Kashmir Ripe for Endgame?

http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/22745

By Badri Raina

I

I have before me the full text of the report on Kashmir prepared by Beersman Paul, President, Human Rights Council, Geneva, submitted to the Council at its 12^th session, 14^th Sept.,-2^nd October, 2009.

The report, which is titled "Belgian Association for Solidarity with Jammu & Kashmir: Solution Under the Indian Constitution," encapsulates the interactions and findings of Mr.Beersman during his "study tour through Jammu & Kashmir State from June 30-July 27, 2009.

After a brief, factual introductory, Beersman lists the individuals and organizations he interviewed during what must clearly have been an exhausting job of fact-finding, covering all three provinces of the state of Jammu & Kashmir and most shades of opinion, although I do not find any entries either for Syed Ali Shah Geelani (the only separatist leader who holds fast to the objective of accession of the state with Pakistan, via, no doubt the formality of self-determination), for Yaseen Malik (JKLF, who steadfastly espouses "independence" from both India and Pakistan) or any interview with a Kashmiri Pandit spokesperson (remembering that the Pandits, at the other end of the spectrum, want the state's accession to India to be unambiguously cemented.) The text can be accessed at http://basjak.org.

Hereunder is a bullet-point summation of the significant points made by some significant Valley leaders other than those whose allegiance to the accession with India remains firmly in place, often referred to as the "mainstream" parties and political groups. My catalogue is clearly not intended to reproduce the full text of what each individual/organization is recorded to have said in Beersman's report, but to highlight what seem to me the chief concerns of each.

Bilal Lone—member, Executive Council, All Parties Hurriyat Conference, (Moderate; APHC-M):

"I am convinced all these strikes, hartals, shut downs and demonstrations

won't get us anything."

"Unless India and Pakistan move closer, no prospects for Kashmir";

approves of back-channel diplomacy, and states that "Independence

is a far off goal."

Firdous Syed—former member, Legislative Council, surrendered militant:

"alienation of the masses with the system is profound"; the important

question is how to maintain contact with the people; the valley needs

roads, water, electricity.

Hashim Quereshi—J&K Liberal Democratic Party:

"against all hartals as they only harm the common man."

"I oppose Geelani."

"no peace until Kashmir issue is discussed between the three parties."

Azam Inqilabi—of "Mahaz-e-Azadi, member, APHC-M; once founder of the

United Jehad Council (since headed by Syed Salauddin):

"it is time when ossified ideas about the Kashmir tangle should give way

to progressive, futuristic,viable, and practical concept of empowerment of

Kashmiris";

no to "prevarication, procrastination, recrimination, polemics";

opposed to "violent ultra-isms";

"let Kashmir be demilitarized on either side of the LOC, let the two parts

be reunified. . .facilitate the installation of a genuinely elected parliament

where patriotic democrats will determine the nature and relations with the

neighbouring countries, especially India and Pakistan."

"free Kashmir" good for South Asia.

Bashir Manzar—ed., "Kashmir Images":

"victim mentality among Kashmiris always blaming Delhi instead of

analyzing ground reasons":

"Omar Abdullah not close to ground level";

priority—"restore law & order";

chaos: APHC and perhaps PDP (People's Democratic Party led by

Mehbooba Mufti, which argues for "self-rule" without bringing Indian

sovereignty into question) responsible for misguiding young people;

"class war";

Riyaz Punjabi—Vice-Chancellor, university of Kashmir:

"unemployment biggest challenge";

"other challenges": "environment, lakes, water resources, energy";

"militants lost public support': "people want peace, stability,

development & flourishing economy";

"most important aspect (for normalcy) is the return of the Pandits—

part and parcel of Kashmiri society"; "people want them to come back";

"should come back, join the mainstream as part of our society, and work

for peace and progress."

Hemlata Wakhloo—Secretary General, Indian National Congress:

"terrorism must be tackled";

"bring back secularism, mutual respect";

"Pakistan keeping the pot boiling"; "people not with militancy anymore";

no "communal killing since 2005"; random killing of "Village Defence

Committee" members;

Zaffar Iqbal Khan—Sec., J&K State Academy of Art, Culture & Languages;

Member, Working Group on State-Centre relations:

approving of Omar Abdullah government;

corruption is a big problem; govt., should be at doorstep;

"political level to be attended by New Delhi";

M.Y.Tarigami—(CPIM; member, Legislative Assembly):

Pakistan supporting agitation to bring PDP back to power;

political change needed to accommodate "anguished youth";

want opportunities;

"centre must come forward with political initiatives";

"talk to mainstream parties and separatists";

"democratic rights and civil liberties must be safeguarded";

time to "reduce disproportionate presence of security forces without

further delay."

Bhawani Bashir Yasir—Chairman, & former Head of Diplomatic Wing &

Sec., General JKLF, Ammanullah, Founder of Ensemble Kashmir

Theatre Akademi:

"problem will continue until root cause not addressed";

"India and Pakistan are playing with us."

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq—Chairman, APHC-M, and religious head of Jamia mosque in Srinagar:

Only suppressive, military approach in use;

elections made everyone "cheerful";

politicians and bureaucrats corrupt;

security forces receiving better equipment, more money;

"militant organizations receive money from Gulf states and

Moslem world";

Solution through 5 point proposal:

1. repeal draconian laws;

2. gradual demilitarization, starting with townships and cities;

3. encourage people to people contact; leaders of both sides should

sit together;

4. encourage more trade;

5. India & Pakistan should jointly start a process reaching out to the

people; revive the peace process

Shabir Ahmed Shah—Chairman, J&K Democratic Freedom Party, member,

APHC-M:

Centre does not want the two APHCs to unite;

political uncertainty; "people are killed, arrested, gangraped";

world order has changed; solutions through "peaceful, democratic means"

"world community must feel our pain."

Dr.Nusrat Andrabi—Member, J&K Muslim Waqf Board:

police should replace CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force);

infrastructure to be built;

environment to be protected;

water problems to be solved;

civil society to be strengthened;

more transparency;

centre must resume dialogue despite bad situation in Pakistan;

some peaceful solution to be found.

Ansari Masroor—President, Itehad -ul-Muslameen; member, APHC-M:

'separatists and authorities have no control over the people";

"agencies not wanting peace are deeply involved in agitations";

too many parties giving instructions;

"these strikes don't suite our struggle."

