Islamist Militants fight for Kashmir's freedom

SRINAGAR, FEBRUARY 20, 2010

It is 11:40 am. For last six hours hundreds of Indian Army troops and police counter-insurgent units have sealed off part of a village and nobody is allowed in or out. One of the region's most wanted militant who carries a reward of two million rupees is believed to be hiding in a house in this Warpora village of Sopore in northern Kashmir’s Baramulla district.

The militant believed to be caught in the cordon is Abdullah Ooni – a top Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) commander in northern Kashmir - who has planned and carried out many attacks on the Indian forces in this region including the recent attack on a police patrol in which four Indian policemen were shot dead

Heavily armed troops belonging to Indian Army’s counter-insurgent unit - Rashtriya Rifles (RR) and local police’s counter-insurgent group Special Operations Group (SOG), carrying automatic rifles including heavy machine guns and Kalashnikov rifles, have sealed off all the escape routes.

Acting on an intelligence input, most possibly a tip off from an informer or through surveillance of the communication lines, the army assisted by police had cordoned the village in the early morning. Concertina wires were laid at all the entry and exit points to prevent the escape of the militants.

Troops had already zeroed in on a house where they believed the militants were hiding. The first contact was established at around 6 am, when militants fired half a dozen bullets at the soldiers. In the ensuing confusion and panic created by the gunfire, two local militants managed to escape from the cordon, the policemen on the spot said.

But police and the army believed Ooni was still trapped – and his death would mean that Lashkar has lost one of its best man in the Valley.

Attack carried out by ten LeT militants on Mumbai in November 2008 led to the disruption of the peace process between India and Pakistan. Both the countries have fought three wars over Kashmir, which was divided between them soon after the two nations achieved independence in 1947.

However, many in the Muslim majority Valley of Kashmir see the militants of LeT and other armed groups as freedom fighters and their funerals attract huge crowds of slogan shouting young men who pour in from the adjoining areas.

LeT is one among the many armed groups who say they are fighting for the ‘liberation’ of Kashmir. The other major group is Hizb-ul-Mujahideen – which comprise of mostly local militants as compared to LeT whose cadre is mostly from Pakistan.

Meanwhile, hours of search at the site where the Lashkar commander is believed to be hiding is leading the troops no where and they are clueless about his whereabouts. It is now almost seven hours and their finger has continuously been on the trigger of their Kalashnikovs.

A policeman from the SOG, who identified himself only by his first name Gulzar, said that it is unlikely that Ooni will still be there. “We are looking for him last six hours and there is still no contact with him. Perhaps he has escaped,” said Gulzar, his face covered with a black cloth.

Like most of the SOG personnel involved in this operation, Gulzar too is a local. “We have to hide our identity. Most of the people in this area are hostile to us,” he said, as others in the group nodded in agreement.

As the troops and police search for Ooni, young boys start to gather at the other end of the road. Sensing that the boys might start throwing stones, the SOG personnel act preemptive and charge on them forcing the boys to run away from the cordoned off area.

Most of the boys who were shooed away by the Kalashnikov carrying masked cops belong to a new generation of Kashmiris who were born in the last twenty years - when the insurgency erupted in the state.

Warpora, like most of the Sopore region, has traditionally been a separatist stronghold and, even after twenty years of conflict – and with ‘seventeen martyrs’ from this village alone – the anti-India feeling is widespread.

In last one year alone, there have been eight encounters between Indian army and militants in this village, a boy who refused to give his name said that is because people here are sympathetic to militants. “We all are sympathetic to militants. People are willing to provide them shelter and food. That is why they come here, but there are also many informers around” he said.

Five kilometers from Warpora village is Upper Seer – a village in Sopore and home to a Fidayeen (member of a suicide squad) who on January 6, this year, attacked an Indian police camp and later barricaded himself along with another militant at a Srinagar hotel. Both the Fidayeen were killed after a fight that lasted nearly 23 hours.

Manzoor Ahmad Bhat – a young man who joined the militant ranks after the 2008 land transfer agitation was a Fidayeen – a militant who raids a military installation – with the sole aim to kill and die. It has been rare that Fidayeen have come back alive from these raids and Manzoor was no exception.

Manzoor’s father, Ghulam Rasool Bhat said that they never saw their son after he joined the militant ranks. “He joined the protestors in 2008 who were marching to the Line of Control and when he returned in the evening he was a changed man, something had happened to him that day,” said the father, as tear trickle down his bearded face.

