The (in)visible in Indian terrorism

Indian Muslims are often accused of terrorist links, but in many cases it is Muslims themselves who are terrorised.

By Irfan Ahmad

India's media often rushes to blame Muslims for acts of terrorism, sometimes without serious evidence [EPA]  

According to the Indian government and media, many Muslim groups have recently been involved in terrorism. Of these, three stand out: Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), formed in 1976 and banned soon after 9/11 for fomenting “communal disharmony” and “sedition”; Deccan Mujahideen (DM), an outfit which shot to prominence by claiming responsibility for the 2008 Mumbai terror attack; and Indian Mujahideen (IM), a group believed to have been formed after 2001. These groups have been charged with killing hundreds of people. The latest attack came on July 13, when 20 people were killed in a series of bombings in Mumbai.

Shortly after the attack, the police said that IM and SIMI were behind the blasts. A nationwide hunt followed. According to Rakesh Maria, Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) Chief, expert teams fanned out to seven states. Officers from the National Intelligence Agency, formed after the 2008 Mumbai attacks to fight terrorism, raided the houses of two IM suspects in Ranchi, capital of Jharkhand state.

In Indian political discourse, outfits like SIMI, DM and IM appear as a threat to India’s stability and its global rise. While some depict them as domestic groups, others portray them as working in alliance with outfits from Pakistan. It is thus believed that IM was floated by Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a militant group formed in 1990 in Afghanistan and active in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. Most accounts of these outfits are, however, inconsistent and even contradictory.

By analysing the Mumbai attack and the alleged involvement of IM and SIMI, I make three arguments. First, since the media and the security agencies have a close and uncritical relationship, we should have a healthy doubt about the accuracy of their information, and refrain from immediately pointing fingers at one Muslim group or another. Despite the fact that barely anyone adequately knows what IM is and how it came about, after the July attack several Muslims were arrested as terrorists.

Second, because Muslims are blamed, arrested, tortured, and killed (by the police) after each terror attack, with little or no evidence, such measures might end up creating the danger the Indian state claims to fight.

Third, I contend that the Indian media’s role in “reporting” terrorism is prejudiced.  

What is Indian Mujahideen?

After the blast, the police arrested many people from Mumbai’s “sensitive” (read Muslim) neighbourhoods, a practice the residents of such neighbourhoods have grown accustomed to in the last decade. One suspect, Faiz Usmani, died in police custody. The police claimed that his death was caused by “hypertension”; his family believes that he was tortured. Usmani was the brother of Afzal Usmani, in jail for his alleged involvement in the 2008 Ahmadabad blast. Both brothers are reported to be IM members.

Riaz Bhatkal, described as India’s “most wanted terrorist”, is regarded as IM’s founder. He became close with SIMI in the early 1990s when it began to radicalise. Born in 1976, Bhatkal went to an English-medium school and later studied engineering at a Mumbai college. But beyond that, much of IM’s history remains unclear. It's not even known whether Bhatkal is alive or dead. After the July 13 blast, the ATS attempted to nab him. This is surprising, because early this year the media reported that Bhatkal was killed in Karachi by Chhota Rajan, Mumbai’s underworld don. 

The media provides differing accounts of IM’s formation and, in fact, is sometimes inconsistent even within a single version. For example, Animesh Roul, the director of the Society for the Study of Peace and Conflict in Delhi, claimed that IM was “conceived at a terrorist conclave attended by top leaders of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Harkat-ul-Jehadi Islami (HuJI) in Pakistani-administered Kashmir in May 2008”. He did not find it contradictory when in the next paragraph he wrote, “IM came into the open for the first time in November 2007”. In Asian Policy, Christine Fair indicated two dates of its formation: 2001 and an ambiguous date of “much later”. According to The Times of India, IM was formed in 2005. To Namrata Goswami of the Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis in Delhi, “key SIMI members …started supporting the idea of the formation of the IM as early as December 2007”.     

IM first hit the headlines after a series of explosions in November 2007. In an email to the media and police, IM claimed responsibility for the blasts. As the email explained, the aim of those attacks was to protest against “the pathetic conditions of Muslims in India that idol worshippers can kill our brothers, sisters, children and outrage dignity of our sisters at any place and at any time and we can’t resist them”. Then, in 2008, minutes before the blasts in Ahmadabad, IM sent an email (entitled “The Rise of Jihad, Revenge of Gujarat”) to the media saying: “We hereby declare an ultimatum to all the state governments of India … to stop harassing the Muslims and keep a check on their killing, expulsion, and encounters.”

The messages are a sign that IM’s aim is to protest against and avenge the killings and humiliation of Muslims at the hands of Hindu nationalists and the state administration. The destruction of the Babri mosque by Hindu nationalists in 1992 is important to IM’s ideological repertoire - hence its description by the media and the terrorism experts as a “home-grown”, “domestic” terror outfit. Since the media regard the Babri mosque as a domestic issue (unlike Kashmir, which is international) and the IM invokes the Babri mosque to rationalise its attacks, the IM is thus considered a domestic outfit.

However, many Indian security experts hold that IM is a tool of Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) used to destabilise India. In these accounts, IM is a means to advance ISI’s agenda of destabilising India and at the same time to exonerate Pakistan of any allegations made by India and the West of promoting terrorism. The logic of the security experts is that the word “Indian” in IM points to India’s domestic groups, rather than Pakistani groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, through which the ISI has been operating in Kashmir. On the other hand, experts like B Raman allege that IM and SIMI's reach extends beyond South Asia, characterising the groups as a part of a global network of Islamic radicals without furnishing adequate evidence.

India’s Guantanamo Bays

The media invariably base their stories on the sources of the state. An apt example is Praveen Swami, a terrorism expert cited by everyone writing about the IM. Swami is to print media what Arnab Goswami (of Times Now) is to Indian TV: Their views are rabidly nationalist, some might even say Islamophobic. Swami reproduces the police version (e.g. see his writings in CTC Sentinel, May 2010; The Hindu, Edit-Page, March 22, 2010; and Frontline, June 2-15, 2007) without giving the other side of the story, namely: the viewpoints of the alleged terrorists, their family members, or the Muslim community. It is well-known that the Indian police are biased against Muslims and have been complicit in killing them, as was evident in the state-mediated 2002 Gujarat violence, in which 1,000 Muslims were killed.

Given that the Indian media is uninterested in reporting “facts” and multiple views, can an anthropologist like me make sense of the mediatised world of terrorism? Thomas Eriksen holds that a concept like globalisation has “no meaning to an anthropologist unless it can be studied through actual persons, their relationship to each other and to a larger surrounding world”. I thus agree with Peter Van der Veer that “behind the growing visibility [of media] is a growing invisibility”.

What is rarely visible in the Indian media, however, are the brutal, illegal methods used against suspected terrorists: torture cells, illegal detention, unlawful killings in “police encounters”; elimination of evidence against the illegal actions of the law-enforcing agencies; and rampant harassment of Muslims. In July 2009, The Week reported on the existence of at least 15 secret torture chambers meant to extract information from the detainees. The methods to extract information include attaching electrodes to a detainee’s genitals as well as the use of pethidine injections. To quote The Week, these chambers are “our own little Guantanamo Bays or Gitmos”, which a top policeman called “precious assets”.

In May 2008, a Muslim boy aged 14 was abducted by the Gujarat police. He was dragged to the police car at gunpoint and taken to a detention centre where he was tortured. He returned home ten days later when the court ordered his release following his mother’s petition. The police subsequently threatened the boy’s family with dire consequences if they pursued the case in court. The police harassment becomes even more acute in light of the fact that most lawyers often hesitate to take up the cases of “terrorists”. As a disempowered community - as the government-appointed Sachar Committee report (of 2006) minutely demonstrates - Muslims themselves don’t have adequate and qualified lawyers to pursue such cases. Muslims’ marginalisation thus renders their voice invisible in the media too.