Five point programme:

1. India should accept it as a "disturbed area";

2. stepwise demilitarization & repeal of draconian laws;

3. free movement along LOC;
4. people to people contacts;

5. make borders irrelevant; "Kashmiris should be given chance of ruling themselves without interference from India and Pakistan." 1947 borders to be restored.

Prof. Abdul Ghani Bhatt—Chairman, J&K Muslim Conference; member, APHC-M:

"Geelani and his APHC are extremists";

"we are interdependent and have to create space for others";

"Kashmir problem must be solved. . .ensuring the survival of South

Asian region as a whole";

"our slogan remains azadi (independence)";

Self-governance for J&K;

Demilitarization on both sides;

Irrelevant borders vis a vis people/trade;

Joint management by India, Pakistan, Kashmiris.

Dr.Siddiq Wahid—Vice-Chancellor, Islamic University of Science & Technology, Awantipoora:

media unreliable;

problem rooted in 1947;

bad if opposition practices negative politics;

Omar Abdullah- a "ray of hope";

"see situation/future positively.

Shakeel Qalander—President, Federation, Chambers of Industry:

self-reliance and balance in trade;

"Kashmiri alienation from India is there";

"Abdullah always advocated an independent buffer state."

Mehbooba Mufti—Head, People's Democratic Party:

"fundamental problem is Kashmir issue";

"there are no militants anymore";

So, "security forces should be withdrawn";

"internal and interregional self-rule";

"we want a solution within the Indian Constitution, without

challenging Indian sovereignty."

Feroze Kacho—Executive Director, Kargil Development Project & State Sec.,

PDP:

"PDP closer to the issue of J&K";

Thupstan Chhewang—Ladakh Union Territory Front:

PDP doesn't want Omar to succeed;

India is soft toward Pakistan;

Buddhist minority treated as slaves;

Ladakh must become Union Territory.

II

Beersman's Conclusions:

It must have seemed to Beersman that extreme positions are scantily reflected in this swathe of opinion, which may be the reason that both the pro-Pakistan Geelani APHC and known pro-India forces, both in the Valley and in Jammu province find small space in his report.

Noting that J&K is at present under the rule of three countries—China controlling Aksai Chin and a territory of 5180 kms ceded by Pakistan, India in control of J&K state, comprising Jammu region, the Kashmir Valley, and Ladakh, and Pakistan in control of Azad Kashmir (POK), Gilgit & Baltistan (Northern Areas), Beersman makes the following concluding observations:

--J&K must remain united within 1947 borders, and a modus vivendi needs to be struck between the Valley and Jammu province;

--that violence stands rejected all across the board;

--"Pakistan should stop cross-border terrorism and cross-border infiltration; stop sending money, ammunition, weapons, stop giving training. . . .As long as Pakistan supports terrorism, openly or covertly, there cannot be peace in J&K; without peace there cannot be a solution."

--priority must be given to the sufferings of Kashmiris; stop violence and deception; "Kashmiris are fed up with violence."

--"common bandits" are "taking advantage of situation"—"abducting people for money, raping, murdering, extorting money from business persons, using mafia practices under the cover of ‘the movement'";

--"it is easy to blame the security forces of all crimes that are committed";

--"composite dialogue must go on";

--who should represent the population?

--"dissident leaders do not have a solution"; "'let a tripartite dialogue start and a solution will emerge automatically' ‘is their view'";

--"The Kashmiri Pandits are the original Kashmiri speaking inhabitants of the valley. They were hounded out of the valley by militancy in 1990: some 500,000. . .fled to safer places. This exodus changed drastically the demographic composition of the population in the valley. After more than 19 years, the return of the Kashmiri Pandits is more and more blurred. Nevertheless, they have their emotional attachment with their birth ground, their roots. They only can return when peace is there and when the rule of law, not the rule of the majority is installed."

--no doubt about human rights violations, both by security forces and militants:

"dissident leaders do not mention and are not critical on human rights violations committed by militants"; security forces should show restraint.

--"terrorism must be tackled. The government must bring back secularism and mutual respect."

--natural for youth in troubled times to be abnormal;

--"construction and reconstruction continues. . .roads, office buildings, medical dispensaries are being built"; "shopping centres, hotels, residential areas, houses, posh villas, etc.,are being built, renovated"; "mobile phone became common good, and is operative in remote areas, and car-park is completely westernized, and latest and most expensive models can be seen."

--Private industry can come up only when peace is restored;

-- the "cry for self-determination by some parties is supported by Pakistan";

"However, accession to Pakistan is (at bottom) the only... option" desired;

"Indeed, according to the Azad J&K, Interim Constitution Act, 1974, Part 7(2), ‘no person or political party in Azad Kashmir shall be permitted to propagate against, or take part in activities prejudicial or detrimental to the ideology of the state's accession to Pakistan."

--"all options should be left open, such as accession to India...to Pakistan, Azadi, total independence, partition";

--"Pakistan has no stand in J&K. Pakistan raided J&K and is at the origin of the de facto partitioning of the state. As early as 13^th August, 1948, the UN Commission for India and Pakistan requested Pakistan to withdraw its troops from the state as a precondition for organizing the Plebiscite. The same Commission in its Resolution of 5^th January, 1949 repeated the request. Until this date Pakistan has not withdrawn its armed forces, and consequently the Plebiscite has not been held."

--"This conclusion is confirmed by the ‘Report on Kashmir: Present Situation and Future Prospects' of Rapporteur, Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne, Vice Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the European Union, and almost unanimously adopted by the Committee on Foreign Affairs (March, 2007)."

