Guns not government, call the shots in Kashmir Villages

Guns not government, call the shots in Kashmir Villages
September 1999
The Statesman

Chaknatnussa. There is no Army camp here. Not even a po-lice post, though the village is the site of the fiercest attack on the Army in the Kashmir Valley since Operation Vijay. The 4 Rashtriya Rifles camp was stormed by militants on 5 August. In the ensuing encounter, five soldiers, in-cluding an officer, six foreign militants and a civilian—a class-XII boy—were killed.
The villagers fled. Those who stayed say they were beaten by the Army the next day. The broken windows and household goods bear testimony to wrath. The villagers say the local police helped and prevented the Army from unleashing their rage any further. But the civil administration refused, telling them not to go home. “Why couldn’t they come? Don’t we matter?” asked the villagers who returned home only after the Army unit moved away to a safer location. The vil-lagers blame the Army for “allowing” the militants across the border. “They don’t do anything and then blame us.”
People in Chaknatnussa say their sympathies are with the militants. “They are Mujahideen fighting our war. We will support them.” But the pro-militant speech is a little too glib for conviction, perhaps addressed at someone in the crowd, a militant. Local policemen claim they camp in the village even by day since the Army camp was removed. Chaknatnussa is far removed from the reality of elections on 18 September. So is Kandi, a nearby village.
The resentment in Kandi is about the occupation of the village school by the Army unit recently. Though the Army earlier occupied a part of the building, it has now taken over the entire area which is out of bounds to civilians for secu-rity reasons. Exams have been postponed. Villagers are not allowed to move after 7 p.m. or to light lamps which the Army deems dangerous. About 20 boys from this village have gone across the border in the last 2-3 months.
So have about 20-25 boys from Vilgam, part of the rough official estimate of around 250 local youths who went over the border in the first phase of the Kar-gil operations. Nazir Ahmed Wani of Vilgam has been killed by militants. So was Sardar Khan of Maidan Chogul last week. He was the National Conference block president and villagers believe he paid the price for hosting the NC MLA and minister for forests, Chaudhary Ramzan, at his house two days before his death.
Villagers of Poru Wattayah complain that they are being forced into patrol-ling duties by the security forces. The idea is apparently to force villagers to prevent militants from entering. “We have only lathis with us. If we encounter militants what do you think we do? We choose the safest option.”
Choosing what appeared to be the safest option did not help Rasheed Gani, a local who has been an active member of the Hizbul Mujahideen. He disappeared one month after surrendering to the local unit of the Rashtriya Rifles.
The dividends of peace are too slow, too remote and too negligible for people to identify with. The benefits do not trickle down to them. The National Confer-ence, says a villager, has just appointed four relatives of the ruling party ac-tivists in Bandipora, ignoring merit.
It is difficult to convince voters of the empowerment of electoral democracy here as it is in Bandipora, which is also identified as one of the areas se-verely affected by militancy. “For the two minutes that you use to cast your vote, you are above your leader. Exercise that power,” says Muzaffar Beig, the People’s Democratic Party candidate from Baramulla, at an election meeting in Bandipora market. But Beig’s speech is all about fear and asking the electorate to take courage to participate. He accuses the ruling party of trying to dis-courage electoral activity by creating fear and suspicion. “A boycott will only help the NC. Guns will not solve your problems. Vote to change your fortunes.
But, the rally is thinly attended. A small crowd listens warily from the dis-tance. Stones skitter across the market place. Close by a car window smashes. Desultory policemen move around, apparently disinterested in stopping the trou-ble. The crowd begins to melt away.
If Beig has with him former militants, Imran Rahi and Bilal Lodhi, the NC is using the services of a former militant turned counter-insurgent turned politi-cian who still operates in the area with his group pf 190 gun-totting counter-insurgents, hated by the locals. The Ikhwan (renegades) are only one of the fears. “We live under the fear of four guns,” says Irfan of Ajaas village—the Army, the Ikhwan, the militants and the police. “How can you even ask us about elections? What do they mean to us?”
Ajaas lies on the Srinagar-Bandipora road, forbidden to Army vehicles because it is pitted with craters. An easy place for planting mines. Villagers here have to travel to Srinagar via the much longer Sopore Road. The crops have failed be-cause of the lack of water. The electric grid station was burnt down. A few days ago Mohammed Ashraf of Safapora was killed in Krishu. “An encounter with mili-tant” is how officialdom described it. “Not so,” say residents. “He was a civil-ian”. Increased militant activities in this belt has meant more crackdowns, beatings at the hands of the armed forces, an occasional death.
Ajaas is a week away from elections, or several eons, depending on how you look at it. “Politicians don’t come here to campaign,” says Ashrar, “they are too scared.” The National Conference insists there will be high voter turnout in this area. If there is, it won’t be because of the voters engagement with the remote exercise of parliamentary
Elections.