It is believed that after SIMI was banned, soon after 9/11, its radical members formed IM. During my fieldwork (2001-2004) on Jamaat-e-Islami and SIMI I did not hear anything about IM. SIMI activists and other Muslims I met felt terrorised themselves. It is worth noting that since 2001 far more people have been arrested as “SIMI terrorists” than the actual number of SIMI members, which in 1996 was 413 (when founded in 1976, SIMI’s members numbered 132). Until today, the Indian government has still not legally proved its rationale for banning SIMI.

The story untold

In the fight against terrorism, evidence and the rule of law are subservient to prejudice. As of this writing, the Indian government has not yet tracked the perpetrators of the July 13 attack. However, only two days after the attack, Subramanian Swamy, a prominent politician and former minister (with a doctorate from Harvard University) wrote an article called “How to Wipe Out Islamic Terror”. Without any evidence, he blamed Muslims for the attack, in the same way that The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Sun suspected Muslim involvement in the Norway shooting nine days later.

What Swamy did is standard practice in Indian media. In September 2006, a blast killed 35 people at a Muslim graveyard in Malegaon (in the state of Karnataka). The media blamed Muslims. Likewise, in 2007, after a blast killed 10 Muslims praying in Hyderabad’s Mecca mosque, Praveen Swami freely wrote about the Muslim terrorists he believed caused it and about what he perceived to be the “Islamist threat to India’s cities”. However, investigations later showed that Hindu nationalists carried out the Malegaon and Mecca mosque terror attacks.

Returning to Subramanian Swamy, Swamy wrote: “We need a collective mindset as Hindus to stand against the Islamic terrorist. The Muslims of India can join us if they genuinely feel for the Hindus. That they do I will not believe unless they acknowledge with pride that though they may be Muslims, their ancestors were Hindus”. Those refusing to acknowledge this, Swamy advocated, “should not have voting rights”. He proposed declaring India “a Hindu Rashtra [state]”. 

Stories of Muslim terrorists abound in both the Indian and Western media. Since the July 13, 2011 Mumbai bombings, vitriolic pieces like Subramanian Swamy’s have appeared frequently in the media. These pieces subtly influence the analyses of many liberal intellectuals.

By contrast, stories portraying Muslims as the terrorised remain fairly sparse. One wonders if, and how, such stories will be told.

Irfan Ahmad is a political anthropologist and a lecturer at Monash University, Australia and author of Islamism and Democracy in India: The Transformation of Jamaat-e-Islami (Princeton University Press, 2009) which was short-listed for the 2011 International Convention of Asian Scholars Book Prize for the best study in the field of Social Sciences.

(C) www.aljazeera.com

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A meeting inside a jail with Afzal Guru

New Delhi based Journalist Vinod K. Jose meets Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru inside the high security Tihar Jail in New Delhi. Read excerpts from this rare interview with Afzal.

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Mohammad Afzal Guru

New Delhi, Feb 19, 2006 (Kashmir Newz Specials):

A rusted table, and behind it stood a well built man in uniform holding a spoon in his hand. Visitors, all of them looked habituated, queued up to open their plastic bags containing food, allowing it to be smelt, sometimes even tasted. The security man’s spoon paved its way through the thick grease floating curries—Malai Kofta, Shahi Paneer, Aalu Bengan, and Mixed Vegetables. As the visitors opened tiny bags of curries the spoon separated each piece of vegetable from the other, quite mechanically. 'Frisking' the food of a middle aged woman the spoon took a dip at the water in the steel bowl nearby. It then moved to the plastic bags of the next in the queue, an early teenage boy. By now water in the steel bowl has all kinds of colours. The floating oil gave it a vibgyor effect when light hit at it on the winter afternoon. Around 4.30 my turn came. The man left the spoon on the table and frisked my body top to bottom, thrice thoroughly. And when the metal detector made noise I had to remove my belt, steel watch, and keys. The man on duty bearing the badge of Tamilnadu Special Police (TSP) looked satisfied. I am allowed to enter now. This is the fourth security drill I had to go through to get into the High Risk Ward of Prison No 3 in Tihar Central Prison. I am on my way to meet Mohammad Afzal, one of the most talked about man in the contemporary times.

A room with many tiny cubicles. The Visitors and inmate are separated by a thick glass, and iron grills. The two connected through a mike and a speaker fixed on the wall. Poorly audible, people at both sides of the glass strained their ears out touching the wall to listen other. Mohammad Afzal was already at the other side of the cubicle. His face gave me an impression of unfathomable dignity and calmness. A little short man in his mid thirties wearing white kurta paijama had a Reynolds pen in his pocket. Very clear voice welcomed me with the best of all mannerisms.

How are you sir?, he said.

I said, I'm fine. Am I to return the same question to a man on the deathrow, was apprehensive for a second, but I did. Very fine. Thank you sir, he answered with warmth. The conversation went on for close to an hour, and continued a fortnight later with a second Mulakat. Both of us were in a hurry to answer and ask whatever one could in the time. I went on scribbling him in my tiny pocket book. He seemed to be a person who wanted to tell a lot of things to the world. But repeated his helplessness to reach people from the current stature of ‘condemned for life’. Excerpts of the interview

There are so many contradicting images of Afzal. Which Afzal am I meeting?

Is it? But as far as I’m concerned there is only one Afzal. That is me.

Who is that Afzal?

A moments’ silence Afzal as a young, enthusiastic, intelligent, idealistic young man, Afzal a Kashmiri influenced like many thousands in the Kashmir Valley in the political climate of early 1990s, who was a JKLF member and crossed over to the other side of Kashmir, but in a matter of weeks got disillusioned and came back and tried to live a normal life, but was never allowed to do so by the security agencies who inordinate times picked me up, tortured the pulp out of me, electrified, frozen in cold water, dipped in petrol, smoked in chilies you name it, and falsely implicated in a case, with no lawyer, no fair trial, finally condemned to death. The lies the police told was propagated by you in media. And that perhaps created what the Supreme Court referred to as "collective conscience of the nation”. And to satisfy that "collective conscience” I’m condemned to death. That is the Mohammad Afzal you are meeting.

After a moments’ silence, he continued.

But I wonder whether the outside world knows anything about this Afzal. I ask you, did I get a chance to tell my story? Do you think justice is done? Would you like to hang a person without giving him a lawyer? Without a fair trial? Without listening to what he had to go through in life? Democracy doesn’t mean all this, does it?

Can we begin with your life? Your life before the case…

It was a turbulent political period in Kashmir when I was growing up. Maqbul Bhatt was hanged. The situation was volatile. The people of Kashmir decided to fight an electoral battle once again to resolve the Kashmir issue through peaceful means. Muslim United Front (MUF) was formed to represent the sentiments of Kashmiri Muslims for the final settlement of the Kashmir issue. Administration at Delhi was alarmed by the kind of support that MUF was gaining and in the consequence we saw rigging in the election on an unprecedented scale. And the leaders, who took part in the election and won with huge majority, were arrested, humiliated and put behind bars. It is only after this that the same leaders gave call for armed resistance. In response thousands of youth took to armed revolt. I dropped out from my MBBS studies in Jhelum Valley Medical College, Srinagar. I was also one of those who crossed to the other side of Kashmir as a JKLF member, but was disillusioned after seeing Pakistani Politicians acting the same as the Indian politicians in dealing with Kashmiris. I returned after few weeks. I surrendered to the security force, and you know, I was even given a BSF certificate as surrendered militant. I began to start the life new. I could not become a doctor but I became a dealer of medicines and surgical instruments on commission basis (laughs).