III

Inference:

The Beersman interviews (of which all are not included here) and his conclusions thereof taken together, alongwith other historical inputs, and this writers's repeated visits to the valley would seem to make the following inferences germane and valid:

--that whatever hopes may have been vested in the praxis of violence on whichever side have come to naught;

--that Kashmiris are truly and finally sickened of killings, whoever be the killers;

--that the longing for peace and stability is a felt one, impelled also by the aspiration among young and talented Kashmiris to make a future for themselves;

--that most hanker for a credible internal democracy, informed by transparent and just governance that can be trusted to redress the groud-level livelihood and developmental needs of Kashmiris;

--that alongwith peace and democracy, the desire to see the back of draconian laws and of the security forces is overwhelming and ubiquitous;

--that most Kashmiris wish to see the LOC made irrelevant for purposes of travel and trade, even as no one argues for any partition or separation on the basis of region, religion or ethnic diversity;

--that most Kashmiris recognize (after Bangladesh and the current turmoil in Pakistan) that religion does not make a viable basis for nationhood;

--that, despite the tragic exodus of the Pandits, they continue to find home and hospitality whenever they visit the valley, and that Muslim Kashmiris would like to see them return, not into sequestered ghettos but as they used to be; just as Muslim Kashmiris also wish to see them assume their allegiance to the valley, sharing the suffering and the risk;

--that most organized groups hold dearly, variously, to concepts like "self-rule" and "greater autonomy" without challenge to Indian sovereignty;

--that Muslim Kashmiris harbour a just grievance about opportunities in the mainland remaining opaque to them because of sectarian politics and prejudice;

There has been some evidence recently that the government of India is beginning to be more accepting of concretizing more fully the "special status" that the state of J&K has under the Constitutional dispensation. There remains a doubt as to how far Pakistan which fully dictates political and administrative functions in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir may stretch itself with regard to according a matching autonomy to territory held by it.

Nonetheless, given the climate of opinion all around, including the global zeitgeist, there is no reason why India should dither from making bold expansions of autonomy in J&K state, coupling those moves with effective and concrete transformations in law and the constitution to ensure that the regions also are accorded internal autonomy in as many functions as feasible by consent.

A greatly useful first move would be to send the army back to border areas, and leave the policing of cities and towns to the local police whose efficiency and training could be vastly invested in and upgraded.

A general amnesty for those undertrials against whom, after all, no proof of any substance exists could be another confidence building measure, making sure that work is found for them.

An open and unbiased calling to account of those involved in extra-judicial killings would seem a most restorative step, especially when accompanied by a repeal in most part of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act.

As Beersman and some of his interviewees have argued, no normalcy can be credible and genuine until as many Pandits return to the valley as want to. Ways have to be conjointly found, in consultation with the people at large, to make this a reality. Even as the Pandits need to realize that their claim to being Kashmiris must remain wobbly till such time as they do not take the plunge to assume the valley again, and do their part to revive traditions of syncretism still lauded the world over.

Just as right-wing Hindutva forces in the mainland need to recognize that the Muslim Indians who stayed back at partition time—or, for that matter, the bulk of ordinary Muslims who fled to the new state of Pakistan—cannot be held responsible either for the Partition or for the mayhem that went with it, Kashmiri Pandits need to understand that the mayhem of 1990 did not involve the general will of Kashmiri Muslims, although they might have done more than they did to meet that mayhem.

But, all in all, the relative performance of the Indian and Pakistani states, the protracted experience of Kashmiris of all communities, the state of dysfunction and regression across the LOC, the complete failure of the politics of violence—with or without cross-border terrorism—the new avenues of advancement of secularism as an idea (in inverse proportion to the disasters wrought world-wide by sectarian/religious ideologies), coupled with the wonderful world of science and technology—all of that makes the moment propitious for all parties to the Kashmir stalemate to push for an endgame.

To my own intuition, permit me to say an agnostic's "amen."

Mass Graves In Kashmir

http://www.countercurrents.org/angana130708.htm

By Dr. Angana Chatterjee
Dirt, rubble, thick grass, hillside and flatland, crowded with graves. Signifiers of military and paramilitary terror, masked from the world. Constructed by institutions of state to conceal massacre. Placed next to homes, fields, schools, an army practise range. Unknown, unmarked. Over 940 graves in a segment of Baramulla district alone. Some containing more than one cadaver. Dug by locals, coerced by the police, on village land. Bodies dragged through the night, some tortured, burnt, desecrated. Circulating mythology claims these graves uniformly house ‘foreign militants’. Exhumation and identification have not occurred in most cases. When undertaken, in sizable instances, records prove the dead to be local people, ordinary citizens, killed in fake encounters. In instances where bodies have been identified as local, non-militant and militant, it demystifies state rhetoric that rumours these persons to be ‘foreign militants’, propagating misrepresentation that the demand for self-determination is prevailingly external. Mourned, cared for, by locals, as ‘farz’/duty, as part of an obligation,

stated repeatedly, to ‘azadi’. ‘Azadi’/freedom to determine self and future.
On 18 and 20 June, the International People’s Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Indian-administered Kashmir (‘Tribunal’, convened in April 2008, www.kashmirprocess.org) visited Baramulla and Kupwara district to conduct ongoing fact-finding and verification related to mass graves at the behest of local communities. The team comprised of Tribunal Conveners Advocate Parvez Imroz and myself, a staff member, and camera crew.

On 18 June, we visited Raja Mohalla in Uri, Baramulla district, 110 kilometres from Srinagar, where 22 graves were constructed between 1996-1997. Then to Quazipora, where 13 bodies were stated as buried in seven graves in 1991. Then we travelled to Chehal, Bimyar village, Uri, holding 235 graves. We re-met Atta Mohammad, gravedigger and caretaker at Chehal, who testified that these bodies, brought by the police, primarily after dark, were buried between 2002-2006. Atta Mohammad said that the bodies appear in his nightmares, each in graphic, gruesome detail. Terrorised by the task forced upon him, his nights are bereft of sleep. Then we travelled to Mir Mohalla, Kichama, Sheeri, to the main graveyard with 105 graves, stated to hold about 225-250 bodies, buried between 1994-2003, and a smaller graveyard, with nine graves, adjacent to a sign proclaiming it a ‘Model Village’.

On 20 June, we visited the northern district of Kupwara. On the way we witnessed army convoys, including one of 21+ vehicles. Created in 1979 through the forking of Baramulla district, approximately 5,000 feet above sea level, Kupwara borders the Line-of-Control to the north and west. Between Shamsbari and Pirpanchal mountain ranges, it is one of the most heavily militarised zones, about 95 kilometres from Srinagar. Kupwara houses six army camps, as military and paramilitary forces occupy significant land. Seven interrogation centres have been operational with police stations functioning as additional interrogation cells. In Handwara town, a watchtower surveils and regulates movement.