“He then left home saying he is going to Srinagar to work. We gave him the permission. After some days police raided our house and then came the army and the SOG”.

Bhat said that they came to know about Manzoor being a militant when an army officer told him the news. On the first day of the Islamic month of fasting, Manzoor had left his home for ever and joined Harkat-ul-Mujahideen.

Eighteen months after he left the home, Manzoor would die fifty kilometers away from his father and home.

“He never came back home to see us. After that I only saw him when his dead body arrived,” said Manzoor father. Manzoor is among the few Kashmiri militants who have participated in the Fidayeen attacks – which are otherwise mostly carried by the Pakistani militants.

Manzoor’s mother takes out the picture of him from underneath a pile of clothes from a wooden rack. The photo was given to the family a year after Manzoor became a militant and shows a bearded boy in his early twenties. It is now the only souvenir for Manzoor’s family.

In the meantime, it was a lucky day for militants hiding at Warpora. All of them, including Ooni escaped an imminent death. “Operation has been officially called off as there has been no success in locating any militant,” said Station House Officer of Sopore police station, Shakeel Ahmad.

The average life of a militant operating in Kashmir is not long and some day Ooni might be running out of luck. The rules of this game of hide and seek between Indian soldiers and the militants have remained unchanged for the last twenty years, and as of now it is unlikely that the things are going to change.

PS: Soon after the Warpora encounter, militants fought an intense battle with Indian forces in Chinkipora after which Indian forces laid a siege of that village and later shelled the residentail houses. Ooni survived that fight and went on engaging in dozens of battles with Indian forces in Sopore. Today is April 25, 2011. Abdullah Ooni continues to be among the most wanted militants in Kashmir.

"Don't die so soon my son....Oh my beloved son – won’t you miss me,’’

When the boys carry the stretcher through the narrow swampy street, there is rage even in their steps. Suddenly the slogans sound like rhythmic wails. A child watches from a window as an elderly woman holds him tight and then showers almonds and sweets. Few fall on the body, wrapped in a colourful blanket.

It is already dark and the mourners try to find their way, guided by the light of their cell phone torches. Fida Nabi (17) is returning home one last time and his funeral procession is like a volcano of anger, a little confrontation with the security men can trigger a violent protest.

The government has already decided to re-impose curfew after a day of hiatus and now officials are waiting anxiously to know the family’s plan to bury this teenager. Fida had been at the fore front of several protests. Tonight dozens of his teenager friends, assembled from across the downtown city, are seething with anger. Afuneral procession in the day meant trouble so the streets are emptied off police and security men way ahead of time to avoid confrontation. The police officers are encouraging the family to conduct the burial in the dark ofida nabif the night. The local police officer sends a message too. The orders have come from the top and pleas were followed by threats - we won’t allow more than 15 people to accompany the body after the sun rise.

The elders don’t discuss the proposals of the police. They consult each other in whispers. The anger has spilled over the streets and with each passing moment more boys are arriving. There is something very common among Fida’s friends – their eyes are moist, wails hoarse and each one of them carries a large piece of green or black cloth mask covering their heads. For a moment, they act adult and shout political slogans. Then the pain of losing a dear friend reaches its threshold and they cry like little boys. Few are accompanied by mothers too. During this latest wave of mass protests here, teenagers have formed the forward lines of the Azadi groundswell as if the baton of the struggle has been silently handed over to them.The police and CRPF often open fire and they take bullets as well – in chest, neck and head. This real threat of death, however, has not deterred them to come out on the streets.

It is clear that the children born during and after the first uprising of 1990 have finally come of age.

“We have seen, heard and felt this war from the time we came to our senses. There are hardly any happy memories.’’ Fida’s friend Nisar (name changed on request) says.

" I have seen the first funeral while I was in my mother’s lap. My mother had to carry me along when I was just eighteen days old. Her cousin had been killed and she couldn’t bear to stay home. Of course I don’t remember it but my mom has repeated even the minutest details of it so many times that it has become an essential part of our family lore’’. He says Fida is his second friend to die in CRPF firing in a week’s time.

Fida’s story is tragic and it has in a way come to symbolise the tale of an entire generation, born in the conflict, during these protests. I dig a bit deeper to know Fida and the picture that emerged fits any regular teenager. He loved trendy clothes, wore a ring for good luck and carried a friendship band around his wrest.