With the meager income I even bought a scooter and also got married. But not a day passed by without the scare of Rashtriya Rifles and STF men harassing me. If there was a militant attack somewhere in Kashmir they would round up civilians, torture them to pulp. The situation was even worse for a surrendered militant like me. They detained us for several weeks, and threatened to implicate in false cases and were let free only if we paid huge bribes. Many times I had to go through this. Major Ram Mohan Roy of 22 Rashtriya Rifles gave electric shock to my private parts. Many times I was made to clean their toilets and sweep their camps. Once I had to bribe the security men with all that I had to escape from the Humhama STF torture camp. D.S.P. Vinay Gupta and D.S.P. Davinder Singh supervised the torture. One of their torture experts, Inspector Shanty Singh, electrified me for three hours until I agreed to pay one lakh rupees as bribe. My wife sold her jewelry and for the remaining amount they sold my scooter. I left the camp broken both financially and mentally. For six months I could not go outside home because my body was in such a bad shape. I could not even share the bed with my wife as my penile organ had been electrified. I had to take medical treatment to regain potency….

Afzal narrated the torture details with a disturbing calmness on his face. He seemed to have lot of details to tell me about the torture he faced. But unable to hear the horror stories of security forces that operate with my tax money, I cut him short and asked:

If you could come to the Case…, what were the incidents that led to the Parliament attack Case?

After all the lessons I learned in STF camps, which is either you and your family members get harassed constantly for resisting or cooperate with the STF blindly, I had hardly any options left, when D.S.P Davinder Singh asked me to do a small job for him. That is what he told, “a small job”. He told me that I had to take one man to Delhi. I was supposed to find a rented house for him in Delhi. I was seeing the man first time, but since he did not speak Kashmiri I suspected he was an outsider. He told his name was Mohammad [Mohammad is identified by the police as the man who led the 5 gunmen who attacked the Parliament. All of them were killed by the security men in the attack].

When we were in Delhi Mohammad and me used to get phone calls from Davinder Singh. I had also noticed that Mohammad used to visit many people in Delhi. After he purchased a car he told me now I could go back and gave me 35,000 rupees saying it was a gift. And I left to Kashmir for Eid.

When I was about to leave to Sopore from Srinagar bus stand I was arrested and taken to Parimpora police station. They tortured me and took to STF headquarters and from there brought me to Delhi. In the torture chamber of Delhi Police Special Cell, I told them everything I knew about Mohammad. But they insisted that I should say that my cousin Showkat, his wife Navjot S.A.R. Geelani and I were the people behind the Parliament attack. They wanted me to say this convincingly in front of media. I resisted. But I had no option than to yield when they told me my family was in their custody and threatened to kill them. I was made to sign many blank pages and was forced to talk to the media and claim responsibility for the attack by repeating what the police told me to say. When a journalist asked me about the role of S.A.R. Geelani I told him Geelani was innocent. A.C.P. Rajbeer Singh shouted at me in the full media glare for talking beyond what they tutored. They were really upset when I deviated from their story and Rajbeer Singh requested the journalists not to broadcast that part where I spoke of Geelani’s innocence.

Rajbeer Singh allowed me to talk to my wife the next day. After the call he told me if I wanted to see them alive I had to cooperate. Accepting the charges was the only option in front of me if I wanted to see the family alive and the Special Cell officers promised they would make my case weak so I would be released after sometime. Then they took me to various places and showed me the markets where Mohammad had purchased different things. Thus they made the evidence for the case.

Police made me a scapegoat in order to mask their failure to find out the mastermind of Parliament attack. They have fooled the people. People still don’t know whose idea was to attack the Parliament. I was entrapped into the case by Special Task Force (STF) of Kashmir and implicated by Delhi Police Special Cell.

The media constantly played the tape. The police officers received awards. And I was condemned to death.

Why didn’t you find legal defence?

I had no one to turn to. I did not even see my family until six months into the trial. And when I saw them it was only for a short time in the Patiala House Court. There was no one to arrange a lawyer for me. As legal aid is a fundamental right in this country I named four lawyers whom I wished to have defended me. But the judge S.N. Dhingra, said all four refused to do the case. The lawyer whom the Court chose for me began by admitting some of the most crucial documents without even asking me what the truth of the matter was. She was not doing the job properly and finally she moved to defend another fellow accused. Then the Court appointed an amicus curie, not to defend me, but to assist court in the matter. He never met me. And he was very hostile and communal. That is my case, completely unrepresented at the crucial trial stage. The fact of the matter is that I did not have a lawyer and in a case like this, what does not having a lawyer mean everyone can understand. If you wanted to put me to death what was the need for such a long legal process which to me was totally meaningless?

Do you want to make any appeal to the world?

I have no specific appeals to make. I have said whatever I wanted to say in my petition to the President of India. My simple, appeal is that do not allow blind nationalism and mistaken perceptions to lead you to deny even the most fundamental rights of your fellow citizens. Let me repeat what S.A.R. Geelani said after he was awarded death sentence at the trial court, he said, peace comes with justice. If there is no justice, there is no peace. I think that is what I want to say now. If you want to hang me, go ahead with it but remember it would be a black spot on the judicial and political system of India.

What is the condition in jail?

I’m lodged in solitary confinement in the high risk cell. I’m taken out from my cell only for a short period during noon. No radio, no television. Even the newspaper I subscribe reaches me torn. If there is a news item about me, they tear that portion apart and give me the rest.

Apart from the uncertainty about your future, what else concerns you the most?

Yes, a lot of things concern me. There are hundreds of Kashmiris languishing in different jails, without lawyers, without trial, without any rights. The situation of civilians in the streets of Kashmir is not any different. The valley itself is an open prison. These days the news of fake encounters is coming out. But that is only the tip of a big iceberg. Kashmir has everything that you don’t want to see in a civilized nation. They breathe torture. Inhale injustice.

He paused for a moment.

Also, there are so many thoughts that come into my mind; farmers who get displaced, merchants whose shops are sealed in Delhi and so on. So many faces of injustice you can see and identify, can’t you? Have you thought how many thousands of people get affected by all this, their livelihood, family…? All these things too, worry me.

Again a longer pause

Also global developments. I took to the news of the execution of Saddham Hussain with at most sadness. Injustice so openly and shamelessly done. Iraq, the land of Mesopotamia, world’s richest civilization, that taught us mathematics, use a 60 minute clock, 24 hour day, 360 degree circle, is thrashed to dust by the Americans. Americans are destroying all other civilizations and value systems. Now the so called War against Terrorism is only good in spreading hatred and causing destruction. I can go on saying what worries me.

Which books are you reading now?

I finished reading Arundhati Roy. Now I’m reading Sartre’s work on existentialism. You see, it is a poor library in the jail. So I will have to request the visiting Society for the Protection of Detainees and Prisoners Rights (SPDPR) members for books.

There is a campaign in defence for you…

I am really moved and obliged by the thousands of people who came forward saying injustice is done to me. The lawyers, students, writers, intellectuals, and all those people are doing something great by speaking against injustice.

The situation at the beginning, was such in 2001 and initial days of the case that it was impossible for justice loving people to come forward. When the High Court acquitted SAR Geelani people started questioning the police theory. And when more and more people became aware of the case details and facts and started seeing things beyond the lies, they began speaking up. It is natural that justice loving people speak up and say, injustice is done to Afzal. Because that is the truth.

Members of your family have conflicting opinion on your case?

My wife has been consistently saying that I was wrongly framed. She has seen how the STF tortured me and did not allow me to live a normal life. She also knew how they implicated me in the case. She wants me to see our son Ghalib growing up. I have also an elder brother who apparently is speaking against me under duress from the STF. It is unfortunate what he does, that’s what I can say.

See, it is a reality in Kashmir now, what you call the counter insurgency operations take any dirty shape—that they field brother against brother, neighbor against neighbor. You are breaking a society with your dirty tricks.

As far as the campaign is concerned I had requested and authorized Society for the Protection of Detainees and Prisoners Society (SPDPR) run by Geelani and group of activists to do the campaign.

What comes to your mind when you think of your wife Tabassum and Son Ghalib?