In Kupwara, we visited Trehgam village, holding 85-100 graves, 24 of which are identified, and spoke with community members. Trehgam was home to Maqbool Bhat (b. 1938), founding figure of the Jammu Kashmir National Liberation Front. Acknowledged as Shaheed-e-Kashmir, Bhat is labelled a ‘terrorist’ by certain segments of India. He sought to unite the territories of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir into a secular, sovereign, democratic state. Bhat was sentenced to death by the Supreme Court of India and hanged in Tihar jail in New Delhi on 11 February 1984. Maqbool Bhat’s nephew, Parvaiz Ahmad Bhat, reminded us that Habibullah Bhat, Bhat’s brother, was the first case of enforced disappearance before 1989.

After Trehgam, we reached Regipora around 3 pm and stopped for lunch. There, two persons introduced themselves as Special Branch Kashmir (SBK) and Counter Intelligence Kashmir (CIK) personnel, and questioned the Tribunal staff member about our visit. After responding, we proceeded to the ‘martyrs’ graveyard’ holding 258 graves, constructed in 1995. This burial ground is meticulously ordered, each grave numbered. The body of a 20-25 year old youth was buried in the first week of June, reportedly killed in an encounter in Bamhama village.

We stopped at a roadside tea stall to speak with local people about the graves. Four intelligence personnel questioned us, asking we disclose information about those we had visited. Soon, four additional SBK and CIK personnel joined the questioning. Other intelligence personnel made phone calls. By then, about 12 intelligence personnel gathered. Following further questioning we proceeded toward Srinagar. A car followed at a distance.
We detoured to Sadipora, Kandi, where locals stated that around 20 bodies were buried. The graveyard, overrun with wild flowers, is part of a larger ground used during festivals, including Id. Two of four bodies, killed in a fake encounter on 29 April 2007, were exhumed, identified as locals, contrary to police records stating them to be ‘Pakistani terrorists’. Saidipora holds Riyaz Ahmad Bhat’s grave, killed in the encounter, age 19. Police records, per the First Information Report, declared him a ‘Pakistani terrorist’. Riyaz Bhat was identified by Javeed Ahmed, his brother, as a resident of Kalashpora, Srinagar, based on police photographs from the time of death. Ahmed travelled with the Tribunal to take us to his brother’s grave. On his knees Javeed attempted to clear the thick brush. Later, in Srinagar, he testified that Bhat had never been involved in militancy. Javeed spoke of grieving, of imprisonment and beatings at the police station. He asked how he could have saved his brother from death.

After Sadiapora, we were stopped at Shangargund, Sopore, at about 6.40 pm, by three persons in civilian clothing. They forcibly boarded the car. We were ordered to the Sopore Police Station. There we were asked to detail our identity, employment, the purpose of the visit, and to hand over tapes which, the police alleged, contained ‘dangerous’ and ‘objectionable’ material. We stated that the Tribunal, a public process, was undertaking its work peaceably, lawfully, with informed consent, and that we had not visited restricted areas. We stated that the police had no lawful reason to seize the tapes. We were detained for 16 minutes.

After several calls to senior police persons, we were released. A red Indica car followed us to Sangrama. At Srinagar, Intelligence personnel were stationed at my hotel. On 21 June, I was followed from the hotel to the Tribunal’s office in Lal Chowk, where about 8 personnel were stationed the entire day questioning anyone who entered or left the office.

My mother, residing in Calcutta, received a query regarding my whereabouts from the District Magistrate’s Office. I was followed to the Srinagar airport on 22 June, and questioned, asked if I possessed dual citizenship. I do not. I am a citizen of India and a permanent resident of the United States. On 24 June, I arrived in Bhubaneswar to submit a statement to the Commission of Inquiry on the Kandhamal violence against Christians in 2007 in Orissa. There too, Central Intelligence officials persistently inquired after me. In April, after announcing the Tribunal, I was stopped and harassed at Immigration while leaving India for the United States, and again on my re-entry in June.

The targeting of the Tribunal has not abated since the Amarnath issue erupted around 23 June. The volatile proposal to transfer 800 kanals of land to the Shrine Board, revoked on 01 July, was supported by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party and Hindu militant Shiv Sena. Despite the Sena’s recent call to Hindus to form suicide squads, it faces no sanctions from the state. Kashmiris of diverse ethnicities and religions dissented the Amarnath land transfer. Community leaders in Kashmir explained that their stance against the proposal is not in dissent to Hindu pilgrims, but a repressive state. During the Amarnath land transfer protests, civil disobedience paralleled that of 1989, amid severe repression. On 30 June, in curfew-like conditions, we met with two families in Srinagar who narrated that the police had shot dead their sons. At one place, in the old city, while the men took the body for burial late at night, the police returned and destroyed property and molested women.

On 30 June, at about 10:10 pm, Parvez Imroz and his family were attacked at home by state forces, who fired three shots and hurled a grenade while exiting when family and community interrupted their attempts. Neighbours reported seeing one large armoured vehicle and two Gypsy cars, and men in CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force) and SOG (Special Operations Group) uniforms. This murder attempt is an escalation in the forms of state-led intimidation and targeting aimed at Advocate Imroz. It is an attempt to make the Tribunal vulnerable and instil fear in us in an attempt to stop this process.

On 01 July, we met at Khurram Parvez’s home before addressing a press conference. Outside, jeeps with plainclothes men continued their observation, accompanied by a jeep with armed men in uniform.

Later, Advocate Imroz, Khurram Parvez, Advocate Mihir Desai, and I went to the police station to lodge a First Information Report. We were not permitted to do so. For security reasons, Parvez Imroz is not staying at home. Khurram Parvez remains under surveillance.

I must allow for distance before revisiting the graves. On 04 July, sitting on a plane at Delhi International Airport, waiting to take-off, I received a phone call on my India mobile, caller ‘Unknown’: “Madam,we know you’re leaving. Think wisely before coming back”.

Orders to unnerve the leadership of the International Tribunal by the Government of India’s intelligence and security administration appear to be generated at the highest levels. The general policy of surveillance should not be used as a pretext to create obstacles for our work. As India argues for a seat on the United Nations Security Council, the Government of India, as ‘Frontline Defenders’ stated in their recent alert supporting the Tribunal, must adhere to its own repeated commitment to peace in Kashmir and international conventions and laws. It must uphold democratic governance and safeguard human rights.

Advocate Imroz, Khurram Parvez, other members of the Tribunal team, have long experienced injustices for their extraordinary work as human rights defenders. A lauded human rights lawyer, Parvez Imroz has survived two, now three, assassination attempts, the first from militants. Since 2005, his passport has been denied. Khurram Parvez lost his leg in a landmine incident. Gautam Navlakha and Zahir-ud-Din have been intimidated and threatened, as has Mihir Desai, in their larger work. It is noteworthy that the Government of India is adding intimidation to the death and rape threats delivered me by Hindu extremists for human rights work.

