SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 1, No. 52, July 14, 2003

INDIA

J&K: Is the 'Healing Touch' Headed for Hard Times?
Guest Writer: Praveen Swami
Special Correspondent, Frontline

Good news seems to be showering down on Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) in great big drops.

Srinagar is full of tourists. There are no houseboat rooms to be had for love or money. The pilgrimage to the Amarnath shrine near Pahalgam has registered record numbers. Corrupt officials are being prosecuted, and Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed has been liberal in his use of the lash against Jammu and Kashmir's notoriously recalcitrant bureaucrats. Businesses are again investing money, and there are signs that the administration is starting to slow down on its favourite support-purchasing act: handing out new Government jobs. Local schoolchildren even gathered in droves to cheer an Indian Air Force display over the Dal Lake, an advertisement if there was ever one for Sayeed's 'Healing Touch' programme, which seeks to rebuild bridges between the alienated people of Kashmir and the Indian state.

Sounds too good to be true? The sad news is that it probably is.

'Healing Touch' optimists have a script that runs thus: Sayeed's People's Democratic Party (PDP) succeeds in building a mass consensus against violence, and in ending the Indian security establishment's alleged atrocities against innocents. He is helped in this task by the India-Pakistan dialogue, which, aided by a little international arm-twisting, marginalizes Pakistan-based jehadi terrorists. And this, in turn, opens space for centrists among Kashmiri secessionist groups to begin negotiations with India, leading to a final resolution of the dispute.

At first glance, the Kul Jamaat Hurriyat Conference [All Parties Freedom Conference, APHC] decision to elect Abbas Ansari as its new head seems to show that events are moving smoothly along at least this part of the 'roadmap' to peace. Although the 62-year old cleric is a pro-forma Pakistan supporter, he is also Shia - the first person from his denomination to head the Hurriyat Conference. Acutely aware of the violently Sunni-chauvinist leanings of the jihadi groups operating in J&K, Ansari has reason to adopt a centrist line. Shia leaders were also prominent in a breakaway Hurriyat faction set up just after the 2002 elections, which called for a dialogue with India.

Ansari's elevation came after weeks of bitter feuding among the Hurriyat's constituents. The Jamaat-e-Islami's political head, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, had called for the expulsion of the People's Conference, led by Sajjad Lone, the son of assassinated centrist leader Abdul Gani Lone. Geelani claimed that the People's Conference had tacitly endorsed the participation of some of its senior leaders in the 2002 State elections, although they were formally expelled from the party. People's Conference luminaries who participated in the 2002 elections include current J&K Minister for Forests, Ghulam Mohiuddin Sofi.

In the fortnight before Ansari's appointment as Hurriyat chief, the war between the centrists and the Islamist right reached new heights. "Those who did not launch a campaign against the polls," Geelani asserted, were "the biggest traitors." People's Conference leader Sajjad Lone hit back, charging Geelani with having created the conditions for his father's murder, and claiming the Jamaat-e-Islami leader was "a nightmare for the Kashmiri people and a dream gift for India." And, as Geelani threatened to launch a new, authentic secessionist platform, Ansari's predecessor G.M. Bhat insisted that, "anyone leaving the Hurriyat will be a traitor to the freedom struggle."

Geelani was not present at the meeting during which Ansari was elected. He was, earlier this year, removed from his post as the Jamaat-e-Islami's representative in the Hurriyat for his refusal to attend meetings until the People's Conference was expelled. Howls of outraged protest from jihadi groups, notably the Hizb-ul-Mujaheddin (HM), led the Jamaat-e-Islami to reverse the decision. Now, Ansari seems to be heading where the Jamaat-e-Islami had left off. He condemned all talk of a break in the Hurriyat's ranks, rejected calls to expel the People's Conference, and said Geelani's position was the consequence of his wrong appreciation of the situation, since he was in jail during the elections.

Recent events can be traced back at least to 1997, when the supreme head of the Jamaat-e-Islami, Ghulam Mohammad Bhat (not connected to former Hurriyat chairman G.M. Bhat), gave an interview that distanced the Jamaat-e-Islami from the Hizb-ul-Mujaheddin and called for an end to the "gun culture." Then, in the spring of 1999, APHC chairman Bhat called for a dialogue between mainstream political parties and secessionists. Finally, in mid-April 2002, and in the face of loud protests by the Islamists, the elder Lone and Mirwaiz Farooq were granted permission by the Indian Government to travel to Sharjah for a closed-door meeting with Sardar Abdul Qayoom Khan, the head of the Kashmir Committee set up by Pakistan's military ruler, President Pervez Musharraf. Pakistan's intelligence chief, Ehtaz-ul-Haq, is also believed to have been present at the sidelines of that meeting.