In a photograph clicked by his older brother Aabid recently, he stands as if a model is posing to promote a jeans line. His jet black hair is cropped in style and it seems he has purposely let a few curls touch his left eye brow. He is wearing a golden colour necklace and his white shirt is spotless. But what caught my eye is his casual gaze. Like any 17-year-old, he tried to look hip. "He would never take his necklace off. It was a gift, perhaps,’’ recalls Aabid.

"He was more of a friend than a younger brother to me’’. Aabid says he had recently started wearing a Kuffiyeh – the Arab style scarves that became a statement of resistance after Yasir Arafat popularized it.

"He had seen a friend wearing it and got one too. He loved to do things that would make him stand out,’’ Aabid says. He says he saw him change recently.

"Ever since these protests started, he was restless and angry,’’ Aabid says. "I think he was very sensitive. Whenever a soldier or a policeman would stop us to show our identity cards or frisk us, he would feel angry. He thought they always look (forces) for a chance to humiliate us’’.

On August, 3, Fida had been at home in Usman Abad, a residential colony that has recently come up in the marshy paddy fields in the city outskirts. Eight months ago, his family had shifted from Nawabazar - a congested neighbourhood in politically volatile downtown. The construction of the house was yet to complete but Fida’s parents decided to move in anyway.

They wanted to take their three sons, particularly Fida, away from the downtown. Fida had quit school soon after he had passed the matric examination. Worried, his father Ghulam Nabi – who works as a salesman at a shop - had made him promise to appear in class 11 examination as a private student. He had also given him money to buy second hand clothes and helped him to put a cart in the Sunday Market along the residency road.

Aabid says Fida liked this new arrangement. He would work on Sundays and have all week free for fun. But he couldn’t carry on for too long. Again his father intervened and this time helped him (Fida) to find a salesman’s job at an acquaintance’s shop. "He was working at Sana garments in Safakadal these days,’’ Aabid says.

Once the current wave of protests started, Fida became restless.

"The shop is in the middle of the downtown city. He knew several among the boys who were protesting. His friends had been injured too while protesting. Many of them had been arrested bythe police,’’ Aabid recalls.

"He was there when Tufail (On June, 11, Tufail Ahmad Mattoo (17) who was killed when a policeman fired a plastic pellet straight on his head, killing him instantaneously and triggering this latest wave of protests) was buried’’. The garment shop was shut because of the unrest, but every day Fida would leave home to join his friends in downtown.

"He never wanted to come to this new house. He would tell us that each time he comes to this new house, he feels he has left his heart in those narrow lanes of the old city. He was a boyfrom the old city’’.

Fida seemed to have loved the congestion and mess of the old city - an affection that was not one sided.

That day, he had been playing carrom with his younger brother and few visiting friends at the family’s new house.

"He didn’t like it here in Usman Abad but once we shifted here, he had made few friends in the neighbourhood,’’ Aabid says.

The government had clamped a strict curfew over the city but there were reports that boys were defying it everywhere. Fida had been talking to his friends on phone. His brother Aabid had not come home for a week ever since he had gone to cover protests in Baramulla because of the curfew. Aabid takes pictures for a local newspaper. "I had called home in the morning. He didn’t let me talk to mom properly and snatched the phone from her. He wanted to talk to me. He sounded cheerful,’’ Aabid recalls. "He wanted me to come home. I was insisting even as I told him there is curfew. When I recall that conversation, I feel perhaps he had a premonition ’’.

His mother Zahida Nabi had pleaded with him not to step out. "I won’t let you go out today. It’s scary out there,’’ Zahida recalls.

So he stayed home. At 6.30 in the evening, a large procession had assembled on the main road. Fida heard the sounds of the slogans and couldn’t stop himself. He stepped out, escaping the eye of his mother. The procession was going towards the city. By the time his mother Zahida knew, he had run to join the protest. A large contingent of police and CRPF had already arrived to prevent the protestors to enter the city at Shaltang junction.

"I saw him standing near the parapet. I was about to call him and suddenly there was firing. I saw him holding his face with his hands and then he fell down,’’ Fida’s uncle Mohammad Amin recalls. "A bullet fired by a CRPF men ricocheted off a rock and pierced through his cheek. He was lying there. There was chaos all around and I couldn’t go closer’’. Finally, Fida was picked up and rushed to hospital.

