammu disorders, the RSS' trifurcation agenda, and its roots.
Dharmendra Rataul of The Tribune reported from Madhopur as early as
August 5 that "hundreds" of Shiv Sainiks and Bajrang Dal men, led by
Dinesh Kumar Babbu, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of the
Legislative Assembly, had "blocked the NH-1A linking J&K with the rest
of the country. Punjab BJP leaders including two State Ministers
camped 10 km away." He cited the details. Azad remarked on August 4:
"There have been four delegations of the BJP going there in the past
one month and they call it spontaneous. The BJP is backing the
Sangharsh Samiti and is funding it" (Indian Express, August 5). Anil
Anand reported in DNA (August 11) that the RSS was "tightening its
hold over the BJP" to implement its agenda and had selected an RSS
loyalist, Leela Karan Sharma, as chairman of the Amarnath Sangharsh
Samiti.

Anuradha Bhasin Jamwal, executive editor of Kashmir Times, published
from Jammu, wrote a detailed report in Communalism Combat (July-August
2008): "That the protests in Jammu were not marked by spontaneity but
by a steady build-up is evident from the fact that in the first few
days of the agitation only a few protesters, supporters of the Sangh
Parivar, were out on the streets. Gradually, the numbers started
swelling into thousands" to join in "the violent protests". Television
channels were not curbed, as they were in Srinagar from August 24,
when they "worked to complement mass mobilisation campaigns by the
Bajrang Dal, the VHP and the RSS". No praise can be too high for
Anuradha or her father, Ved Bhasin, the paper's founder, for standing
by the values of secularism and honest journalism throughout these
difficult years.
RSS agenda

The RSS' agenda was mooted almost from the time of the State's
accession to India. Its prime mover was none other than Maharaja Hari
Singh, as Nehru wrote to Vallabhbhai Patel on April 17, 1949, after
reading an intelligence report from Kashmir: "In this report, among
other things, a reference was made to a growing Hindu agitation in
Jammu province for what is called a zonal plebiscite. This idea is
based on the belief that a plebiscite for the whole of Kashmir is
bound to be lost and, therefore, let us save Jammu at least. You will
perhaps remember that some proposal of this kind was put forward by
the Maharaja some months back. It seems to me that this kind of
propaganda is very harmful, indeed, for us. Whatever may happen in the
future, I do not think Jammu province is running away from us. If we
want Jammu province by itself and are prepared to make a present of
the rest of the State to Pakistan, I have no doubt we could clinch the
issue in a few days. The prize we are fighting for is the valley of
Kashmir.

"This propaganda for a zonal plebiscite is going on in Jammu, in Delhi
and elsewhere. It is carried on by what is known as the Jammu Praja
Parishad. Our intelligence officer reported that this Praja Parishad
is financed by the Maharaja. Further, that the large sums collected
for the Dharmarth Fund, which are controlled by the Maharaja, are
being spent in propaganda for him" (Sardar Patel's Correspondence
1945-50; volume 1, page 262).

It had no effect on Patel because he had ranged himself for Hari Singh
and against Abdullah. Only three months after Jammu and Kashmir's
accession to India, Hari Singh threatened secession in a letter to
Patel dated January 31, 1948: "Sometimes I feel that I should withdraw
the accession that I have made to the Indian Union. The Union only
provisionally accepted the accession…" (ibid, page 167). He was, of
course, not reprimanded by Patel.

General K.M. Cariappa reported to Nehru that "the Maharaja's
brother-in-law was openly carrying on a campaign against Sheikh
Abdullah and his government and issuing pamphlets of this kind". Nehru
added that in an intelligence report "mention was made of the Yuvraj
[Karan Singh] getting mixed up with this business" (ibid, page 262).

To Patel, Nehru "after all… is also a Hindu and... a Kashmiri Hindu",
"a patriot", and Kashmir was "a Hindu State situated in Muslim
surroundings" (ibid, pages 3 and 4).

Shyama Prasad Mookerjee resigned from Nehru's Cabinet in 1950 and set
up the Jana Sangh, with the RSS' support, on October 21, 1951. Nehru
called it the "illegitimate child of the RSS" (The Hindu; January 6,
1952). Mookerjee was in search of a plank. Kashmir came in handy. He
asked Nehru in a letter on January 9, 1950, that if a plebiscite were
held "what will be the fate of Jammu in case the majority of the
people, consisting of Muslims, vote against India?" He dilated on "the
peculiar characteristics of different parts" of the State.