What really transpired in the closed-door meeting is not known, but Lone emerged demanding that jihadi groups "leave us alone." Meanwhile, Geelani again came under fire from within his own party, which passed a resolution supporting the "conciliatory stance adopted by Umar Farooq and Abdul Gani Lone." In the months before Lone's assassination, which came just months after the 2002 Sharjah meeting, Lone and Geelani were engaged in a furious debate on the character of the secessionist movement in Jammu and Kashmir. Geelani insisted that its Islamist character be acknowledged, and the presence of foreign jihadis thus legitimised; Lone, who had not too many years earlier himself described the foreign jihadis as "mehmaan Mujahideen" (guest holy warriors), claimed it was nationalist.

Significantly, however, the centrist influence in the Hurriyat led to no real political breakthrough. Bhat, for example, rapidly backed down on his call for dialogue, and abandoned it altogether after an abortive assassination attempt. Put simply, the Hurriyat centrists were in no position to defy the real ground-level power of the jihadi groups. While Geelani clearly understands that dialogue is necessary, he also believes armed struggle is necessary, until that dialogue begins, to give the Islamist Right a favourable bargaining position. Unless the centrists can find some means to contain the influence of the jihadi terrorist groups, no real forward progress is possible. Democracy and dialogue, quite simply, cannot function with a gun held to their head.

What, then, of the gun?

Recent Union Ministry of Home Affairs data provides empirical tools with which the course of the 'Healing Touch' may be plotted. It is clear that there has indeed been some decline in violence. The data compares terrorism during eight months of PDP rule, from November 2002 to June 2003, with terrorism during National Conference rule from November 2001 to June 2002. It suggests that any major indicator of terrorism levels, be it the total numbers of acts of violence, the killings of civilians, or the deaths of security force personnel, has shown a decline. Yet, a closer look at the data shows this aggregate impression of improvement is, quite simply, a myth.

First up, the decline in the numbers of violent incidents relates only to the first four months of this year. In May and June, terrorist attacks showed a sharp upsurge, and registered numbers very similar to those seen in 2002. Killings of Indian security force personnel and terrorists followed a very similar pattern. The much commented-on lull of these months, it is important to remember, may have been as much the consequence of an unusually bitter winter, which made movement difficult for terrorists and security forces alike, as political developments. June, in a sign of what might be yet to come, saw more civilians, terrorists and security force personnel killings than were witnessed in the same month last year. Reports from much of southern Kashmir, as well as Kupwara and other mountain regions, suggest there is a massing of terrorist groups, larger in scale than anything seen in recent years.

More important, though, one key figure has shown no meaningful decline at all - the killing of Muslim civilians. Even during the winter lull, killings of Muslim civilians remained at levels similar to those seen in 2001-2002, a sign that terrorist groups retained their ability to strike at those perceived to be security force informers, political activists, or simply soft targets and those considered hostile to jihadi control of civil society. It doesn't take much to see why terrorist groups must sustain civilian killings, whatever the contours of the macro-level India-Pakistan détente within and outside J&K. "Democratic politics is encroaching on the control the jihadis have over their constituency," legislator Mohammad Yusuf Tarigami recently told The Hindu, "so they use guns to keep their flock together."

'Healing Touch' optimists refuse to concede that strong counter-terrorist action is a necessary precondition for meaningful democratic dialogue to begin; people's pressure will bring about that end, they claim. If they're wrong, the 'Healing Touch' could soon find itself trapped between a rock and hard place.

INDIA

Tackling Insurgency in the Northeast: Fickle-minded in Delhi
Wasbir Hussain
Associate Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management, New Delhi; Consulting Editor, The Sentinel, Guwahati

India has long been one of the most vocal advocates of the position that terrorism, as a global threat, must be confronted with coherent and cooperative responses across the world, and has long faulted the US-led 'global war on terror' for its selectivity and internal inconsistencies. Regrettably, the Indian Government's own actions and positions on matters relating to terrorism and armed separatist insurrections within the country have remained highly ambivalent, even contradictory. New Delhi's ambivalence on the issue of tackling insurgencies in the country's Northeast have now been brought into sharp focus by Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Mukut Mithi, who contends that the Vajpayee Government has "ignored and rejected" his persistent pleas for central paramilitary forces to launch a special counter-insurgency operation to flush out and neutralize heavily-armed Naga militants wreaking havoc in his State.