For five days, his mother waited patiently in the corridor outside the Intensive Care ward of Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, occasionally slipping in to see him breathe. At 10.15 pm on Sunday, Fida died. The doctor pulled the sheet over his head and walked away silently. "He’s alive,’’ Zahida Nabi screamed, putting her ear close to his chest to hear that little sound of life. Then she pulled her hair and tried to suckle him as if he was a baby. " Wake up my son– wake up – just once. I promise I will never scold you again,’’ she shouted, pleading with her dead son as if to break his sleep.

The family and friends too were around and they rushed to arrange an ambulance to Fida home. "I didn’t know what to do. So I started calling friends,’’ Aabid recalls. "He died. Can you imagine? He is only 17. Have you seen his pictures? He was a handsome boy,’’ Aabid says and breaks down.

"I just wish I had been with him. I want to see him one time the way he used to be. The bullet had disfigured his face. I want to see him smile. Oh God. Why did this happen?’’

Every human being has a measure of protection against pain. I feel I have reached my threshold. For years, I have witnessed blood and gore and felt numb but Aabid’s words pierce through my protective shell. The wails suddenly feel like sharp daggers, slicing through my heart. I didn’t know how to respond and walk away slowly. A few yards ahead, a group of boys are sitting silently in a dark corner. I join them. Their attire suggests they are all Fida’s friends. I am unable to see their faces and gauge the mood. But I start anyway and begin with small talk. They are forthcoming. Perhaps they have seen me talk to Aabid which gives them the confidence. These boys generally avoid talking to reporters. In fact, they detest media and are convinced that their story is always distorted. Did he throw stones? I ask. "Yes but only when the police and CRPF stopped the procession. I do too,’’ his friend, who didn’t give his name, says. "We want Azadi. We shout protest and shout slogans. The police and CRPF don’t like it. They try to catch us and we throw stones’’. He says Fida is a martyr. "His blood won’t go waste,’’ he insists. His voice is hoarse – perhaps he has been shouting slogans for days. I didn’t ask. Although the boys are polite, I can feel the anger.

A few yards ahead, an elderly man tries to convince a large group of angry teenagers to let them bury him (Fida) in the local graveyard. It is evident that the elders feel the situation can go out of control. "They (police and CRPF) won’t allow us even to reach the main road during the day. They won’t let us go all the way to Nawabazar and then to Shaheed Mazar (Eidgah) to bury him. They are saying only 15 people can accompany his body,’’ an elder tells the boys. The teenagers are angry and are in no mood to budge. Their plan is to take the body to Nawabazar in downtown, wait for the sunrise and then take out a funeral procession to the neighbouring Eidgah where they want to bury him in `Behishtay Shohdaye Kashmir’. This graveyard is the biggest in the valley and was exclusively set up for all those men and women who were killed by security men during the last two decades. Hundreds of militants too are buried there.

There is chaos and a few elderly women too pitch in to convince the boys. At one point, the teenagers give in. The elders organize Jinaza, the funeral prayer, in a hurry and the body is taken towards the local graveyard in neighbouring Parimpora. On their way, the boys change their mind and place the stretcher carrying Fida’s body on the Srinagar-Baramulla highway. Minutes ago, an army convoy had passed through and the elders apprehend a clash. After a lot of pleading, the boys agree to bring the body back home.

Fida’s body is placed in the middle of a tent, erected in an empty plot of land, especially for the mourners. Dozens of women encircle it. Soon Fida’s mother Zahida Nabi brings henna to paint the little finger of his left hand – a local custom to prepare a groom before he leaves to the bride’s home. "He is a groom. He is a groom,’’ Zahida repeats. The crowd gets hysterical. And as the blanket is lifted off his face for a final glimpse, a few women shower almonds and sweets on his body. Fida’s mother starts singing dirges in Kashmiri.

"Don’t die so soon my son– your nails are still wet with henna - Oh my friend – Oh my beloved son – won’t you miss me,’’ she sang as everyone repeated.

"Oh my martyr – Oh my martyr, are you thirsty – are you thirsty’’. Soon Fida’s teenager friends start shouting Azadi slogans. Zahida starts franticly hugging Fida’s body. There is a girl, holding Fida’s feet and crying silently. Hours later Aabid tells me, Fida was seeing her. "She is devastated. They have had a little fight that morning and she wouldn’t take his calls,’’ he says. "Now she will never get a chance to talk to him (Fida) again’’.