This year is the tenth anniversary of our wedding. Over half that period I spent in jail. And prior to that, many a times I was detained and tortured by Indian security forces in Kashmir. Tabassum witnessed both my physical and mental wounds. Many times I returned from the torture camp, unable to stand, all kinds of torture including electric shock to my penis, she gave me hope to live…We did not have a day of peaceful living. It is the story of many Kashmiri couples. Constant fear is the dominant feeling in all Kashmiri households.

We were so happy when a child was born. We named our son after the legendary poet Mirza Ghalib. We had a dream to see our son Ghalib grow up. I could spend very little time with him. After his second birthday I was implicated in the case.

What do you want him to grow up as?

Professionally, if you are asking, a doctor. Because that is my incomplete dream.

But most importantly, I want him to grow without fear. I want him to speak against injustice. That I am sure he will be. Who else know the story of injustice better than my wife and son?

[While Afzal continued talking about his wife and son, I could not stop recollecting what Tabassum told me when I met her outside Supreme Court in 2005 during the case’s appeal stage. When Afzal’s family members remained in Kashmir Tabassum dared to come to Delhi with her son Ghalib to organize defence for Afzal. Outside the Supreme Court New Lawyers chamber, at the tiny tea stall on the roadside, she chatted in detail about Afzal. While sipping and complaining the tea for excess sugar she told me how Afzal enjoyed cooking. One picture she painted struck me deep—one of those dear private moments in their lives, he would not allow her to enter kitchen, make her seated on the chair nearby and Afzal would cook, holding one book in his band, a ladle in the other and read out stories for her.]

If I may ask you about Kashmir issue…how do you think it can be solved?

First let the government be sincere to the people of Kashmir. And let them initiate talk with the real representatives of Kashmir. Trust me, the real representatives of Kashmir can solve the problem. But if the government consider peace process as a tactics of counter insurgency, then the issue is not going to be solved. It is time some sincerity is shown.

Who are the real people?

Find out from the sentiments of the people of Kashmir. I am not going to name x, y or z.

And I have an appeal to Indian media; stop acting as a propaganda tool. Let them report the truth. With their smartly worded and politically loaded news reports, they distort facts, make incomplete reports, build hardliners, terrorists et al. They easily fall for the games of the intelligence agencies. By doing insincere journalism you are adding to the problem. Disinformation on Kashmir should stop first. Allow Indians to know the complete history of the conflict, let them know the ground realities. True democrats cannot turn down the facts. If Indian government is not taking into account the wishes of Kashmiri people, then they can’t solve the problem. It will continue to be a conflict zone.

Also you tell me how are you going to develop real trust among Kashmiris when you send out the message that India has a justice system that hang people without giving a lawyer, without a fair trial?

Tell me, when hundreds of Kashmiris are lodged in jails most of them with no lawyer, no hope for justice, are you not further escalating the distrust on Indian government among Kashmiris? Do you think if you don’t address the core issues and do a cosmetic effort, you can solve Kashmir conflict? No, you can’t. Let the democratic institutions of both India and Pakistan start showing some sincerity, their politicians, Parliament, justice system, media, intellectuals...

9 security men were killed in the Parliament attack. What is that you have to tell their relatives?

In fact I share the pain of the family members who lost their dear ones in the attack. But I feel sad that they are misled to believe that hanging an innocent person like me would satisfy them. They are used as pawns in a completely distorted cause of nationalism. I appeal them to come out of it and see through things.

What do you see is your achievement in life?

My biggest achievement perhaps is that through my case and the campaign on the injustice done to me, the horror of STF has been brought into light. I am happy that now people are discussing security forces’ atrocities on civilians, encounter killings, disappearances, torture camps, etc...These are the realities that a Kashmiri grows up with. People outside Kashmir have no clue what Indian security forces are up to in Kashmir.

Even if they kill me for no crime of mine, it would be because they cannot stand the truth. They cannot face the questions arise out of hanging a Kashmiri with no lawyer.

An ear-splitting electric bell rang. Could hear hurried up conversations from the neighbor cubicles. This was my last question to Afzal.

What do you want to be known as?

He thought for a minute, and answered:

As Afzal, as Mohmammad Afzal. I am Afzal for Kashmiris, and I am Afzal for Indians as well, but the two groups have an entirely conflicting perception of my being. I would naturally trust the judgment of Kashmiri people not only because I am one among them but also because they are well aware of the reality I have been through and they cannot be misled into believing any distorted version of either a history or an incident.

I was confused with this last statement of Mohammad Afzal, but on further reflection I began to understand what he meant. History of Kashmir and narration of an incident by a Kashmiri is always a big shock for an Indian whose sources of knowledge on Kashmir happen to be confined only to the text books and media reports. Afzal did just that to me. Two more bells. Time to end Mulakat. But people were still busy conversing. Mike put off. Speaker stopped. But if you strained your ear, and watched the lip movement, you could still hear him. The guards made rough round-ups, asking to leave. As they found visitors not leaving, they put the lights off, mulakat room turned dark. In the long stretch of walk out from the Jail No 3 of Tihar jail compound to the main road I found myself in the company of clusters of twos and threes, moving out silently—either a cluster of mother, wife and daughter; or brother, sister and wife; or friend and brother; or someone else. Every cluster had two things in common. They carried an empty cotton bag back with them. Those bags had stains of Malai Kofta, Shahi Paneer and Mixed Vegetables, often spilled over by the rash frisking of the TSP man’s spoon. The second, I observed, they all wore inexpensive winter clothes, torn shoes, and outside Gate No 3 they waited for Bus No 588, Tilak Nagar-Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium bus, that perhaps took them to Dhaulakuan main junction—they are the poor citizens of this country. Remembered President Abdul Kalam’s musing how poor people were the awardees of capital punishments. My interviewee is also one. When I asked him how much ‘tokens’ (the form of currency allowed in the jail) he had, he said “enough to survive”.

Vinod K. Jose is a foreign correspondent attached with Radio Pacifica Network, USA. He is based in New Delhi. vinodkjose@gmail.com 

(C) http://www.kashmirnewz.com/n000122.html 

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What is in a name – Islamabad

What is in a name you might ask? Well everything and nothing. If it was just another town name might have gone unnoticed, but if it is a town in Kashmir by the name of Islamabad it is sure to give ammo for right winged ideologues who despise every mention or resemblance of even a shred of green in Kashmir.

Those who distort history play with the sentiments of the gullible, for whom history may not have been a good scoring subject. But have we not known how distorted and state convenient history comes in modified and adequately parameterized form for the education system in India. Schools often get a rundown, watered down ‘what suits state’ history, most the facts that state considers inconvenient left out. But that is besides the point here.

Islamabad has its own history and a well documented one. In 1763 AD Ismail Khan a Mughal governor in Kashmir laid the foundation stone of a town in south Kashmir named after him ‘Islamabad’. Islamabad also means abode of peace. In his book “The Valley of Kashmir’ Sir Walter Lawrence (1896) calls Khanabal a port of Islamabad.

In another place he writes “The main roads at present connect Srinagar with Islamabad, Vernag and Jammu via the Banihal pass (9,200 feet) with Shupiyon” Please note ‘Shupiyon’ is the original name of present day “Shopian’ that has been modified after the Indian rule in Kashmir. In his book Sir Walter Lawrence mentions “Islamabad’ almost 80 times.

The book “Jammu and Kashmir Territories” by F Drew also has mention of Islamabad town in South Kashmir.

During the Dogra rule Maharaja Hari Singh invited prominent citizens of Islamabad town to the foundation stone laying of SMHS hospital at Srinagar. All the official invitations by the Dogra ruler had addresses of these invitees written as Islamabad. In fact during the rule of Maharaja Ranbhir Singh there were attempts to rename Islamabad town but they did not succeed.

Records of post received in early 1900’s by a noted intellectual of Islamabad town, from Delhi, Punjab and other parts of undivided India and now preserved by his family were all addressed to Islamabad, Kashmir. The postage stamps of that era have postal seals of Islamabad town.