Karan Singh revived his father's plans. On November 14, 1965, he
confirmed to Neville Maxwell of The Times (London) his ideas on
trifurcation. Kuldip Nayar, who headed the United News of India,
reported his views at length – "a unilingual Kashmiri-speaking State";
Jammu's merger with Himachal Pradesh; and Ladakh to become a Union
Territory. Jammu and Kashmir was an "administrative monstrosity".
There was no "sanctity behind" it. His family had brought the two
parts together through conquest and he as successor would say that
"the sooner the present arrangement was ended the better it would be."
(He had written differently to Nehru earlier.)

B.K. Nehru became Governor of Jammu and Kashmir on February 26, 1981.
"The only real briefing that I got was from Tiger (Karan Singh) who
put the State of Jammu and Kashmir in correct perspective for me. He
explained that the State was a wholly artificial creation, its five
separate regions being joined together by the historical accident that
Raja Gulab Singh had conquered all the territories over which his
father Maharaja Hari Singh was ruling at the time of Independence and
Partition. Those five different entities had nothing in common with
each other…. In our part of the State, there were three clear
divisions – Jammu, which was Hindu, Kashmir, which was Sunni Muslim
and Ladakh, one part of which was Buddhist and the other Shia Muslim.
Because of the lack of commonality between these three divisions, the
sooner they were separated the better it would be for the future"
(Nice Guys Finish Second; 1997; page 589).

Karan Singh's statement of August 5, 2008, refers to the recent
upheaval as "a symptom of a deeper problem including the relationship
between the three regions of the State still with India" – a strange
formulation – "Kashmir, Jammu and Ladakh. The fundamental problem
needs to be looked into carefully and a national consensus arrived at,
but that can be done only after the next round of national and State
elections." He is the only one outside the BJP to call for Governor
N.N. Vohra's ouster.

As Union Home Minister, L.K. Advani set the ball rolling calculatedly
at Leh on June 7, 2000. He knew he was on charged territory. The
Ladakh Buddhist Association (LBA) had for years threatened to use
violence. A social boycott of Muslims was on for months. The ritual
qualification "within the four corners of the Constitution" is less
relevant than the fact that the Home Minister countenanced ("can
discuss") trifurcation at all and did so in the context of the memo
containing the demand which the LBA gave Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee
that day.
Idea of trifurcation

THE HINDU PHOTO LIBRARY

Maharaja Hari Singh, whose last days as the ruler of Jammu and Kashmir
were marred by a massacre of Muslims.

Constitutionally, the Centre has no right or power in this matter.
Article 3 empowers Parliament "by law" to "diminish the area of any
State". In relation to Kashmir, however, no such Bill can even "be
introduced in Parliament without the consent of the Legislature of
that State". The Centre has no business to offer to "consider" a
demand whose acceptance is the sole prerogative of Kashmir. Advani
could not have been unmindful of the chain reaction his remarks would
set off. The LBA's memo said: "We believe a lasting solution lies in
trifurcation of the State." The Times of India's correspondent summed
up the reaction in a report from Jammu published on June 14, 2000:
"Trifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir, an idea forwarded by organisations
and individuals – either as a demand or suggestion in the public
debate, set in motion by the Centre – has been given new
respectability by Union Home Minister Advani's remark… during the
Sindhu Darshan festival demanding trifurcation of the State or Union
Territory status for Leh." Buddhist protests led to the scaling down
of the tamasha.

On June 30, 2002, the RSS' All India Workers' Conclave at Kurukshetra
adopted a resolution that asserted: "The people of Jammu think that
the solution of their problems lies in the separate statehood for
Jammu region." It also supported "the demand for U.T. [Union
Territory] status for Ladakh region". This is the agenda that is being
promoted in Jammu now.