The work of the Tribunal is an act of conscience and accountability, fraught with the charge of complex and violent histories. Its mandate, in documenting Kashmir’s present, is to chronicle the fabric of militarisation, status of human rights, and legal, political, militaristic ‘states of exception’. The Tribunal’s work will continue through the coming months. We have received extensive solidarity from civil society; victims/survivors, at street corners, from villagers, ordinary citizens, those committed to justice. Each life in Kashmir has a story to tell. The subjugation of civil society has produced magnificent ethical resistance. The state cannot combat every individual.

Nearly two decades of genocidal violence record 70,000+ dead, 8,000+ disappeared, 60,000+ tortured, 50,000+ orphaned,incalculable sexualised and gendered violence, a very high rate of people with suicidal behaviours; hundreds of thousands displaced; violations of promises, laws, conventions, agreements, treaties; mass graves; mile upon mile of barbed wire; fear, suppression of varied demands for participation to determine Kashmir’s future, spirals of violence, protracted silence. Last year, Kashmir’s only hospital with services for mental health received 68,000 patients. Profound social, economic, and psychological consequences,and an intense isolation have impacted private, public, and everyday life. It has generated brutal resistance on the part of groups that have engaged in violent militancy. Repressions of struggles for self-determination and international
policies/politics have yielded severe consequences, creating a juncture at which the failure of governance intersects with a culture of grief.

Torture survivors, non-militants and former militants, that I met with testified to the sadism of the forces. Reportedly, a man, hung upside down, had petrol injected through his anus. Water-boarding,mutilation, rape of women, children, and men, starvation, psychological torture.

Brutalised, ‘healed’, to be brutalised again. An eagle tattoo on the arm of a man was reportedly identified by an army officer as a symbol of Pakistan-held Azad Kashmir, even as the man clarified the tattoo was from his childhood. The skin containing it was burned. The officer, the man stated, said: “When you look at this, think of azadi”. A mother, reportedly asked to watch her daughter’s rape by army personnel, pleaded for her release. They refused. She pleaded that she could not watch, asking to be sent out of the room or be killed. We were told that the soldier pointed a gun to her forehead, stating he would grant her wish, and shot her before they proceeded to rape the daughter. We also spoke with persons violated by militants. One man stated that people’s experiences with the reprehensible atrocities of militancy do not imply the abdication of their desire for self-determination. This, he stated, is a mistake the state makes, conflating militancy with the intent for self-determination.

He clarified that neither is self-determination an indication of allegiance to Pakistan, largely to the contrary.

The continuing and daunting presence of military and paramilitary forces, increased and sophisticated surveillance, merges with pervasive and immense suffering and anger of people in villages, towns, and cities across Kashmir. Parallel to the presence of 500,000 troops and commitment to nuclearisation, official figures state that there are about 450 militants in Kashmir and that demilitarisation is underway. In March 2007, three government committees on demilitarisation resolved that the ‘low intensity war continues’, placing in limbo troop reduction and the repealment of draconian laws -- the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, 1958, imposed in Jammu and Kashmir in December 1990, and the Disturbed Areas Act, 1976, enacted in 1992. Local realities reflect that these laws and the military seek to control the general population with impunity.

Kashmir is increasingly defined as a ‘post-conflict’ zone. ‘Post-conflict’ is not the propagation of tourism toward an overt display of nationalism. Post-conflict is a space in which to heal, reflect, and enable civil society participation in determining peace and justice. The graves speak to those that listen. Those haunted by history are called to remember.

(Dr Angana Chatterji is associate professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies and co-convener of the International People’s Tribunal in Kashmir. A shorter version of the article appeared in Tehelka magazine’s recent issue).

The Political Uses of Official History of Kashmir

http://www.countercurrents.org/junaid020708.htm

By Mohamad Junaid
The newly-formed Institute of Kashmir Studies has provoked a shrill debate among academics, and also in some sections of the civil society. The debate, despite its frequent tumble into abuses and allegations, is only a sign of how the story of Kashmir can no longer be a monologue, but must contend with a democratisation of its recitation. There are many stories of Kashmir now, all vying for validity, but none commanding authority. The history of Kashmir is no longer something which can be imposed from above: its democratisation will ensure that it will always remain in the making, and never find its conclusion. It is being created as it is spoken about.

The postmodern re-evaluation of the nature of history has managed to put the old correspondence theory under a cloud. The earlier emphasis that the past is "out there" for us to discover and reconstruct, unmediated by language, does not hold substance, since it is widely agreed that language is a contaminated medium, facts/evidences are pre-fabricated, and our understanding of the past stands upon layers and layers of narratives; all of which, instead of leading us toward any "basic truth," actually drive us farther away. Kashmir's history, like Kashmir itself, is getting written, written-over, and rewritten. It is not that new irrefutable evidence is emerging, but the realisation has dawned that the version of history, which till now we thought was "the history," is just a story; and, it is possible to have alternative stories.

This present process of history-creation, however, is not taking place in a neutral, fair space. As happens always, the votaries of the official story are afforded a moral high-ground by the state: their version of history is seen to further ostensibly benign values of the state; they do further values, but not always the benign one. Any mark of dissent is branded as malignant and fit case for erasure. Take, for instance, R. K. Bhat's vitriolic response to M. Ashraf's comments (both published in this newspaper) on the institute's vision statement. It would be pointless to decry Bhat, who clearly betrays an ill-intent in trying to noisily silence Ashraf by calling him "rabidly communal," "bigoted," and a supporter of ethnic-cleansing of Kashmiri Pandits rather than engaging in a scholarly manner with some of the pertinent issues that Ashraf raises. Bhat's spat is like a bubble coming out of the gelatinous potage of old hegemony. He is shocked to see someone showing a dare to challenge his history; perhaps this is what has evoked a venomous outburst from him instead of stirring him to be circumspect about his own position. Bhat's statement of the "fact of history" that Kashmir got its name from "Kashyap Muni," repeated ad nausea by others too, will not find the natural acceptance of the yesteryears anymore: from history it has been dethroned and returned to its vague mythic status. It becomes important now to add "it is believed," or, more importantly, "a religious community believes," before we proclaim that Kashmir took its name from a drummed-up sage called Kashyap Muni. Yet Bhat will not delimit his truth-claim. His potage has been solidifying for many years instead of becoming more fluid like the society around him. The arrogant certainty with which he deludes himself is twice removed from present debates about the discipline of history: he not only refuses to accept what he remembers as the history of Kashmir as just another narrative, but on top of that he privileges improbable myths as history. In places with moderately decent academic freedom Bhat would be laughed at, but in Kashmir we have to listen to him.

