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 |  Subject: War-weary Kashmiris enjoy a period of calm  Sun Jan 04, 2009 7:59 am | |
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- SOMINI SENGUPTA: War-weary Kashmiris enjoy a period of calm
Somini Sengupta
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After years of being caught in the middle of an insurgency Kashmiris have become weary of the fighting, but the present calm and the fact that they are now turning out to vote does not mean they have embraced India, writes SOMINI SENGUPTA
MORE than a decade before the attacks last month in Mumbai, militants from Lashkar-e-Taiba showed up in Bothoo in Indian-administered Kashmir, turning this pine-ringed village into a lair that became known as "the cat's attic".
Locals immediately recognised that they were different from the Kashmiri guerillas before them. These fighters were mostly from the Punjab province of Pakistan. They were well armed, well trained and ruthless. They introduced suicide bombings here in 1999. The following year, they attacked a nearby Indian army camp, recording the screams of the soldiers holed up inside and then playing them back to locals, who lapped it up.
But today, after years of being caught in the middle of an insurgency that has been brutally suppressed by Indian forces, Kashmiris are weary of the fighting. Lashkar militants still make the treacherous passage over the hills from Pakistan, people here say, though fewer of them come. The valley is quieter than it has been in years.
In recent weeks, Kashmiris have even reached a new watershed: channelling local grievances into the polling booth and turning out in record numbers to vote in the staggered state election, the last phase of which is on Wednesday.
Overall turnout figures have soared over 60 per cent, according to the state election office, and the voting has been notably free of violence and coercion, at least by Kashmiri standards. The militants, in an apparent concession to Kashmiri fatigue, did not threaten those who took part in the vote. In this district, turnout was 59 per cent.
But the fact that Kashmiris are turning out to vote does not mean that they have embraced India, as weeks of massive protests this summer demonstrated. They continue to chafe under the restrictions of the Indian security forces, whose human-rights record in Kashmir has been internationally criticised for years.
Kashmiris are voting to demand ordinary things: roads, electricity, jobs. "The main problem here is unemployment," said Shafqat Shabir, 18, a first-time voter in the nearest town, Bandipore, on Election Day last month.
He and his friends had taken part in the anti-Indian demonstrations earlier in the year, screaming azadi, or freedom from India. Azadi, said his friend Afaq Hussain Mir, 22, is "our birthright".
That cause remains essential to Lashkar, and it is still its most effective recruiting tool. Formed more than two decades ago with the help of the Pakistani intelligence agencies, the original mission of Lashkar was to challenge India's hold on this fertile, mostly Muslim valley, which the two countries have fought over for six decades.
As peace talks progressed in recent years between India and Pakistan, Lashkar sharply reduced its attacks in Kashmir. At the same time, Lashkar has moved on to bigger, higher-profile targets throughout India.
The targets included a science centre in southern Bangalore, a Hindu temple in eastern Varanasi and, the most audacious of all, Mumbai, the financial capital, where a three-day siege killed about 170 people and nine gunmen.
While Lashkar has denied any link to the Mumbai attacks, the one surviving gunman, from among at least 10, said he belonged to the group and named known Lashkar commanders as his trainers.
The link to Kashmir remains strong. The man identified as the mastermind of the Mumbai attacks, Zaki ur-Rahman Lakhvi, once served as a commander here in Indian-controlled Kashmir. Residents say his son, known as Qasim, is among the more recent Lashkar fighters who have trickled over the border.
In October 2007, Zaki ur-Rahman Lakhvi was killed in an all-night gun battle with Indian soldiers on the outskirts of Bandipore.
Sympathy for the militants coexists with fear, frustration and admiration. When Lashkar first landed on the doorsteps of the villagers, people here recalled, residents trekked down to the bazaar and bought provisions for them. Despite being brazen killers, people said, the Lashkar cadres were surprisingly well-behaved guests.
They did not interfere in village disputes, as members of some of the other militant groups had. They did not harass women. They never ordered the men and women of Bothoo to stop praying at the shrine of a female Sufi saint, as other radical Islamist groups had. However, they never prayed there themselves.
But the people paid a high price for the presence of the militants. As Lashkar established itself here, Indian security forces fought back, turning this remote village into a war zone. Men lost limbs. Women lost their husbands. For years, no one was safe.
After the Indian army set up a camp in the middle of Bothoo, the village chief said he begged the local Lashkar commander not to attack. If he did, the village chief said he feared that the army would retaliate by burning the whole place down, as it had done elsewhere.
The village chief spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of making enemies. He said his brother had been killed by Lashkar militants after they accused him of being an informant.
Even today, loss hovers over these tin-roofed houses. Memories are raw. Rosha Begum Reshi said she lost her husband after Indian soldiers accused him of being a militant. They dragged him out of the house and shot him to death.
Nazir Ahmad Reshi lost a leg when members of another Pakistani militant group, Jaish-e-Muhammad, shot him as he tried to save a neighbour from their wrath. Today, at 28, he hobbles on crutches. He cannot work. He cannot leave the village.
His father, Ghulam Reshi, lean and angry, spoke bitterly about the fighters who crossed the border from Pakistan. He no longer cared which group they belonged to. They were not welcome.
"They wasted my son's life," he said. "Our own people didn't commit these atrocities. It was as though they started sending convicted murderers from the other side."
Despite such frustration, many still fear that without a political solution soon to the Kashmir conflict, Kashmiris, especially the young, will grow impatient and support the insurgency once again. -- IHT - Code:
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http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Monday/Columns/2433642/Article/index_html |
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