Until 1990’s Islamabad was the de-facto name of this South Kashmir town: that is till insurgency started in Kashmir. During the insurgency melee Indian security forces had been scrambled and posted across the nook and corner of Kashmir. Now during questioning if a commoner would say he was going to Islamabad, CRPF would immediately connect that to the Pakistani Islamabad and beat the pulp out of these poor souls. Suddenly CRPF personnel started firing on the signboards that read Islamabad; any mention of this name was enforced as a taboo. The signboards of buses that had for decades been reading “Islamabad’ had to undergo a sudden transformation. Security forces wanted Islamabad out of the local lexicon and Anantnag in, for which the security forces exerted much of their muscle, stick and gun power. Locals outwitted them by replacing the bus route boards to ‘Khanabal’, which is the closest stop to Islamabad, thus keeping the idea of Islamabad in their mind and heart. Nowadays Islamabad is back to its rightful place on the bus route boards.

While across India many cities may have been reverted to original names, in Kashmir strangely most of the towns have been twisted out their original names and all this under official patronage in the last 6 decades of Indian rule. ‘Shupiyon’ was modified as ‘Shopian’, ‘Pulwom’ was modified as “Pulwama’, Sopur as Sopore, Varmul as Baramulla and the list goes on and on. What wrong if an overwhelming majority of locals want to use the original name of these towns and places? Any crime this?

Meanwhile in India all the kings’ horses and all the kings’ men could not force change CP to Rajiv Chowk. Some things are better in their original form.

You would want to ask what happened to ‘Anantnag’. Well Ananatnag was originally a dwelling borough very much like Mattan (Martand) and Bijebehada, a subset of the bigger town of Islamabad. The name was later incorporated for the district by state governments post Indian rule. Islamabad continued as the name of the town proper.

In case of Islamabad town in Kashmir, the rightist hate comes from its proximity to the name sake capital of Pakistan, ignoring the fact that when the Islamabad of Kashmir was known such, Pakistan was not even conceived and India was even yet to start her Independence struggle. But since all resemblance to Pakistan in Kashmir is hate worthy be it Islamabad town, the green scarf or the rock salt: the ignoramus cry hoarse against Islamabad. What these bigots fail to justify is the existence of Hyderabad both in India and Pakistan, the existence of pre partition Lahori Gate in Delhi. Why does the Hyderabad and Lahori Gate not want them to press for a name change? Just because these places are not in Kashmir hence attempts at portraying rightist valor will not fetch adequate political returns here.

In fact you will find most of these dogmatic chauvinists enjoying “Karachi Halwa’ from Chandni Chowk, Delhi or a Mumbai sweet shop without bothering about the Karachi in it.

What is in a name you had say? Call Islamabad anything you want, but let it be Islamabad ‘the abode of peace’.

(Saadut is a blogger from Kashmir and his blogs can be accessed at saadut.blogspot.com. All views are his personal and do not represent any institution.)

(C) Kashmirdispatch.com 

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Interview with Ved Bhasin

From (C) Kashmir Life: “Jammu Riots Changed J&K Politics”

 Ved Bhasin

In an exhaustive interview with Shahnawaz Khan, Ved Bhasin shares his views, and first hand information on many events and personalities in state politics.

Kashmir Life: You have completed more than five decades in journalism. Tell us something about the journalism of those days.

Ved Bhasin: In a way I have been in this profession for more than six decades. It started when I was a student of Prince of Wales College Jammu. In 1945, I was the editor of the college magazine, The Tawi and I was also the president of students’ union. Those days the student union and Jammu politics was divided on communal lines. We had mostly the Muslim Conference and Hindu Sabha, which were very strong in Jammu. It was total communal polarisation. It suited the rulers to divide the people on communal lines, and then the voting was also based on the separate seats for Hindus and Muslims. In the college also, which was the only one in Jammu province then, there was a Muslim students’ federations, there was a Hindu students’ federation and there was a Sikh students’ federation. We formed an organisation, which was secular – Jammu Students Federation. With me were people like Balraj Puri and Abdul Khaliq Ansari who later became the president of Plebiscite front in Azad Kashmir and struggled there for an independent Jammu and Kashmir for a number of years. Together we formed this organisation and I was the general secretary and then president for a number of years.

KL: So you were active in politics then?

VB: In fact, during my college days, I was more interested in politics than journalism. I came in touch with Journalism because of my association with the Tawi.  Then I used to write news items also concerning the academic and student activities in the newspaper Ranbir, which was founded by Lala Mulk Raj Sahaf, the first newspaper in Jammu and Kashmir state. With him I learned some kind of journalism there. That time as I said I was more interested in politics.  I was associated with the National Conference at the age of 14 because our organisation was almost associated with National Conference. At the national level, in Indian politics, we were associated with the Socialist Party of India, Jaiprakash Narayan and other leaders, and we worked for overall freedom of India and also for fight against autocracy in Jammu & Kashmir. So in a way my life was, a kind of intermingling between politics and journalism and some kind of literature also. I was not able to decide which way to go, though my first preference was politics. But somehow, subsequently after many years I got totally disillusioned with politics and devoted myself to journalism.

KL: When did your journalism career begin formally?

VB: Afterwards I went to New Delhi for post graduation. After I returned in 1949-50, there was a newspaper Naya Kashmir edited by one Nazir Samadani, who later became MP also. He joined the government service, so I was editing the Naya Kashmir. I started its Hindi edition also. Then I was also working for different newspapers. I worked as the Jammu correspondent of Khidmat. I worked as a Radio Kashmir Correspondent too, but my services were terminated in 1953 because I opposed the arrest and deposition of Sheikh Abdullah. In 1952, I started my first newspaper, an Urdu weekly entitled Naya Samaj. I believe this was the first political weekly in Jammu. Although that time National Conference was in power, and I was member of the National Conference, still we pursued an independent policy. We were critical of the establishment. But particularly that time the Praja Parishad movement had started, for Ek Pradahan, Ek Vidhan, and I was politically opposing it. Naya Samaj also very forthrightly exposed the real character of the movement, as to how it was sponsored by the RSS. Earlier also in 1947, at the time of communal riots, we had formed a students peace front and were working for communal harmony, thought we did not succeed because that time the riots were organised by the state itself with the support of RSS and some other organisations.  That time I was threatened by the then governor Chetan Chopra that I would be arrested if I continued working for the Hindu-Muslim unity.

KL: There were many newspapers that time. Were they enjoying some kind of freedom of speech? If so, why we have very little material available on the communal riots of J&K?

VB: Actually nobody wrote about it to that effect. I presented a paper in Jammu University some years back, My experiences of 1947, and it was verbatim quoted by some Pakistan newspapers. It is about how the killing took place, how it was organised by the state. I have done some work, and I am going to do some more work on it, on how it happened and also how the state did not deal with it properly, particularly the government at that time. Subsequently, when Sheikh Abdullah came to power, and we presented him with documentary evidences of the involvement of the state administration and RSS in the killings, instead of taking action they tried to appease the Hindu communalists. The tragedy of Kashmiri leadership has been that in Jammu they have always tried to appease Hindu fundamentalism. That has suited them. They never allowed a secular political voice of dissent to be raised, either in Jammu or in Kashmir.

KL: When did you start the Kashmir Times?