It is important to keep in mind what Michel Foucault said: hegemonic discourses are hand-in-glove with power, in that they reinforce it. The discourse on Kashmir's past, too, is interminably linked to the power (read continuation of Indian control over Kashmir). As a case in point, the categories through which Kashmir's past and present are viewed are not, and can never be, adequate. Categories like "syncretism" and models like the "cultural mosaic" were constructed in the last few decades and inflicted upon Kashmir's past. I am not arguing this to give any credence to the opposing view point that Kashmir had either a pure Hindu or a pure Islamic past, but to question the uses and abuses of "syncretism" as a category of understanding. Syncretism points to the commonality of some doctrinal elements and not simply to the commonality of everyday life practices. At the doctrinal level, Hindus and Muslims have never shared much, apart from certain universal values which don't amount to much in analytical significance. Of course, the everyday life in Kashmir has been to a great extent marked by hybridity, but that is the case with most other societies, which precludes Kashmir's uniqueness. In his work on kinship relations of Kashmiri Pandits of a southern Kashmiri village, T. N. Madan ignored Muslims who constituted a huge majority of the village, as if there was rigid segregation of the two communities. Well, if Madan couldn't detect any syncretism in the late 1950s how is it that we have suddenly found it now? Syncretism has a political use. Muslim syncretism suits India's 'national integration' project: it softens the Muslimness in Muslims, and reveals a Hindu influence on them, apparently to the formers advantage. It matters little that the same syncretism is not asked of Hindus. The "pure" form of Islam (whatever that means) is naturally assumed to be dangerous, but pristine Hinduism (again a misnomer)—in the way Kashmiri Pandits value caste purity—is seen as unproblematic. Kashmir's syncretism is also called "Kashmiriyat," which is made out to be the dominant feature of Kashmiri society. How is it that a fragile social interaction between 95 percent Muslims and 3 percent Hindus is constructed as the dominant feature of Kashmiri society? Clamouring Kashmiriyatists may erase the socio-economic dimensions of that interaction, but to suggest that everything was hunky dory is to live in a state of denial. For instance, the way Madan "objectively" mentions Muslims (rarely as he does) as performing impure rites for Hindus, as midwives, or tillers of Pandit land, or Muslims in general being "polluting," without pausing for a moment to question why it should have been like that, underscores this point. Similarly, the lack of any major Kashmiri Muslim rebellion during a large chunk of the Dogra period does not indicate that relations between the explicitly pro-Hindu rulers (and the Pandit beneficiaries) and their systematically-impoverished Muslim subjects were harmonious.

Given we have a consciousness to inform our understanding that the official history is used to prop up the state's legitimacy we can unearth its basic components. For instance, the clue to work loose the mainstream Indian discourse on Kashmir is quite starkly presented in Bhat's article itself, when he seeks to find the basis for Kashmir's inclusion in India in Hinduism. Bhat spends almost 90 percent of his piece finding this Hindu connection, while he half-heartedly devotes a small paragraph on 700 years of Kashmir's latest history. My intention is not to suggest that times and societies prior to Kashmiris' transition into calling themselves Muslims cannot be a proper subject of history-writing, but the way emphasis is put on trying to find roots of Kashmir's 'essence' in Hinduism, is at best ridiculous. The same way, what the vision document of the Institute of Kashmir Studies, which Bhat cites, claims—historically Kashmir has been integral part of the cultural mosaic of India and no study of Kashmiri thought and cultural is possible without situating it in the broader perspective of Indian thought and culture—smacks of a brazen attempt to add one more piece of state historians' fantasies to the official, and politically-expedient, history of Kashmir. That "India" as a geo-national construct, and "Hinduism" semiticized to be its religion, being 19th century products of elite, upper caste, imagination should be taken into account before dim-wits are tasked to come up with such half-baked statements.

For other Kashmiri historians who have been contesting arguments such as that of Bhat's for decades now, they too must display caution while claiming to know "facts." The real contest is not about whose facts are right, but about who displays a critical capacity to expose the inbuilt power equations within certain forms of historical narrative. A postmodern consciousness expects us to keep in mind the relativity of our own historical interpretation, and awareness that after all it is just another story. Otherwise, we commit the mistake of seeing the past through our present lenses, like a Bhat or a Madan does, who see Kashmir's past as a history of persecution of Kashmiri Pandits. In Kashmir, though, one needs to acknowledge that the state propagates the official history (which is what the Institute of Kashmir Studies envisions to do), and those people that contest it are either muzzled or marginalized. Kashmir's nonconformist historians are accountable to the most marginalised, yet politically alert, Kashmiris, who have often been bruised by state-sponsored histories; this is what democratisation of history-writing means. People no longer take "facts" without a pinch of salt. Many historians need to catch up with that habit. If that is done, then people like Bhat would need a lot more than an armoury of abusive polemic, and the Indian state much more than the military muscle, to stifle budding challenges to the hegemonic discourse on Kashmir's past and present.

Articles on Elections in Jammu and Kashmir

Kashmir: Illusion And Reality Of An Inconvenient Truth
by Tariq Shah

We now hear the Indian Prime Minster hailing the Kashmir vote as a ballot for "national integration". People are more interested in development and good governance than Azadi, we are told, while hundreds of reports in the Indian and the international media confirmed by India's own chief election commission-- suggest that people voted not for integration with India but for pani, bijli and sadak, without compromising their aspiration for a peaceful settlement of the Kashmir issue.

That people's participation in the highly controversial election will, at best temporarily, help the Indian propaganda machine, was a foregone conclusion. The cruel joke is that the otherwise prudent prime minister himself unleashed this propaganda. In doing so, he has heaped insult on the intelligence of those who shouted from the rooftops that they did not vote for integration with India but for the realization of their mundane daily needs jobs, water, roads, power, schools, and healthcare.