The police had been consistently sending messages asking not to delay the burial till the morning. Sensing the tension, a group of elders finally yield to the pressure of the boys and decide to quickly arrange for a truck to take the body to Nawabazar. "They won’t let us bury him here. So let’s see what happens once we reach Nawabazar,’’ an elder says. At around 3 am, the funeral procession finally leaves. The city is dark and empty – the security men have retreated to their sand bunkers and camps. The elders, however, don’t take chances and guide the truck through narrow lanes to avoid security bunkers. "We don’t want to even take a slight risk. We are avoiding to pass by any security bunker,’’ says Masood Ahmad, a businessman and a neighbor of the family. "The boys are shouting slogans and if they (security men) react angrily, there will be a massacre’’.

In Nawabazar, the boys jump off the truck and quickly make an announcement over the mosque loudspeaker. A CRPF man walks out slowly to check but returns to his bunker immediately. Soon the residents start waking up and come out in dozens, rubbing their eyes. Another funeral prayer is organized – this time right in the chowk. The security men watch from the pigeon holes of their bunker but don’t venture out. Perhaps, there are orders not to confront the people tonight.

The residents remember him and his four childhood friends, playing cricket in the inner lane on every strike day. Waseem, Bari, Suhail and Basit are all accompanying their bosom friend for his last journey.

"We have met and become friends here. We wanted to bring him here one last time,’’ Waseem explains.

"It means a lot to us. If anyone among was there in his place, he would have done the same’’.

Fida was born here. When he died, every family in Nawabazar wept for him. Even the children have come out in the dead of the night to bid him a final goodbye. "We have carried you in our laps – we have loved you – you were our boy with beautiful eyes – how can you leave us,’’ women wail as they stand in semi circles around the stretcher that carries his body. Fida is a son of a thousand mothers here. Though his father Ghulam Nabi was from Sopore, he had married in Nawabazar and soon left his ancestral home to live in a rented house, near his in-laws.

The boys pick up the stretcher again. Their plan is to keep the body inside the mosque and wait. A local cleric, however, intervenes and pacifies them. Finally, a procession moves towards the Eidgah graveyard.

At 5 am, Fida is buried next to his friend Anees who was killed last week. "He (Fida) had come and helped dig the grave and carry mounds of earth,’’ his friend Waseem recalls. "We didn’t know, he is the next’’.

It is already dawn. The sky over Srinagar is overcast. Within an hour, the soldiers will be again on the streets to impose curfew.

PS: Fida’s friends tried to organize a blood donation camp at his house in Usman Abad neighbourhood but the police didn’t allow the officials of the Blood Bank from SMHS hospital to come.



Courtesy: Muzammil Jaleel for The Indian Express
Source : Bloodied Rivers of Kashmir

Abuse 'widespread' in Kashmir jails

ALJAZEERA
Leaked cable suggests US diplomats were briefed by the Red Cross of continued torture in Indian-administered Kashmir


                             

Torture has been routinely used in prisons in Indian-administered Kashmir, a US cable released by the whistleblower website WikiLeaks has suggested.

The cable, released on Thursday, says that the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) had briefed US diplomats on widespread torture in 2005.

The memo, titled "ICRC frustrated with the Indian government"dates back to April 6, 2005, and outlines a confidential meeting in which the ICRC told diplomats of "torture methods and relatively stable trends of prisoner abuses by Indian security forces", based on data derived from 1,491 interviews with detainees from 2002-2004.

ICRC was quoted as saying their staff made 177 visits to detention centres in Jammu and Kashmir and conducted 1,296 private interviews, but reported that "they had not been allowed access to all detainees".

Techniques included electric shock treatment, sexual and water torture and nearly 300 cases of "roller" abuse in which a round metal object is placed on the thighs of a sitting detainee and then sat on by guards to crush the muscles, according to the cable.

The memo added that since torture and ill-treatment continues unbated, "the ICRC is forced to conclude that the Government of India (GOI) condones torture".

Prerna Suri, Al Jazeera's correspondent in New Delhi, said though shocking, the allegations were not new.

"Human rights groups and activists have been bringing out all these allegations in the last few years at various public fora," she said.

"The spokesperson of the government of India said that this is an internal assessment of American diplomats, and for them isn't something that would warrant a response to."

Suri added that India has consistently denied human rights abuses in Kashmir, and that it is alleged that the root problem comes from a special dispensation that governs Indian troops in Kashmir.

"The Armed Forces special Powers Act gives the army sweeping immunity .They can pick up civilians who they think are perpetrators, and in some cases they can also get away with killings and torture with any prosecution and some say that this is where the rot actually stems from".