VB: In 1954, my newspaper Naya Samaj was banned, under the Defence of India rules 1950, because we supported Sheikh Abdullah at that time – not supported, but we opposed his undemocratic deposition and arrest. I was member of the National Conference general council, I was expelled. Then I started a weekly Kashmir Times from Delhi. A friend of mine was there, I asked him to file a declaration from there.  After some issues arrived here, the state banned its entry under the then Customs Act and seized copies in Lakhanpur. Then I came to Srinagar and filed a declaration here for Kashmir Times.  That time the state press act was there as the Indian press act was not applicable then.  I was asked by the district magistrate to deposit Rs 2000 as security. That was a huge amount in 1954. Then I motivated a friend of mine in Jammu, who was a contractor, to file a declaration in his name. I did that and somehow influenced the deputy commissioner who attested it. So I started the Kashmir Times as a weekly. It continued as a weekly, then as a tabloid for some time. Then it was for some time shifted to Srinagar and then back to Jammu. In 1971, I converted it into a full fledged daily and it is going on since then. There have been lot of problems, lot of difficulties, lot of struggle, and the basic reason has been that the rulers in Jammu and Kashmir have always been insensitive to any kind of criticism. They are not prepared to accommodate any voice of dissent. It is true of the present regime and earlier regimes also. Take Sheikh Abdullah’s regime, right from 1947 when he came in power, elections were rigged, opponents of National Conference were pushed across (the line of control), most of the leaders whom Sheikh Abdullah thought as potential rivals. Within the state, freedom was curbed, civil liberties were denied, there was no freedom for public meetings, demonstrations, and this happened in different regimes whether it was Bakshi Ghulam Muhamamd, G M Sadiq or Mir Qasim. It is going on.

KL: You have witnessed 1947. Was there any chance of Kashmir remaining independent? And were the main players, Shiekh Abdullah and Maharaja, keen to retain J&K as independent state?

VB:  As far as Maharaja was concerned, he was in favour of independence for various reasons. Number one, he wanted to be an absolute ruler, number two, there were no friendly relations between him and the Indian National Congress. So he was in favour of independence. Otherwise, he could have easily joined the Indian union before August 15, 1947 as many other princely states did. In fact, on August 15, 1947, pro-Maharaja organisation like Hindu Rajya Sabha and RSS hoisted Maharaja flags (state flags) in Jammu everywhere. They did not hoist Indian National Congress flags. And the banners said, Sovereign Independent Jammu and Kashmir Ladakh Baltistan under Maharaja Hari Singh. That means the parties supporting Maharaja, particularly the Hindu Rajya Sabha headed by Pandit Prem Nath Dogra were favouring independent Jammu and Kashmir. Obviously they were guided by the Maharaja and by the then prime minister Ram Chandra Kak. Kak was certainly opposed to Kashmir’s accession to India. Plus Maharaja’s Swami had told him that he will become a great emperor of entire region. And at that time, even RSS was in favour of independent J&K state along with Nepal. As far as National Conference is concerned, it was certainly close to Congress. And they were part of the All India State People’s Conference, which was an organisation of the princely states sponsored by the Congress. Sheikh Abdullah became a president in 1945, when he was behind bars during quit Kashmir movement. That way he was close to them but still, by and large National Conference was in favour of independent Jammu and Kashmir, though they had not made up their mind, as Sheikh Abdullah was in jail just before the accession. I personally believe that if the raiders from Pakistan had not come, the situation would have been entirely different. When they came, they were also hostile to the National Conference, and its many workers were killed in Baramulla and other places. Aziz was killed, Maqbool Sherwani was killed. It brought about a transformation in the views of National Conference. You can see that when Shiekh Abdullah after his release was asked what he wanted, he said first power should be transferred to people, then they would decide. That way he was vacillating. But subsequently when accession took place, the National Conference not only endorsed it but openly campaigned for it. Sheikh Abdullah campaigned for accession, obviously on the conditions that ultimately people would ratify it, and it would be confined to three subjects, foreign affairs, communications, and defence. Until his arrest, Sheikh was in favour of accession to Indian union but with greater power to state. His struggle was for greater autonomy, maximum powers which he tried to concentrate in his own hands.

KL: Was it technically possible for J&K to remain independent in 1947, as the Maharaja or Sheikh Abdullah wanted?

VB: Technically, yes, what was the hurdle.

KL: Were they supposed to accede to one or the other?

VB: If India and Pakistan had agreed to it, there would have been no problem. The major threat could have been only from Pakistan. With India there were no links, for Instance this Pathankot route was not there. There was no road. The Radcliff award was meant only to facilitate Kashmir’s accession to India. The general impression was that Gurdaspur district, (Pathankot and other areas) were Muslim majority area and these would go to Pakistan. If that had happened, Kashmir would have had no road links with India.

KL: Would it have become automatically part of Pakistan?

VB: No, that time also Maharaja was not interested. The Maharaja asked India and Pakistan to sign a standstill agreement, that the present arrangement would continue till Maharaja is able to decide which state he would like to join. Pakistan accepted. But India refused and asked him to decide.  Obviously they wanted him to announce his accession to India, as they thought he was a Hindu ruler. The GOI had also double standards. In the case of Nizam of Hyderabad, they said people would decide. In the case of J&K, they said ruler will decide. In the case of Nawab of Junagadh, who had announced his accession to Pakistan, India did not agree. They said, because the majority is Hindus, people would decide.

KL:  If Maharaja favoured independent state then why do some historians write that he permitted movement of Patiala security men from principality of Patiala to Jammu and Kashmir state?

VB: No that came just before the accession. For instance, November. Even after accession. The communal riots took place in Jammu after instrument of accession was signed, after Sheikh Abdullah took over as head of administration – that is November. Some riots were taking place earlier also, but mass killings, when the convoys went to Pakistan and were butchered, happened when Sheikh Abdullah was head of the administration. He didn’t intervene or could not. I don’t know the reasons but perhaps his feeling was that the Muslims in Jammu were not his supporters.

KL: So that was the reason he did not intervene?

VB:  I don’t know, but actually he did not intervene. He could have. Although it was a kind of diarchy then, the Diwan was there, even when Sheikh Abdullah became the prime minister, Mir Chand Mahajan was there, Janak Singh was there. In fact, we had gone to Delhi, some of us, Om Saraf, me, Balraj Puri, to discuss with Nehru and others that this diarchy should end. That power should be fully transferred to people and that Maharaja was an obstacle in the transfer of power, so he should be removed.

KL: Were the 1947 riots spontaneous?

VB: Those were organised and planned by the rulers with the support of the RSS and other organisations.

KL:  Rulers, you mean the Maharaja?

VB: Maharaja obviously was there. Maharaja’s Diwan was there.  Once Mir Chand Mahajan (PM) came to Jammu, when communal riots were taking place. He invited some minority leaders, including from communal parties and National Conference. Trilok Chand Dutt was there, Girdhari Lal Dogra was there, Om Saraf was there. I was also there as a students representative. At the Maharaja’s Palace, he said the power is being transferred to people of J&K state so why don’t you Hindus and Sikhs demand parity. Parity means, equal representation to Hindus and Muslims as the Muslim League at some time in India had said. No one replied except Om Saraf. Om Saraf said that how can we demand parity. There is so much difference in the population of Hindus and Muslims. Muslims are a vast majority, Hindus are a small minority. How is it practical and possible? At this Mir Chand Mahajan pointed to a forest area down the Maharaja Palace, where there were some Gujjar bodies, who had been recently killed. He said that the population can also change. So what did he mean by that? I am an eye witness to what happened in Jammu. When Jammu city was placed under curfew, Muslims were not allowed to come out of their houses, Hindus were moving freely. And convoys of RSS men would start from Prem Nath Dogra’s House, the Praja Parishad chief, in Kacchi Chawni. They were armed, some Sikh refugees who had come also joined them. They were moving freely from lane to lane massacring people. Opposite the Tourist Reception Centre, they entered a lane.  I was there with a Sikh friend of mine. He said let us oppose, but a Sikh ran after him with a sword, and confronted him, that why he was opposing. So they entered that lane and massacred people, mostly washermen and other people. Even in rural areas, which were Muslim majority, people were killed. Even in Doda district, Sheikh Abdul Manoob’s family was killed. The survivor Sheikh Abdul Rehman later joined Jan Sangh and now is in BSP.I was called for by the governor of Jammu, Chet Ram Chopra, who was also a relative. He told me if I were not his relative, he would have got me arrested. He asked why I was talking of communal amity. He said it is not time to talk of peace while it is time for Hindus and Sikhs to defend themselves. He told me instead of working for communal amity, we should send our workers to their training camps. They were giving training to Hindu youth in Jammu. I told my colleagues about it. Balraj Puri said, ok let’s us send one boy. We send one, who saw that RSS men and many other young men were trained to use .303 rifles. Muslims were not able to move out. In Ustad Mohalla particularly, they were starving. In Talab Khatika, Muslim population was concentrated. Pir Mitha and Lakhdatta Bazar became the borderline. Subsequently, they were told to surrender, and were told they would be sent to Pakistan if they wanted. Afterwards Muslims put up white flags and they were evacuated and taken to police lines. We used to go there, take fruit etc for our Muslim friends there. Then they were told that they would be sent to Pakistan.  So buses and trucks were arranged. Some 10 to 15 thousand people were taken in those buses, and then that route was changed after Miran Sahib area, and they went from Digiana area. There, RSS people, some Sikhs, some soldiers were already waiting. The people were then dragged out of these buses and massacred. Very few of them escaped. The killing was kept totally secret from other people in police lines. They were told their kin have reached Pakistan. Then after three days another convoy was sent and similarly massacred. Obviously this can’t be done without official patronage.

