[Reader-list] Selective condemnation of rape and murder has become bane of J&K politics

[S. Jabbar]

Dear Sanjay,

Psy-ops, sly-ops?  Strong language.  Why, because you don't agree with what
is being said?   

A.A. Fayyaz being 'widely regarded as the Praveen Swami of Kashmiri
journalism' is neither here nor there.  There are many names floating around
about me and about you, and indeed about many people who draw attention to
themselves by occasionally speaking the truth in Kashmir so let us not go
into the merits and demerits of these appellations.

This piece is the latest of a few he has written about Pulwama.  If you do a
net search you will find his first report, which was indeed a 'straight
forward rendering' of the incident.  You may also find a few reported by
others, though few journalists have written about this case because few
have the courage to do so.  The reason I did not post the ones preceding
this because I think someone already did post it last week or 10 days ago,
unless I read it on another list-serve.  I apologise for the confusion this
may have caused.

Fayyaz incidentally, writes now for the Early Times. He calls the Pulwama
incident rape as does the MLA from Langate in the Assembly.  You may pass it
off as sexual harassment/sexual violence/sex-under-coercion, but the fact
remains that the woman in question was an unemployed nurse who had gone to
the CMO's office because he had promised her a job.  I have no idea whether
this was the first time he was sexually assaulting her, or not and I don't
know whether the person who filmed it was her relative or his colleague.  An
enquiry has been ordered  and I will not comment until some more facts
emerge.  

You ask rhetorically why is there a trust deficit between the citizens of
the Valley and men in khaki?  The answer is obvious and I am the last person
to be mealy mouthed about it.  You want me to further clarify: because the
men in khaki have not had an exemplary record in the last 20 years in J&K,
just as men in khaki and by extension men with guns all over the world,
murder often passing for patriotic action and rape, shrugged off as
collateral damage.  I have actually met women who have been sexually
assaulted by men in khaki in Kashmir and have condemned those incidents in
no uncertain terms.  However, having gone through all that is available on
the Shopian case, I cannot in all good conscience say that the women were
either murdered or raped.

I am deeply disturbed that you read condescension in my statement about the
'women's initiative.'  Please do not create misunderstandings by putting
words into my mouth.  Some of these women I have known for many, many years,
some I have worked with in the past and I have great affection and respect
for all of them.  Having said that I do not agree with their report.  They
know this as I attended their press conference and publicly asked questions
that they could not answer to my satisfaction.

To go into the Shopian case, its twists and turns, to question every
allegation will take me time and energy that I do not wish to expend on this
list.  I am writing about it and I beg your patience until it is published.
If not, do call or drop in for a cup of coffee and I will be happy to
clarify my views.
Best
sj



> From: Sanjay Kak <kaksanjay at gmail.com>
> Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 11:32:58 +0530
> To: Sarai <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Selective condemnation of rape and murder has
> become bane of J&K politics
> 
> Sonia,
Where is this piece from? It usually helps to source such
> incendiary
writing, since the net is a place awash with propaganda and
> psy-ops.
(Sly ops?) Of course Mr Ahmed Ali Fayyaz is a senior
> Kashmiri
journalist-in fact he is widely regarded as the Praveen Swami
> of
Kashmiri journalism, and that is no small compliment to both.
About the
> piece: he has devoted considerable space to last years
events around the
> Shopian rape and murder, but the rhetorical use to
which he puts it overwhelms
> the details of this more recent event. One
misses a straight forward rendering
> of what has actually happened in
Pulwama. This is important because the
> mainstream media (including the
vast Indian Express bureau) seem to have
> missed the importance of this
incident.
For me A A Fayyaz's sentence "Second
> one has been purportedly shot on
camera and the actor stands not only
> identified but also placed under
suspension, arrested and jailed" is quite
> loaded. I would imagine that
most serious journalists would want to tarry for
> a moment on the
"purportedly shot on camera", and ask the who/how of this
> piece of
evidence. A rape shot on camera? By whom? The fact that he has
> been
placed under suspension, arrested and jailed is not evidentiary. This
is
> Kashmir we are talking about, after all.
Whatever its journalistic failings
> the piece inadvertantly still draws
attention to some important questions: why
> is there such a huge trust
deficit between the men in Olive Green/Khakhi and
> the people of
Kashmir? Why did the people of Shopian go on a 42 day hartal
> last
year? To suggest that it was only because they were misled
> by
self-serving politicians of the PDP and NC is to display an
astonishing
> lack of regard for facts: the Majlis-e-Mashawarat, which
led the hartal and
> the ongoing struggle, had made it clear that no
political parties were welcome
> in town, and they managed to keep the
issue quite distinct  from "Separatist"
> politics as well.
I think think a journalist of A A Fayyaz's stature would
> have done
well to find out what were the pressures that made Dr Nighat
> change
her statement (whether or not she swore on the Qur'an). Then perhaps
he
> would be led to the circumstances that led to the other Dr Un-named
being
> "purportedly shot on camera".
Lastly, am I the only one who reads some
> condescension in your comment
that "this group of well-meaning women are not
> the first to get misled
with half-facts and half-truths in Kashmir". Perhaps
> it would be
better if there was a concrete critique of the report of
> the
Independent Initiative, or their findings and conclusions. When you
say
> "the Shopian case was an extremely complicated case, which was
manipulated and
> presented to the world as fact", is there an
alternative reading that you
> would share with us, or guide us to?