[read the rest here: http://www.countercurrents.org/shah080109.htm]

Why People Defied the Election Boycott Call in Jammu and Kashmir
by Ghulam Nabi

The large scale turnout surprised the pro-freedom leadership and pro-Indian parties as well as the state of Pakistan and India. While the Indian state project the voter turnout in favor of Indian state, Kashmir based political parties including the ruling party believes this vote is for development, not for the resolution of Kashmir. New Delhi based news channels and news papers forgot their journalistic ethics which they often do, when it comes to the matter of projecting India as a biggest democracy, and Kashmir as an integral part of India. While some news papers and news channels projected the voter turn out as the defeat of separatist sentiment in Kashmir, while the others wrote Pakistan should stop now taking about Kashmir, as the kashmiris have shown faith on Indian democracy. Indian president in her address to the Nation on the eve of 60th Republic day of India also projected elections in Kashmir as the Kashmiri people’s faith on Indian polity. One wonders how she could forget the protests of hundreds of thousands of people in recent Amarnath controversy when people marched to the streets of Kashmir to demand for Aazadi (independence). On the other hand this was again the time when separatist like Mirvaiz Umar Farooq, first time confessed that the governance and resolution are two separate issues ,alas had separatist leadership realized it earlier we would not have lost hundreds of lives which were killed because they either contested election or casted their vote .

[read the rest here: http://www.countercurrents.org/nabi280109.htm]

A Just Peace In Kashmir? Reflections On Dynamics Of Change

http://www.countercurrents.org/shapiro070809.htm

By Richard Shapiro

What are the various roles that diverse constituencies must play to facilitate political processes that undo militarization and subjugation in Indian administered Kashmir? How can systemic structures that institutionalize violence, cultural annihilation, economic impoverishment, and political disempowerment be countered through non-violent, ethical resistance? What alliances are necessary to allow hope for overcoming cycles of oppression and breaking with histories of domination? How can international, national, and local actors and institutions work together to disrupt socially unnecessary suffering and ameliorate the conditions of existence? What forces must cohere to enable a just peace to emerge in a democratic Kashmir in the foreseeable future?

Numerous obstacles present tremendous challenges to movements for social justice. The current world order is predicated on systems of inequality that hierarchically divide countries, peoples, cultures, classes, genders, sexualities, ethnicities, and faith traditions to the benefit of the few and the detriment of the many. Dominant powers prescribe the rules of the game to their advantage and utilize knowledge, technology, and markets to structure social relations in their interests. The new global order presents itself as the best of all possible worlds in which sovereign nation-states organized through representative democracy, rule of law, free markets with government regulation, Enlightenment rationality, and human rights are promised as the solution to the problems of poverty, war, ecological devastation, genocide, and terrorism.

This dominant narrative of progress through the spread of capitalism organized in nation-states and guided by knowledge has attained hegemony as it has captured the imagination of postcolonial nations like India. Postcolonial nations have largely reproduced the structures of colonial oppression and organized themselves to become players in the existing global order as militarized, hyper-masculinized, nuclear powers measuring their worth on the basis of GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Emerging middle-classes of massive proportion in postcolonial nations like India buttress this process of nation building that mirrors and enforces dynamics of globalization through the production of unparalleled poverty, massive and multiple dislocations, genocide of indigenous peoples, ecological disaster, and abundant psychological malaise. India is embraced by the international community, meaning largely the United States and Western Europe, precisely because it marches in step with the new world order. India amasses great cultural capital as “the world's largest democracy” in spite of the fact that it is home to 40% of the worlds most economically destitute, and seeks to constitute itself as a nation through policies that disregard the needs of the vast majority of its population.

India is inventing nothing new in its self-constitution as a powerful nation-state. National identity is being fabricated through the equation of India with Hindus, in blatant form in entities like the RSS and BJP, and in more subtle form in the Congress and progressive Indian citizens for whom nationalism linked to 'Hindu cultural reassertion' is an unreflective response to a colonial past. The equation of Hinduism (unity in diversity) and Christianity with tolerance for difference, and Islam with terrorism, backwardness, and fanaticism, functions as a global trope supportive of unleashing disproportionate violence on Muslims in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Palestine, as well as within the territory of India in Gujurat, Orissa, and in the 'disputed territory' of Kashmir. India forms itself as nation with unexamined Hindu majoritarianism at its base, just as unexamined Christian cultural dominance organizes the United States, rendering explorations of the links between religionization, nationalism and particular secularisms close to impossible. India is also typical in its self-formation as nation in fashioning internal and external enemies as crucial to defining itself, and super-exploiting its most proximate 'others' to fuel its prosperity. European nations had the Jew as internal enemy. The United States is founded on the backs of its twin others - enslaved Africans and massacred Native Americans.

India has as its main 'internal other' the Muslim, who can take no solace in also occupying the role as external enemy in India's dominant narrative. This double site is what the state uses to legitimate the brutalization of the Kashmiri people. Firstly, there is India's need for a majority Muslim state within its borders to legitimate itself as a progressive, pluralistic, secular nation. Without a Muslim majority state within India, India cannot as easily legitimate itself as a progressive member of the new global order. Secondly there is India's need to establish national identities that take precedence over regional, local, traditional identities. As a nation, India is in the process of seeking: (1) to establish territorial dominion over the current boundaries of the nation, (2) attain a monopoly on the means of violence, and (3) organize human and natural resources to enhance the productivity and power of the nation. Every nation that has achieved the normative status of modern democracy has utilized sustained and prolific violence to realize these three imperatives and in the process establish its identity. India is in a very vulnerable moment in this process as is evident from an examination of the myriad territories and forces fighting for autonomy in some form from the Indian state. Part of the strategy to foster national identity, simultaneous to providing very little to the vast majority of its population, and in fact fostering mal-development that impoverishes and displaces poor, rural 'citizens', is to fabricate an 'us' that must protect itself from 'them'. Without internal enemies India cannot unify itself as a nation.