KL: Was there any Muslim officer in Maharaja army then, who was part of the process?

VB: I don’t think so.

KL: Was the change in demography the only motive?

VB: It was foolish to think of changing demography. I don’t know the actual reason, but I think they didn’t trust them and thought they were a perpetual nuisance.

KL: How did that massacre change the politics of Jammu?

VB: It did change the politics of Jammu. It did communalise the politics of Jammu. If Muslims had been there, perhaps the situation would have been different. Like the land row agitation, the blockade, perhaps this would not have happened. Now the Muslims have either to be silent, or be part of the process.

KL: So can we say that these riots were responsible for alienation of Jammu from Kashmir?

VB: Not only these riots, there were other things too. For example let us take Azad Kashmir. Except some parts of Muzaffarabad all areas of Azad Kashmir were part of Jammu province. So when Indian army was advancing even Sheikh  Abdullah supported ceasefire. When somebody asked him later, he said those people have never accepted him as the leader.

KL: So non-Kashmir Muslims did not accept Abdullah as the leader?

VB:  They were with Muslim Conference. They were led by Chaudary Ghulam Abbas. He was in prison. Then Abdullah pushed him across the LoC.

KL: There was some communal violence across the Line of Control in Mirpur too.

VB: Yes, in Mirpur there was some reaction to Jammu riots. What happened that there was a Muslim police officer from Mirpur posted in Udhampur. He and his family were killed by RSS people, and that created a reaction in Mirpur. The other thing is that, surprisingly in Mirpur town the RSS people started riots, but subsequently the Muslim from rural areas joined in.

KL: How do you see Sheikh Abdullah’s years of governance between 1947 and 1952?

VB:  That government, as I said, was not a democratic government. They did not behave in a democratic manner. They did not tolerate or encourage any opposition. Corruption had started. Sheikh Abdullah may have been honest at that time, but some of his ministers were corrupt, some bureaucrats close to him were resorting to corruption. He did not do anything to that, and the worst was that he denied democratic rights to people. He did not tolerate any opposition. He crushed the freedom of press. He and other NC leaders did not tolerate any voice of dissent. He acted as an authoritarian ruler. The constituent assembly elections of 1951 were totally rigged. Personally I believe that if the elections were held in a fair manner NC would have still secured a two third majority. There was no threat to NC. May be 15 seats had gone to opposition – five to Praja Parishad  in Jammu, another 10 or 15 to pro Pakistan elements in Kashmir. If that had happened, then the situation in J&K would have been different.  That constituent assembly, in that case, would have been representative of the people, and it could have ratified or changed the accession. That was the first big mistake committed in J&K. Praja Parishad agitation was the other (mistake), which was financed by the Home Ministry of India. It was patronised by them. There is evidence that they were financed by home ministry. The purpose was to cut Sheikh Abdullah to size and to pressurise him to concede more powers to New Delhi.  That is how the Delhi agreement came up. Shama Prashad Mukherjee came, he died here because of his ill health, and that was exploited all over the country. It was used against Sheikh Abdullah, and then Delhi agreement was forced upon him. One of the best task that Sheikh Abdullah government did after 1947 was the abolition of big landed estates. Another was debt reconciliation act. A lot of people were under debt by private money lenders who were cheating and exploiting people. It was decided whoever would pay back one and half of principal amount, the rest would be written off. That way a lot of people got relief. Similarly, under big landed estates abolition act, land was transferred to the tiller. It is not true that it was aimed against Kashmiri Pandits. It is not that more Kashmir Pandit families were landlords. There were many Rajput landlords in Jammu, there were many Muslim landlords in Kashmir. And not just Muslims were benefited. In Kashmir obviously they were, but in Jammu there were more than four lakh Hindus, schedules caste Hindus, Dalits, who were benefited by the act. It is a false propaganda that it was a communal move. It was not. It was the commitment of NC under Naya Kashmir program.

KL: There were three hallmarks of Sheikh Abdullah’s rule. His authoritarianism, the praja parishad movement, during which Mukherjee died, and third his alleged dabbling with US. Which one of these factors actually led to his arrest as prime minister?

VB: I think the last one. Sheikh Abdullah meeting with Adlai Stevenson, was used for that purpose (arrest), that he had met him and is thinking of independent Jammu and Kashmir. Obviously, Abdullah was more concerned in absolute power. It is not that for people he was interested. He was interested in absolute power, and if India gave him absolute power, he was willing for it.  Initially he supported accession with India because Jinnah did not trust him. That time he said that ‘ours is an association of ideology. We believe in democracy, secularism and federalism. And Indian leadership also believes in secularism democracy and federalism. Pakistan is a theocratic state, and there is no federalism, Punjabis are dominating, and they are all feudal elements, India is more progressive and in Pakistan and they would support feudal elements.’

KL: So American hobnobbing was the main factor that motivated Nehru to arrest Sheikh Abdullah?

VB: Nehru was under pressure from his colleagues, and they thought he is conspiring with America to declare J&K as independent. Which was not a fact.

Abdullah did say that he was thinking of those lines if India did not allow him to function properly. Initially he was committed to accession to India, with J&K enjoying maximum autonomy, with accession confined to three subjects. If India had honoured this commitment perhaps Abdullah would never have changed. You know what provoked Abdullah. First of all the IB (Intelligence Bureau) started functioning here. They had no business. Col Hassan Walia, and  B N Mullick the IB chief. Col Walia was here living on Gupkar road. One Jain was in Jammu, manipulating everything. He was the person through which RSS and New Delhi were operating. That provoked Abdullah as he said IB had no business here, and law and order was a state subject. Then they pressurised him to also have some offices from New Delhi to which he did not agree. There were pressures for integration of services, curtailing the rights of state high court and other things.

KL: In the recently released book, Limits of influence – America’s role in Kashmir, by US diplomat Howard B. Schaffer, it says that Abdullah first said he wanted an independent Kashmir and when Americans showed interest he backtracked and said he was more interested in autonomy.

VB: Sheikh Abdullah was always wavering on this thing. In his speech to the inaugural session of the constituent assembly also he mentioned three options accession to India, accession to Pakistan and independence. Then by and large he argued against independence. My own feeling is that he was content to be with India, on one condition that New Delhi would not interfere in his affairs. That he should function as an autocratic ruler here.

KL:  What was the behaviour of the Indian press then?

VB:  The press (Indian press) was totally supportive of the government of India. Actually the Indian press started creating problems for Abdullah when the Praja Parishad agitation started. A section of the press was sympathetic to them. When Mukherjee died they were hostile to Abdullah. Otherwise also the press was critical of Abdullah. Even a section of press was critical of land reforms also, as to why they are doing it without giving any compensation.  Indian press represented the big business that time. And it was under the influence of Indian home ministry. So in a way they created problems for him. Abdullah was not prepared to hear any criticism, so he did not deal with them properly. So after 1953 when Abdullah was arrested the Indian media supported government of India. And initially they fully supported Bakshi.