Jammu will be split evenly. Three of its six districts, now broken up
into 10, have a Muslim majority - Poonch (91.92 per cent), Rajouri
(60.23 per cent) and Doda (57.92 per cent). Two tehsils in Udhampur,
Gul Arnas and Gulab Garh, have a Muslim majority. Farooq Abdullah
realistically warned that these areas would not live with Jammu; the
massacres would be worse than those of 1947; and "India will be left
with two and a half districts while the so-called Greater Kashmir will
go on a platter to Pakistan eventually" (Greater Kashmir; October 3
and December 11, 2000). Mirwaiz Maulvi Umer Farooq also said "if the
Dogras of Jammu's two and a half districts want to secede from the
rest of the State… we won't oppose it either" (Indian Express; August
10, 2008).
Massacre in Jammu

Farooq Abdullah's reference to the 1947 massacres has a poignant ring.
His father had overlooked the ethnic cleansing of Muslims of Jammu,
under Maharaja Hari Singh's auspices, to forge a Union with India on
the basis of the ideology of secularism. As Gandhi said on November
27, 1947, "This has not been fully reported in the newspapers"
(Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi; volume 90, page 115). It was, and
still is, little known in India. It is now being recalled in Jammu.
Here are the facts. Gandhi said on December 25, 1947: "The Hindus and
Sikhs of Jammu and those who had gone there from outside killed
Muslims there. The Maharaja of Kashmir is responsible for what is
happening there…. Muslim women have been dishonoured" (ibid, page
298).

In 1947, Muslims were in a 61 per cent majority in the Jammu province.
Horace Alexander wrote in the Spectator (January 16, 1948) that the
killings had "the tacit consent of State authority" and put the figure
at 200,000. On August 10, 1948, The Times (London) published a report
by "A Special Correspondent", an Indian Civil Service official who had
served in the State. He wrote: "2,37,000 Muslims were systematically
exterminated – unless they escaped to Pakistan along the border – by
all the forces of the Dogra State, headed by the Maharaja in person
and aided by Hindus and Sikhs. This happened in October 1947, five
days before the first Pathan invasion and nine days before the
Maharaja's accession to India." India was, therefore, not responsible
one bit. Hari Singh was, personally. Between 1941 and 1961, the Muslim
population of Jammu fell from 61 per cent to 38 per cent.

In 1971 Hari Singh's complicity was fully exposed by the publication
of Nehru's letter of December 30, 1947, and the Sheikh's letter of
October 7, 1948, both addressed to Patel, significantly (Sardar
Patel's Correspondence; volume 1, 1971, pages 135 and 237).

The Sheikh wrote: "There was enacted in every village and town through
which he [Hari Singh] passed an orgy of arson and loot and murder of
Muslims. In Jammu the killing of Muslims all over the province
continued unabated for weeks under his very nose."

That orgy is being recalled in Jammu now. In an article entitled
"Being Muslim in Jammu", Zafar Chaudhary writes: "There was hardly any
family in the region which escaped" it. Those "events permanently
changed the way the Muslims of Jammu would live or think" (Economic &
Political Weekly; August 23, 2008). Some decided to make peace with
the BJP agitators. The BJP's State president, Ashok Khajuria, said at
a press conference on July 26: "Muslims vacate your houses... I am
warning you… else, Jammu people are ready to throw you out."

>From 1947 to 1953, these very forces undermined Sheikh Abdullah's
standing in Kashmir. In 2008, they have strengthened its demand for
azadi. It is, of course, absurd to say that land for the SASB will
affect demography. But people overreact when they are told that they
are not in a majority in their own State. Witness: Assam. In Srinagar
I was told by the 15 Corps Commander in 1995, while working on an
article for Frontline, that Kashmiri Muslims were not in a majority in
the valley itself. On August 16, 2008, S.K. Sinha said the same thing
in the Manekshaw Memorial Lecture. What is it that drives persons in
government to say such things? Imagine the impact of a similar remark
in Mumbai, for instance.
The land and the law

Now for the land issue. In 1989, the number of pilgrims to the
Amarnath cave was only 12,000. In 2007, it was 400,000. Is there any
place of pilgrimage anywhere in India where land is sought to be
allotted or transferred in any form for the pilgrimage? Whether by
leave and licence or by lease? In law, citizens have a right to move
along any road, subject to considerations of security and the like.
When throngs gather, the organisers arrange facilities. Land need not
be allotted for that. It has not been, anywhere at any time. Neither
at the Kumbh Mela, where far greater numbers gather, nor at Gangotri
and Goumukh in Uttarakhand, where, on May 1, 2008, the BJP government
limited the number of pilgrims to 150 a day to protect the
environment. Experts have testified to the environmental degradation
already wrought on the route to the Amarnath cave. Yet, S.K. Sinha
wanted to extend the duration of the yatra and the numbers who visit
the cave.