Best

Sanjay Kak

On Wed, Mar 31, 2010
> at 7:47 PM, S. Jabbar <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com> wrote:
> Kshmendra, it is
> unfair to condemn them as such.  The Shopian case was an
> extremely
> complicated case, which was manipulated and presented to the world
> as fact.
> Sadly, this group of well-meaning women are not the first to get
> misled with
> half-facts and half-truths in Kashmir.  I think the admission by
> Dr.Nighat
> last year of forging the vaginal samples genuinely shocked many
> people in
> Kashmir-- after all she had sworn upon the Qur'an.  That coupled
> with the 2
> cases of murder in Maisuma (where near riots had broken out as
> people had
> initially suspected the security forces) will, hopefully cause
> some
> introspection.  Ahmed Ali Fayyaz's article is a move in that direction.
>
> --sj
>
>
> From: Kshmendra Kaul <kshmendra2005 at yahoo.com>
> Date: Wed, 31 Mar
> 2010 06:37:29 -0700 (PDT)
> To: "S. Jabbar" <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com>
> Cc:
> sarai list <reader-list at sarai.net>
> Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Selective
> condemnation of rape and murder has
> become bane of J&K politics
>
>
> Continuing the question (it is a continual one where incidents and
>
> characters change):
>
> Where today are the Miss Marples, the whodunit
> experts, the Umas
> (Chakravarty), Ushas (Ramanathan), Seemas (Misra), Vrindas
> (Grover), Dr.
> Ajitas, Anuradhas (Bhasin Jamwal), those members of
> "Independent Women's
> Initiative for Justice" and authors of "Shopian:
> Manufacturing a Suitable
> Story"
>
> Kshmendra
>
>
> --- On Wed, 3/31/10, S.
> Jabbar <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> From: S. Jabbar
> <sonia.jabbar at gmail.com>
>> Subject: [Reader-list] Selective condemnation of
> rape and murder has become
>> bane of J&K politics
>> To: "Sarai"
> <reader-list at sarai.net>
>> Date: Wednesday, March 31, 2010, 5:22 PM
>>
>> RAPE
> OF POLITICS
>>
>> ....and where are those Mehboobas, Shameemas, Asiyas
> today?
>>
>> Selective condemnation of rape and murder has become bane of J&K
> politics
>>
>> Ahmed Ali Fayyaz
>>
>> JAMMU, Mar 30: Hullabaloo over then
> widely perceived rape-cum-murder of two
>> young woman, married Neelofar Jan
> and unmarried Asiya Jan, of Shopian in May
>> last year was understandable as
> well as justifiable. Jostling for the
>> limelight, female politicians of all
> hues had done whatever possible to
>> undercut one another in the race of
> smudging the men in uniform. There were
>> initially efforts to involve the
> Balpora-based formation of Rashtriya
>> Rifles. Soon the campaign was
> downgraded to a unit of Central Reserve Police
>> Force (CRPF). But once both
> proved to be the hard nuts, convenience zeroed
>> in on Police. Even as two of
> the Police personnel, detained for their
>> alleged involvement in destroying
> the evidences, were just a vegetarian
>> target, counter-insurgency profile of
> then SP and Dy SP of Shopian made it a
>> perfect case for a mass
> movement.
>>
>> For weeks together, Kashmir was yet again in flames. Eight
> people got
>> killed, and around 1,000 sustained injuries in clashes with
> Police and armed
>> forces. Over a thousand vehicles, including 50 ambulances
> of different
>> hospitals in the Valley, were damaged in stone pelting. There
> was shutdown
>> after shutdown for four months. Damage caused to the Kashmir
> economy is
>> estimated to be in hundreds of Crores of Rupees. Loss suffered
> by the
>> student community remained incalculable. Why all that? Obviously
> because
>> government officials, supposed to protect the honour and life of
> women, were
>> perceived to be involved in the sinister act of outraging the
> modesty of the
>> victims and doing away with them.
>>
>> Within months, yet
> another government official---this time a doctor on whose