In a lengthy telephone conversation from Itanagar, the capital of the hill state of Arunachal Pradesh that borders Myanmar and China's Tibet region, with this writer, Mithi disclosed that Naga rebels, particularly the Isak-Muivah faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN-IM), have been indulging in rampant extortion, kidnappings and killings in the districts of Tirap and Changlang, and have generally created a reign of terror. He put the number of NSCN-IM cadres operating in the two districts - strategically located at the tri-junction of the States of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and Nagaland, and, of course, Myanmar - at about 500. Rebels owing allegiance to the rival NSCN faction headed by S.S. Khaplang are also present in the area. The Chief Minister said it was because of the prevailing security situation in Tirap and Changlang districts, that his Government had to put off the panchayat (local body) elections in the area, which were to have been held in April. An idea of how the rebels are terrorizing the people, including political leaders, Mithi observed, can be had from the fact that the NSCN-IM cadres had even kidnapped his (Congress) party's Tirap district vice-president.

It was under these circumstances that Mithi's Congress Government convened a meeting of the State Security Coordination Committee (SCC) at Itanagar in May and decided to launch 'Operation Hurricane', a special offensive by the security forces to combat the Naga rebels in Tirap and Changlang. Since the SCC is a Committee notified by the Government of India two years ago, it is apparent that New Delhi was, and still is, aware of the fact that a serious insurgency situation was developing in otherwise peaceful Arunachal Pradesh, a State that has not been witness to a local militant movement so far. Mithi disclosed that, at that meeting in May, apart from the State Chief Secretary, who is the chairman of the Committee, and representatives of federal intelligence agencies, the Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs (Northeast), was also present. "Although the MHA official was himself present at that meeting, we intimated the Home Ministry of the decision to launch Operation Hurricane and sought three paramilitary battalions for the purpose," the Chief Minister said. The Ministry of Home Affairs, Mithi added, initially agreed in writing to send one battalion of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) for a period of 45 days to carry out the operation, but later went back on its promise. Speaking to this writer for the second time in a week on Saturday, Mithi said Operation Hurricane eventually could not be launched "due to New Delhi's non-cooperation."

It is clear that the Union Government is not in favor of any military offensive against the Naga rebels at the present juncture, since there is a ceasefire agreement in place and the Government of India is engaged in 'peace negotiations' with the NSCN-IM, and to an extent with the rival NSCN-K. New Delhi's reasons for not coming to Mithi's aid were let out by the visiting Minister of State for Home, Swami Chinmayananda, when he questioned the Arunachal Pradesh Government's urgency in pushing for Operation Hurricane at a time when the Center was engaged in a dialogue with 'both factions of the NSCN.' The Minister made these remarks on Friday at a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-sponsored public rally at Khonsa, in the militant-infested Tirap district.

But a peace process can hardly be legitimate grounds to obstruct action to expel or contain the criminal activities of the NSCN in Arunachal Pradesh, and the Center's attitude raises several serious questions. With a ceasefire deal in place with the NSCN-IM, the Vajpayee Government should have been able to prevail upon the Naga rebel group to stop its cadres from operating in Arunachal Pradesh, and to prevent them from indulging in violent activities there. Apart from clearly exposing the fact that New Delhi does not, in fact, have much of an influence over the rebels, it brings to the fore the ticklish issue of the ceasefire jurisdiction. Are the NSCN-IM cadres supposed to adhere to the ceasefire ground rules only in the state of Nagaland where the truce is actually in force? But, again, if the ceasefire is not applicable anywhere else in the Northeast, outside Nagaland, then how can New Delhi ignore pleas or attempts by another State to launch counter-insurgency operations against members of this rebel group who are engaged in a range of violent and criminal activities in that State? Answers may not be forthcoming from the Government, but by giving the Naga rebels a broader playing field, New Delhi could be indirectly conceding a measure of legitimacy to the NSCN-IM's dream of a 'Greater Nagaland' which would bring the Nagas populated areas in the entire region under a single political and administrative umbrella.

The lack of a transparent policy on insurgency has created enormous scope for confusion over the issue of how security forces, State Governments, political leaders, the media or even the common people are expected to conduct themselves in an insurgency situation. In Arunachal Pradesh, Chief Minister Mithi surprised everyone in April when he okayed the arrest of two of his ruling Congress legislators - Tongpong Wangham, a cabinet minister, and another legislator, T.L.Rajkumar - on charges that they had links with the NSCN-IM. They were booked under the State's new anti-crime legislation, the Arunachal Pradesh Control of Organised Crime Act, 2002 (APCOCA), but were freed on bail. Mithi indicated that the duo had since been 'pardoned' by the Court, after they turned approvers in the case. The Chief Minister insists that such problems or charges of a politician-insurgent nexus have come up in Arunachal Pradesh only because New Delhi has 'permitted' the Naga rebels to operate freely in his State, and to threaten and intimidate one and all. Mithi takes this position to reject any need for a federal investigation into allegations regarding the militant-politician links in his State, declaring, "We are acting on this on our own under the provisions of APCOCA." With neither the Center nor the State bound by a clear counter-insurgency posture and policy, the shadowy world of insurgent politics in India's Northeast can only be expected to get murkier.