The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) efficiently maintains 12
temples and their sub-shrines in the Tirumala-Tirupati area. The TTD
once owned 600 villages, but they were acquired by the State under the
Zamindari Abolition Act, 1950. The average income of the TTD is a
whopping Rs.800 crore. The TTD, established by the TTD Act, 1932, is
now governed by Chapter 14 of the Andhra Pradesh Charitable and Hindu
Religious Institutions and Endowments Act, 1987. A Board of Trustees
is constituted by the State government, which also appoints the chief
executive and other officials. The Tirumala hills comprise seven
peaks. The temple of Sri Venkateswara is on the seventh peak. Section
114 of the Act empowers the State government to notify "the limits of
the Tirumala Hills area for the purpose of civic administration". It
will be deemed to be a village under the Gram Panchayats Act, 1964,
and the Public Health Act, 1939.
Sengupta report


Following a blizzard in August 1996, the Government of India asked
Nitish K. Sengupta, IAS (retired), and member of the Trinamool
Congress, to inquire into the tragedy in which 243 people died on the
Amarnath Yatra. Had his report, the only definitive study of the
actual state of things, not been flouted by S.K. Sinha, no disputes
would have arisen. There are two routes to the Amarnath cave. The
"traditional route" is from Srinagar – lately from Jammu – to Pahalgam
onwards. "The limited carrying capacity of the 32 km track provides
strong grounds for controlling the number of pilgrims… there should
not be more than 9,000 or 10,000 pilgrims" on the last sector. The
other route is from Sonamarg to Baltal onwards, "an alternative or
supplementary route", which, Ghulam Nabi Azad said on August 4, "is
taken barely by 10 per cent of the pilgrims".

Sengupta recommended that the Tourism Department "should be the
administrative department responsible for conducting the yatra" plus a
Board, with the Chief Minister at its head, to "undertake primary
responsibility of looking into all matters relating to Amarnath
Yatra". At one place he calls it a "coordination committee" (page 25),
at another (page 49) a Board "to coordinate efforts of the various
agencies". It would "lay down overall policy measures" and exercise
supervision". It is the government that wields executive power.

The yatra should start on July 1 and end on August 15 – 45 days – with
an overall ceiling of 100,000 pilgrims for the annual yatra and only
10,000 pilgrims a day between Chandanwari and the cave. He was most
emphatic on both the duration and the ceiling on numbers (page 54).
S.K. Sinha flouted both.

In an article in Asian Age (August 14), Sengupta opines that "as long
as only 20,000 pilgrims are there they would be able to take shelter
in existing huts and be safe".

He considered the Baltal route as an alternative. "Almost 5 km of this
route from Sangam on the way to Baltal is extremely difficult and
risky. There cannot be any question of permitting large number of
people to travel on this track." It is "extremely slippery". The Army
holds that it is not an "immediate alternative possibility". Why then
did he recommend development of this route? If the numbers are
restricted, as he himself said, the Pahalgam route would suffice. Yet
it is on the Baltal route that the controversial land was allotted.

He did not recommend any acquisition of land. The Jammu and Kashmir
Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board Act, 2000, set up a Board for
"upgradation of facilities" for the pilgrims with the Governor as its
head. The Board is empowered (Section 16 d) "to undertake
developmental activities concerning the area of the Shrine and its
surroundings" – and no more.

S.K. Sinha became Governor in 2003. On July 2, 2004, a petition was
filed in the High Court at Jammu, not in Kashmir where the Amarnath
cave is situated, against the State government for just three reliefs
– it must not interfere with the SASB's decision at its meeting in New
Delhi on March 17, 2004; it must give up registration of yatris
nationwide and quotawise; and it must not authorise a private
helicopter service. No demand for land was made at that meeting at
all. Only suitable accommodation for yatris and shelters – without
allotment of land. The SASB supported the petition, "it is interesting
to note", Justice Permode Kohli remarked in his judgment on April 15,
2005. He went far beyond the petition to grant reliefs it did not seek
and counsel it did not ask for. He ordered extension of the yatra to
two months. "The State should not object to it."

The land issue surfaced in this judgment as an order to "permit user
of the land by the Board" to upgrade the infrastructure along the
route. The judge found the Baltal route "narrow and dangerous…." but
then found "considerable improvement" on both routes – on evidence
neither side had provided.