>> evidence stood
> the ³rape-cum-murder² of the Shopian duo---has been found to
>> have outraged
> the chastity of a hapless woman at his clinic at the nearby
>> district
> headquarters of Pulwama. There are few differences between the two.
>> First
> one was fully based on surmise, speculation and perception. Post
>> mortem
> reports of two teams of doctors made it an explosive case of gang
>> rape and
> murder. Actors need not to be searched in such kind of incidents in
>> the
> strife torn Valley. Second one has been purportedly shot on camera and
>> the
> actor stands not only identified but also placed under suspension,
>> arrested
> and jailed.
>>
>> In case of Shopian, the victims were found to have died
> once. In case of
>> Pulwama, the victim has been left to die a hundred times
> every day as long
>> as she lives. The latest revelation is that she happens
> to be the mother of
>> a girl doing first year of her MBBS and a 17-year-old
> son who is in class
>> 11th. Shopian happened by night in a nullah and Pulwama
> in broad daylight
>> during the holy month of Ramazan, at a property owned by
> a religious trust.
>> Then, why an uproar on Shopian and a silence of
> convenience on Pulwama? The
>> biggest poser of the cruel times in Kashmir: Is
> it the outfits of an actor
>> that categorizes rapes in the Valley? Had the
> Pulwama actor been in Khaki,
>> would the Kashmiri politicians have maintained
> this silence. The questions
>> ahead: Are the Kashmiri female politicians
> concerned over the outrage of the
>> modesty of hapless women by government
> officials or are they exploiting such
>> incidents selectively to create space
> for themselves in the politics of
>> deceit and camouflage that has had a
> bullish market from New Delhi to
>> Islamabad?
>>
>> PDP President, Mehbooba
> Mufti, and the pro-Pakistan Dukhataraan-e-Millat
>> supremo, Asiya Andrabi,
> stole the show in Shopian as they left no stone
>> unturned in berating the
> men in uniform. That was understandable for one was
>> the queen of the
> mainstream opposition and another indisputably the highest
>> profile female
> political activist in the separatist camp. But the ruling
>> National
> Conference¹s MLA, Shameema Firdaus, appeared to outsmart all and
>> sundry in
> the agitation when she led a procession of workers on Residency
>> Road in
> Srinagar, chanting slogans against the Shopian rapists and killers
>> and
> demanding exemplary punishment for them all.
>>
>> Of late, Shameema Firdaus,
> has been appointed by Omar Abdullah government as
>> the Chairperson of the
> State Women¹s Commission. While Asiya and her ilk in
>> the separatist camp
> must have now realized the dangers of walking into the
>> trap of pro-India
> politicians, PDP chief has never been sighted in Assembly
>> since the day
> Pulwama surfaced on March 21. Ms Firdaus remained in
>> attendance but did not
> utter a word of condemnation even when the
>> independent MLA from Langet,
> Engineer Sheikh Abdul Rashid, raised his lonely
>> voice on the floor of the
> House and demanded termination of the doctor¹s
>> services.
>>
>> Until
> yesterday, the big question was: How could the two women have drowned
>> to
> death in ³ankle deep waters² of Rambiara ? After CBI exonerated all the>>
> four Policemen and filed a chargesheet against 13 persons, including six
>>
> doctors---notably then deputy Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr Ghulam Qadir>>
> Sofi, now booked for raping a woman at his clinic---a bigger question
>>
> surfaced: How do the gang rapes in Valley take place while leaving hymen of
>>
> an unmarried woman intact? Now a far bigger question: Is it all politics on
>>
> rape or rape of politics---to spare the rapists in civvies and target only
>>
> the rapists in uniform?
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