Growing anger

Suri said the cable was likely to create more restlessness in the region.

"We have seen this year, some of the worst protests on the streets of Srinagar ... Hundreds of thousands of people came out on to the streets protesting [against] army rule."

The cable said the ICRC revealed to US diplomats that in 852 cases, detainees reported cases of ill-treatment, including various forms of torture. As many as 681 detainees were said to be subjected to more than one form of ill-treatment.

The memo added that the ICRC reported that ill-treatment and torture "is regular and widespread" and "always takes place in the presence of officers" and that the ICRC "has raised these issues with the government of India for more than 10 years".

The cable added that while the ICRC reported that security forces were rougher on detainees in the past, "detainees were rarely militants [they are routinely killed], but persons connected to or believed to have information about the insurgency".

Violence linked to insurgents in Indian Kashmir has eased since nuclear-armed India and Pakistan launched a peace process in 2004 over the disputed Himalayan region.

But popular pro-independence protests since June have left more than 110 protesters and bystanders -- many of them teenagers - dead.

India and Pakistan each hold part of Kashmir but claim it in full

I am a stone pelter. Who are you?

FIRST PERSON

------- and what else can I do to express my resistance against oppression, writes Imran Muhammad Gazi an MBA student.

I have been shot in the ribs. I am on a stretcher in an emergency ward of a city hospital. Who am I? I am a stone pelter from a busy commercial area of Srinagar. This is my comprehensive introduction, no need to have a name, surname, qualification and profession. Just one word sums up my personality "Stone Pelter". I am not that educated but some of my educated peers tell me I have always been in news right from 1931. You will find me everywhere, i have stood the test of time, leaders have changed slogans have changed but I have not. Yes there was a time when I was sidelined, and gun wielding elders occupied the centre stage.


Situation has changed and I am again in business in urban Kashmir, Ragda 2008 restored my lost glory, you called it a revolution, I watched spell bound vast multitude of people filling the streets of Kashmir, it was on that day at historic Eidgah, the gun wielding elder passed the baton on to me and with a smile on his lip and tear in his eye said” your turn mate”. I still don’t know why those tears in the eyes of the elder, perhaps I am too young to understand this.
You can find me on any street of urban Kashmir, although I have some favourite spots, I love jamia Masjid and Maisuma, old town Varmul, Sopur, and Malakhnag Islamabad to name a few. You can easily recognize me as I am the best dressed youth of my area, trendy jeans, smart sports shoe, whacky jacket and few fashion accessories, they say I buy them from the money I get for stone pelting. My income is being discussed everywhere and there is no unanimity on that it varies from 100 to2500,at times I am afraid that I may be brought under income tax net. My attire has little to do with fashion, and more with the nature of my job, I am supposed to be athletic and nimble footed and I have to mingle with the crowds, hence my attire. Ideal day at work is thrilling and exciting, the suspense, the drama, the surge and the chase is right out of 80s blockbuster Hindi cinema.

I dodged shells and bullets, ala Rajnikanth, only difference is there is no retake on the street, either you dodge in first take or you are down in the gutter. Stone pelting used to be an art but with the passage of time it has developed into a science, it is more because of those chocolate pelters, some of whom are students of best schools of Srinagar. Purists moan the adulteration; pragmatists call it the need of the hour. These chocolates talk about projectile motion, angle of projection and range, I don’t get a bit of that. They introduced “sling”, whatever oldies may say it is an effective combat weapon. I have not talked about my adversary ,most of the time it is the “Ponde police” sorry local police, it is an honour to have such an enemy in the battlefield, the most professional and business savvy police force in the world, highly well versed with economics. Such is the level of efficiency that they no longer waste bullets on us but use teargas shells for dual purpose of chasing and killing us, you can not blame them after all world is going through a recession and cost cutting is the mantra. They perfected this technique under there former boss, whose name was a tongue twister for us, we remember him as Asif Mujtabha the paki batsmen. He was a brilliant officer, disciplinarian, had a penchant for cleanliness, smoothly killed almost sixty of us in a span of few weeks, yet you could not see a speck of blood on his hands nor his immaculately worn uniform, as I told u spick and span. He treated us like his kids, ensured we did not suffer any pain or agony, bullets hit us, either on head or chest, he was such a noble loving and caring father. We miss him, they transferred him, must have been promoted, I feel good at least our blood helped someone to make a career.
Why do I pelt stones, this thought had never crossed my mind, I just instinctively new when I had to don the armour and start the battle. It was only after Ragda 2008, I heard some whispers, hushed tones, and few glances of suspicion on the street. I am street smart, I realized I am not the darling of the masses anymore, people who fed me with (Teher) even in the midst of the battle, now hated me. I should have seen this coming, it all started with the fatherly police chief Asif Mujtaba, quoting Hadith against stone pelting, learned man he is, after securing our (duniyah) worldly life, he immediately focused his attention to secure our (akhirat) life here after. We miss him; he was our real benefactor, trying to ensure us peace in this world as well as other world.