On appeal, a Division Bench comprising Justices Y.P. Nargotra and V.K.
Shanji gave interim directions on May 17, 2005, "without prejudice to
the rights of the parties". No judgment was given. In regard to land,
the word "user" was not used; it was allotment. "The land to be
allotted by the Board would be only for the purposes of user." This is
allotment, not permission for user. Allotment implies transfer of
legal interest in the land, however limited. It is not sought in any
of the pilgrimages in India or anywhere else. Local bodies do not
"allot" land to bus companies. They permit them to erect stops and
shelters on the route.

Meanwhile, on May 29, 2005, the Secretary, Forest Department, Sonali
Kumar, wife of the SASB's chief executive officer Arun Kumar, issued
orders, at his request, for diversion of land to the SASB. His and the
Governor's offensive remarks on reactions to the eventual order of
allotment on May 26, 2008, need not be recalled here (see the writer's
article "Why Kashmir erupts"; Frontline; August 1). Like the Central
Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980, the State's Act of 1997 also lays
down mandatory curbs, even for permits that forest land "may be used
for any non-forest purpose". A Cabinet resolution based on the advice
of an advisory committee is mandatory.

The Secretary, Forest, overlooked this as did the three judges of the
High Court. Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed rescinded the order
and stalled on S.K. Sinha's demands. The High Court stayed the
rescission.

In a letter of January 1, 2008, S.K. Sinha contended that the Governor
is "sovereign ex-officio holder of the power… who acts on his own
personal satisfaction and not on the aid and advice of the council of
ministers… the member [of the Legislative Council] may be explained
that he does not enjoy the powers to question the decisions of the
body" (Greater Kashmir; June 12, 2008). This was insolent nonsense. As
a statutory body, the SASB is amenable to the Court's orders and also
to the Assembly's probes. S.K. Sinha even proposed to set up an
independent Amarnath Development Authority on the stretch from
Sonamarg to Pahalgam.

Proceedings under the Act were taken only in 2007. The Law Department,
the Advocate General and Law Minister Muzaffar Hussein Beig considered
the applicability to Jammu and Kashmir of the Supreme Court's interim
directions in a case on April 27, 2007. They were not. But on November
23, 2007, the Court gave its judgment in the case (T.N. Godavarman vs.
Union of India (2008) 2 -SCC 222). Its observations bind Jammu and
Kashmir. They were not considered before the Cabinet took the decision
on May 20 or before the government passed the order on May 26. Both
are bad in law. These facts are cited in the Forest Department's
memorandum to the Cabinet for its decision dated February 26, 2008. It
is gravely flawed and misrepresents the Advocate General and the Law
Minister.

It is noteworthy that the Supreme Court did not clear the project in
that case although it would have helped the poor tribal people in that
area. It made important observations on balancing development with
environment concerns. In the Amarnath case, the land sought to be
given is on the alternative, and not sole, route to the cave which is
admittedly dangerous. Only a political agenda can explain such sheer
obstinacy.

The Forest Department's order of May 2008 went beyond "user"
(paragraph 9). Arun Kumar said it was permanent and the yatra would be
for the whole year (Rising Kashmir; June 17, 2008). The State
government has now agreed to make the land available to the SASB for
three months, reportedly. It wants to give "user rights"; the SASB
wants "exclusive rights" (The Hindu; August 25). On August 30 the
Sangharsh Samiti rejected the government's proposal on the grounds
that it was not given "exclusive" rights. Within hours, the government
caved in and accepted the Samiti's diktat. It will "set aside for the
use by SASB exclusively the land in Baltal" and falsely characterise
this as land traditionally under use for the use of the yatra. The
accord is worse than the order, which never used the word "exclusive".
The duration of use will be for the yatra and also from time to time
as the SASB requires – a faint hint of user throughout the year. There
is no provision for return of land. The accord is one-sided and void:
it violates Section 2 of the Act of 1997.

The 39.88 hectares of forest land were to be given "at Baltal and
Domail", not on the main Pahalgam route. The Sengupta Report was to be
abandoned - on the duration of the yatra and on the number of yatris.
The yatra becomes a show of political strength, not a holy pilgrimage.
The SASB's spokesman, Rajendra Mishra, said on August 18 that the
numbers would increase. The accord if concluded will be void in law.
The entire process has been irregular, most shockingly.