KL: The role of D P Dhar appears very messy in 1953?

VB: Not only D P Dhar, the role of the communists in J&K has been like that. Even before 47 when even Sheikh Abdullah was also under the influence of communists. B P L Bedi was here, he was in favour of independent Kashmir. Communists were not opposed to creation of Pakistan. Communists were opposed to quit India movement in 1942. They were working for the British then. In 1947 they were not hostile to idea of Pakistan. Most of the communists in Pakistan were with Pakistan establishment. Then communists were critical of UN as they said it was controlled by Anglo-American lobby. As long as Soviet Union mattered in J&K affairs, they supported it. Like plebiscite under five powers, they supported it. That way the Communists were always wavering on this issue. In 1952 their paper Crossroads, edited by Romesh Thapar, encouraged separatists tendencies in J&K. Their plea was Indian government was in the clutches of Anglo American block, so they were for balkanisation of India. The Telengana movement had started. Their policy changed when Nehru and India came closer to Soviet Union. Then Soviet Union supported Indian in the UN. Then ultimately communists changed attitude and supported Kashmir’s accession. After that communists were the main people who attacked Abdullah. On May 1, 1953, Prof Hiren Mukherjee, the leader of communist party in parliament, came to Jammu and addressed a public meeting where he openly attacked Abdullah. Till then they were patronising him, but then he said, Government of India is sleeping, GOI is not aware of the Anglo-American conspiracy, and that Abdullah is playing in the hands of Anglo-American block, so GOI should take action. And the communists were in the forefront to oppose Abdullah and the situation that erupted in 1953.

KL: But some historians have portrayed D P Dhar more as a mole?

VB:  D P Dhar was playing New Delhi’s game, and Communists game also and so on.  A sharp man, intelligent man, but not with much commitment.

KL: Bakshi Ghulam Muhammad era has been much maligned in Kashmir but is that image because of the media reports?

VB: Bakshi was not a democrat, even Abdullah was not. But Baskhi was ruthless in the manner that he did not tolerate any opposition. He did not allow any opposition to function. In 1955 I was expelled from the National Conference. Then I became the founder secretary of the Praja Socialist party of JK. I went to Delhi, talked to some political leaders, Ashok Mehta and other socialist leaders, J P Narayan, R M Lohia, -  we said that a pro-India secular democratic opposition should be formed in J&K. So far the opposition was either from pro-Pakistan elements in Kashmir or from RSS and Jan Sang in Jammu. We said that this opposition will serve as a bridge between J&K and New Delhi and also oppose the government. So we formed the Praja Socialist party. We took out a procession in Lal Chowk and suddenly peace brigade people, Gulam Qadir Ganderbali was the SP, came and attacked Ashok Mehta. A case was registered under pressure from New Delhi, but ultimately the judiciary was under pressure too.  So Bakshi was not a democrat, he was a kind of benevolent ruler. He considered himself Like Nawabs and Maharajas of yesteryears, a benevolent one. Somebody would come, he would help, give permit to poor.  Give jobs, that way he encouraged corruption also, as anyone who did not believe in democratic methods would develop corruption. But it was to his credit that he started an era of development of J&K.  He declared education free from primary to post graduation.

KL: Was it, as is the impression, that he did these development works at the behest of New Delhi?

VB: No, but obviously Delhi might have been interested, but Bakshi did it on his own. Even in Sheikh Abdullah government he was the only effective minister.

He had some qualities. He was not much educated but had a lot of common sense. He had a very sharp memory and largest personal contacts. If he had met you once and then see you after six months, he would say you are so and so. He was accessible. He started daily Durbar and met people every morning for two hours, issue orders. He would violate rules, but he did help a large number of people.

KL: A benevolent ruler?

VB: Yes he was kind of benevolent dictator.

KL: A lot has been said of Maharajs’ equation with people of Kashmir. What was the Maharaja’s equation with the people in Jammu?

VB: Jammu were co-religous to him but that does not mean he benefited Jammu.

Our own point of view is that Maharja Hari Singh or his father have done more development in Kashmir than in Jammu. Jammu was more backward than Kashmir in 1947. There was more poverty in Jammu, including his own Rajputs in Ramban and Gool Gulabgarh. They were very backward. They had no land. One of the Dogra poets wrote, “People say this is Dogra rule, but what Dogra rule is this where Dogras don’t get even saag.” Now Jammu people complain that Jammu has not been developed for tourism, but what happened during the Dogra rule. They did not develop tourism. Baderwah was the personal Jagir of Maharaja Hari Singh’s father, but they did not develop that. And then Maharaja Pratap Singh started this process of bringing people from Punjab. He thought they (Khatri caste people) are good administrators, (like our family). So the families came here, settled here, they were provided all kinds of facilities, they were in services, they were holding high positions, they were in business. My own grandfathers’ brothers were in good positions, one was a judge, another a top class contractor and so on. So this is what they did. They did not trust even the Hindus of Jammu, particularly the lower caste Hindus.  They did not have land, they did not get services, they were poor. And then Maharaja would spend six months in Kashmir, then he come to Jammu for a few weeks in winter, and then go to France, go to Germany, go to London and spend time there.

KL: So how popular was the movement against monarchy in Jammu?

VB:  It was not a popular movement. In Kashmir it was popular. In Jammu there were just few of us.

KL: So Jammu was impoverished but there was not animosity?

VB: Well there was no political awakening. There still is very less.

KL: Coming back to the Bakshi era, had there been some other person than Bakshi Ghulam Muhammad, would GOI have been able to dilute the autonomy to this extent?

VB: No, it did not happen in Bakshi’s time. They did pressurise Bakshi. He did yield to some extent. Like some things like integration of services happened. But what after that.   It was during Sadiq’s time that most integration took place. And Sadiq’s article in Hindustan Times that time that article 370 is an window for extending relations tells a lot. Sadiq agreed to merge NC with Congress. Bakshi was never supportive of integration. Not because of any love for people. It was also that he wanted more power for himself. A number of times Bakshi resisted. Most of the Indian laws were made applicable to J&K during Sadiq’s times and even during Farooq Abdullah’s time.

KL: How should we remember Bakshi – inept, corrupt, or benevolent ruler as you said?

VB: Corrupt, I would say who was not corrupt. Sadiq may be exception personally, but Sadiq government had a lot of corruption too, his colleagues were corrupt too.  It is not only Bakshi, other rulers were corrupt too.

KL: But Bakshi was the only ruler against whom a commission was set up?

VB: The commission was not set up to root out corruption. It was a matter of political vendetta. Because G M Sadiq and others wanted to malign Bakshi. So what happened after that. There was no follow up action. And when in 1967 elections Bakshi was heading the NC, the elections were rigged. If elections were fair Bakshi could win 20-25 seats in Valley. Ballot papers were rigged. Some of us even went with those evidence to Delhi. I was talking to then director information & broadcasting then before elections. He asked me what I think how many seats Bakshi will win. I said he may get 20 to 30 seats, and I said that it would be good we will have as two parties, two non-communal parties. But he replied, Ved Ji, we cannot afford 20-25 seats. So we later had large scale rigging. D P Dhar and Mir Qasim were mainly responsible. Afterwards Bakshi won a parliamentary seat too.

KL: Wasn’t Bakshi rule the climax of Goonda Raj in Kashmir.

VB: It started right after 47. The Halqa President of National Conference would browbeat people, resort to exploitation also, I won’t name anyone, a lot of these people, their children have now retired from senior positions in government service. Abdullah was at the helm till 1953. What was happening. They were intimating people, beating people, browbeating people. In 1951 elections even candidates were abducted and kept in illegal confinement. 

(C) Kashmir Life http://kashmirsolidarity.wordpress.com 

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