A (molvi saheb) priest who calls himself a Puritan, and who lead many processions in Ragda2008, seconded the view and said the hadith is from Bukhari shareef, it was a bolt from the blue (nabi trath) for me, same molvi used to quote Bukhari shareef in 1990s and would read out from Babul jihad (Chapter on jihad) why this hadith was never read to us until now. What had changed, Bukhari Shareef or Molvi Sahib, it was for the first time and not the last time that I have wept, yes warm tears flowed not from my eyes but the stone cold heart of a stone pelter. I wiped my tears, with my rough hands and yes mourning the death of conscience of our Ulema I did what I knew best, yes I pelted stones mocking at the simplicity of the molvi sahib.

A columnist picked up the thread from were the molvi left, writing smoothly with his “LEFT HAND “. He mocked at my lack of education, it is easy to doge the bullet than a writer’s pen I was pinned to the ground, argument lost. There is a saying in Kashmiri (Asoolus kyah kari ghulam rasool).I don’t know the English meaning of this as I am a petty stone pelter. Agreed I am not educated, but my journo brother is, if he is writing today it is because of me who is fighting in the street for the very honour he is trying to defend sitting in his study with a laptop on the table and Coffee Mug in his hand. His colleague who shot frames was shot in broad daylight; he could not get an FIR registered. I did what I knew best, and yes I pelted stones in protest against this cowardice of the police. Street is my school, and this is what I have been taught. Get an FIR registered for your colleague with your university degree in hand and we will talk my brother. Intelligentsia scorn me, to them I am a ruffian, and they refer to me as the lumpen proletariat. They are all learned scholars, poets, linguists, writers; they are mirror of our society.

When I and my friends were slaughtered on the streets some Rahi lost his way in the commotion, and found himself in a hall were some Gyan Peeth award was given to him by someone whose hands were smeared with our dirty blood. He accepted the award with hands folded in benediction, feeling at last he has found his way not knowing Rahi has been lost in wilderness forever. When men of intellect stoop so low I do what I know best, yes I pelt stones in despair. I have one question for all you learned men. Do those Shawls of honour have smell of our blood and warmth of the breath of a dying stone pelter? By the way was it not the proletariat who brought a revolution, an old news paper I found with” Sulla Masala” talks about that.

Enough of arguments, after all I am a stone pelter I can not win an argument with you, for you are learned men. It is clear to me my countrymen that I am an impediment to your progress, it pains me, I don’t want you to be backward, I want you to prosper. What then is the solution? I can not stoop to your level nor can you rise to my level. Don’t you worry I have a solution. Let there be a role reversal for a day, you be the stone pelters and we the perennial stone pelters the target. I will gather all my friends at Eidgah and you stone us to death, we will take all your stones with a smile on our lips and a tear in our eyes, smile we will for your prosperity and tears will roll, for we won’t be there to see the smile on your lips when you achieve your prosperity. Having stoned us don’t you think you won, it is we who have won for once from masters of inaction you have become men of action, and did not we pelt stones all our lives just to make
you act.

One last request my countrymen, please do not make a graveyard for us, for you will make a ritual of visiting it every year along with our respected leaders , who will come separately, as they come to our funerals individually, strange not even our blood unites them. They say unity is possible only on principles, true how can blood of a stone pelter or chastity and honour of a common Kashmiri woman be a principle to unite on, and it must be some high principle. Even if you bury us don’t ever visit our graves for old habits don’t die we will rise from our graves and pelt stones on sight of a Hypocrite. Tell my mother I will miss her, for I had two Homes Street and her lap, and yes her lap was comforting but it was the street that was my calling.