It is bad enough that the Cabinet did not consider the Supreme Court's
ruling. What is shocking is that the Forest Department's memo
contained grave factual misrepresentations regarding Advocate General
Altaf Husain Naik and Law Minister Muzaffar Hussain Beig. On August
26, Naik said in detail that the file in this case was "never"
referred to him. His observations related to a different case of
diversion of forest land. In equal detail, on August 27, Beig informed
me that his views also quoted in the memo related to a different case.
Clearly the Forest Department in its zeal pressed into service in the
Amarnath case opinions by two lawyers given in an altogether different
case and misrepresented them in effect. This vitiates the entire
process.

No order for diversion can be made now, even under an accord, unless
the entire procedure under the Act of 1997 is undergone afresh.
Section 2 of the Act mandatorily requires advice of the advisory
committee which must be given afresh - plus "a resolution of the
Council of Ministers", which will come into being only after the next
elections.
Mailed fist for valley

REUTERS

Trucks stranded on a road blocked by protesters in Jammu on August 26.

The mailed fist is reserved for the valley. The few days of mammoth
but unarmed rallies revealed nothing about popular sentiment that was
not known before. S.K. Sinha himself said: "We have been able to
control militancy in Kashmir but the mindset behind the separatist
movement is intact" (Business Standard; August 16). Precisely.
Militancy can be crushed. Alienation cannot be. It deepens with
repression. It cannot be eradicated by the crackdown on August 24
following the visit of M.K. Narayanan, National Security Adviser.

S.K. Sinha could not have behaved as he did or even survived in office
but for the Centre's backing, mainly, but not exclusively, by Home
Minister Shivraj Patil. Even before the crackdown ordered by the
Centre, the disparity in treatment was glaring. It has become worse
since, because some in New Delhi sympathise with the agitators in
Jammu and have been consistently and notoriously hostile to the ones
in Srinagar. It is the same old story of "them" and "us". In Jammu, as
Amitab Sinha remarked, "It is significant that despite loss of public
property and defying of curfew and prohibitory orders by thousands of
people, authorities have restrained themselves from making preventive
arrests" (Indian Express; August 6). There were attacks on Muslims;
the Gujjars' huts were torched.

Muzamil Jaleel cited specific cases in Srinagar of the Central Reserve
Police Force targeting ambulances ferrying the injured and, "in one
instance, they opened fire at the entrance to a hospital's casualty
ward" (Indian Express; August 15). Kashmir Times editorially censured
police firing "inside the emergency and casualty wards of the SMHS
hospital" (August 13).

It is the very peaceful character of the Hurriyat's movement that
unnerved New Delhi. "The change is that there is no militancy this
time," Mirwaiz Umer Farooq said on August 16. "New Delhi cannot
dismiss the demand of Kashmiris as militancy. Now, it has to address
the issue [of Kashmir's status]."

On August 23, a day before the crackdown, the United Jehad Council
headed by Syed Salahuddin "unanimously decided to silence the guns in
Kashmir" (Shujaat Bhukhari; The Hindu; August 24). The New York Times'
Somini Sengupta reported from Srinagar: "The main city hospital was
filled with Kashmiris shot and wounded by Indian security forces"
(International Herald Tribune; August 23). On August 24 came the
crackdown. "This is the strictest curfew in Kashmir in the past 20
years" (Indian Express; August 27). Srinagar went without newspapers
from August 24. Mediamen and even doctors with passes were beaten up.

Whatever for? To soften the Hurriyat leaders to secure acceptance of
the new land deal? And, indeed, what follows next? When Nehru arrested
Sheikh Abdullah on August 9, 1953, he imagined that with repression
over time Kashmir would submit. It did not. It will not now, either.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must assert himself and, with his
liberal instincts, ask himself two questions: What will be the
consequences of appeasement in Jammu? And what will be the
consequences of the repression in Kashmir? He can arrest the drift to
disaster even now. How can elections be held in Jammu and Kashmir in
this situation?

Burke's speech in the House of Commons on March 22, 1775, on
conciliation with rebellious America has stood the test of time: "The
use of force alone is but temporary. It may subdue for a moment; but
it does not remove the necessity of subduing again; and a nation is
not governed which is perpetually to be conquered… conciliation
failing, force remains, but force failing, no further hope of
reconciliation is left."