As everything in the hospital room is becoming hazy and death is waiting to embrace me, I remember a couplet by some Iqbal, I read on the back of an auto rickshaw of a fellow stone pelter.

jis khak Ke Zameer Main ho Atish Chinar
Mumkin Naheen Ki Sard Ho Woh khake Arjmund.
Is it true my country………….

(Imran Muhammad Gazi is an MBA Pass-out Kashmir University. Feedback at gaziimran@yahoo.com)

Appeared in Greater Kashmir

Amnesty International urges Indian authorities to release Kashmiri boy

Amnesty International has urged the authorities to immediately release a Kashmiri Boy, Murtaza Manzoor, 17, a resident of Zaina Kadal in Srinagar, who was unlawfully detained on January 21, this year, under the draconian law, Public Safety Act (PSA), by Indian police in connection with last year’s uprising. The Amnesty International in its recent report while quoting Murtaza’s family said that they had produced substantiated documents, which clearly mentioned the age of illegally detained youth as 17 years. “His detention clearly violates UN Convention on the Rights of the Child which stipulates that such detention should be in a separate facility for children, as close as possible to his family in order to facilitate family contact,” it added.

The report mentioned the inability of Murtaza’s family to meet him in Kot Bhalwal Jail Jammu where he was lodged. “Murtaza’s father is a rickshaw driver and cannot meet the expenses for jail visits and legal proceedings for his release,” the Amnesty International maintained. Pointing out the deplorable condition of prisons, it said that among a large number of Kashmiris detained by the police during last year’s massive anti-India demonstrations many were aged below 18. Amnesty International has specifically sought an amendment in the Jammu and Kashmir Juvenile Justice Act especially with respect to the age factor and that all underage prisoners be treated as juveniles.

With Amnesty International spearheading ‘ Free Murtaza’ campaign,’ the social networking sites are flooded with messages and tweets urging the puppet Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah to stick to his promise of not detaining minors under the PSA.

A Tribute to the Woman of Kashmir

By : Muhammad Faisal

It was a raw urge and an emotional outburst, i wanted to write about to get some closure over the pain i had seen recently. I saw the mother of Sameer Jan, the 8 year old boy beaten to death and trampled with jackboots in the 2010 Uprising.

                                    Sameer Jan 8 jackbooted to death


I came home feeling enraged and saddened, came to my room, closed my eyes and my world wandered,
Wandered around the bloodied paradise that Kashmir had become.It was painful, felt like a dagger cutting your body in half,slowly like the merciless butcher. I couldn’t bear the pain of seeing Sameer’s Mother, of her eyes haunted by the blackened body of her son.
I needed something to vent, so i wrote this:-
Kashmir, the world’s most militarized zone, suffocating with over 500,000 thousand strangers thumping on its soil, once called the Paradise on earth is now in shards, reminiscent of the conflict that has been going on for six decades. The six decades which have been full of pain, tears, passion and suffering for the people that live in its misery.

Over 400,000 souls departed since 1947, while others survived the pain of massacres, mass-rapes, torture, disappearances and sufferings that sounds like wrath of the evil over the good. Justice is hardly delivered and the procedures to seek it are never ending,

A Mother who lost her son, killed while she was dreaming about the henna on his little finger the day he would have been married, was returned with a coffin. The pain of losing her son kills her every moment his flash passes by, silently.

Her daughter awaits the return of her groom who was taken into the darkness, never to be seen again. The boy, who she was in love with, whom she wanted to tease and play games with, is nowhere. She wonders if he ever will comeback, is he alive or is he dead somewhere in the mountains. She is an empty soul wandering and staring at the knob every night.

Her sister haunted by the nightmares of the time when her soul was torn apart by the beasts in the dark of the night. Her screams and cries for a saviour gagged by their hands. She sought justice and the door was shut on her, Her family and the hypocritical society banished her. She survived the pain but the Pain took everything of her, took her dreams of being married, of having a family, of being humane. She now lies in the dark corner of the room, a life less soul.

She looks with a sigh to her neighbours’ abandoned house whom she used to gossip about her never-ending chores, of her annoying Hash (Mother in Law), left her amidst the chaos and fear. She wishes for her to return to the house occupied by the gun-toting troops of the country down south.

This mother has been the rock of resilience, survival, strength and hope. This mother is KASHMIR.

The hope has never faded in the hearts of the people living in Kashmir, Hope of a glorious future, of a new beginning, of a new dawn, of Freedom

"Muhammad Faysal is a Human Sciences student, He writes at www.muhammadfaysal.wordpress.com"