This internal enemy is also resolutely claimed as integral to India. The state and its loyal subjects repeat the same refrain: 'Kashmir is an integral part of India.' 'Kashmir is integral to India.' Kashmir is the other that is integral to the self, a difference that is integral to the identity of India. How then does India treat this other, this integral difference? To debase, devalue, disrespect, destroy the people, culture, history, land, waters, aspirations, imaginations, passions, thoughts, of this other that is claimed as integral to self reveals much about India's current state of existence. What other measure is available to us to assess ourselves as ethical entities than how we treat the other, how we engage the differences to which we are ethically obliged to respond? What nation has satisfactorily answered to this call? If a day arrives when Kashmir is 'a nation unto itself', independent and sovereign, an equal to all other nations, will Kashmir point the nation-state in a new direction? Will the differences integral to Kashmir be respected, affirmed, heard and engaged? Will 'the other' be the call to 'the self' to practice hospitality? Will the Gujur, the village woman who buried loved ones and waits in silence for words of/from other loved ones, the atheist, the ardent believer, the Shia, the Sufi, the pundit, the Buddhist, the differently abled, the homosexual, the beggar, the prostitute, be welcomed as participants in constructing a nation that will be 'a light unto other nations'? Will the other be welcomed without the demand or structural incentive to assimilate, to mirror/mimic dominance to be recognized as human? These questions are too much, perhaps even unfair. Yet, is it not necessary to raise them?

Kashmir occupies a literal and imaginary border as inside and outside of India in ways that structure an impossible predicament. The state (and its elites and middle-classes) does not trust Kashmiris whose allegiance is always presumed to lie with Pakistan as an Islamic Republic, thus denying Kashmiris the rights of citizens of India, while asserting the inviolability of its sovereignty over Kashmir as a secular, democratic nation governed by equality under rule of law. The distrust legitimates military rule organized through special laws as necessary to provide law and order as a matter of internal security. Thus, on the basis of being part of a democratic state, the rights granted citizens of such a state are denied to Kashmiris. Inclusion in nation is coupled with dispossession from historical memory, rights, and life. India legitimates its mistreatment through a logic originating with European nation-states. This denial of civil and human rights, rule of law, and the freedoms of citizenship to Kashmiris is because the state must protect itself from forces within itself that threaten its character as a lawful, democratic nation. India must violate what is most inviolable, through a state of exception (the use of law to suspend law as definitive of sovereignty), to protect itself. The discourse requires the allegiance of the Kashmiri people to India, as proof that Kashmiris are not what the nation suspects - traitors and terrorists, as precondition to access to the rights of citizenship. These same rights of citizenship provided by the nation, while denied to Kashmiris, are used by India to justify its claims to being a legitimate state entitled to act as it does in Kashmir. As a legitimate state, India is predicated on civil rights and rule of law that it may legitimately suspend in the name of national security. Kashmiris must align with India given this legitimacy, while living as subjects without rights in so far as the state defines them as a threat to its sovereignty. India must violate what gives it legitimacy in order to protect itself from the internal enemy integral to it. India must destroy itself to protect itself. The state of exception produces a state of autoimmunity. India is also asserting itself as superior to other regional nation-states, and an emerging player in relation to Western Europe and the United States. Like other powerful democracies, India is entitled to do whatever is necessary to fight terrorism and strengthen itself as a powerful, sovereign, capitalist nation, aligned with the movement of progress (dominance).

Kashmiris are placed in a situation where allegiance to India as prerequisite to participation in a lawful democracy involves allegiance to a state that has no rational basis to demand or expect allegiance from the people of Kashmir. India needs to exaggerate the degree of cross-border infiltration and armed Islamist militancy to rationalize 500,000+ troops, blurred boundaries between police and army, and massive intervention in daily life through systematic surveillance, land seizures, checkpoints, torture, disappearances, gendered and sexualized violence, fake encounter deaths and countless daily humiliations calculated to break the spirit of the Kashmiri people. This reality is currently resisted through mass demonstrations, regular protests, strategic use of elections, strategic boycott of elections, navigating restrictions on 'free press', civil society mobilizations, legal cases, an International Tribunal, and regular acts of dignity, courage, and faith that characterize the present in Kashmir. India demonstrates the persona all too common in the 'league of nations' - to act with impunity and disregard for international law and local demands for justice. India uses this fiction of the Kashmiri as existing in the shadowy space of inside/outside the nation to legitimate an occupation that ignores the historical particularity of Kashmir and the promises made to the people of Kashmir to determine its own future. The plight of Kashmiri pundits also becomes an opportunity for the state to legitimate regularized violence and systematic oppression of Kashmiris. Were all Kashmiris, whether currently residing in the state of Jammu/Kashmir or elsewhere, to be given voice to express their will, free from coercion, retribution, and manipulation, the outcome would not be in doubt.

Kashmir is the longest standing disputed area in the United Nations, the most militarized spot on earth, and a drain on the hopes for prosperity, peace and freedom for people throughout the subcontinent, and the world. There is no moving toward peaceful coexistence between India and Pakistan, no stabilization of the region, no possibility for global nuclear disarmament, no hope for forms of development that prioritize sustainability and cultural survival over militarization, urbanization, and middle-class consumerism, no space for the impossible healing through mourning/memorializing the trauma of Partition, without granting self-determination to the people of Kashmir.

The realization of that which is demanded by rationality in service of justice and emancipation is always against the odds. In relation to Kashmir, a more peaceful future requires at least four interrelated movements: (1) Massive, non-violent, ethical dissent within Kashmiri civil society must continue and expand, attentive to alliances that build stronger relations between men and women, youth and adults, various faith communities, urban and rural, rich and poor, facilitative of inclusive forms of polity that enable a diverse, pluralistic movement for freedom. (2) Leadership must form a unified coalition that activates and learns from the multiple constituencies that make up Kashmiri society. Divergent desires and imaginations regarding the future of Kashmir should be encouraged and discussed, outside the search for homogeneity or conformity. A Kashmir free of subjugation should enable multiple forms of life through participatory democracy, just governance, and economic practice promoting health, education, and individual and collective prosperity. Natural resources, like water, should be both safeguarded, and utilized for sustainable development. Cultural heritage should be understood as an inheritance of all Kashmiris to fashion a unique society nurturing hospitality, innovation, and multicultural polity. (3) Education and mobilization to shift public opinion in India must be undertaken throughout civil society to expand pressure on the Indian state. Citizen delegations from the various states and communities of India must visit Kashmir to learn first hand about the atrocities, resistances, hopes, and concerns prevalent in Kashmir. Such delegations must bring their new understandings to their neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, and places of worship to facilitate discussion and reflection that expand the voices of those who demand that illegal and immoral action in Kashmir done in their name immediately cease. Institutions in India must sponsor delegations from Kashmir, composed of diverse peoples who constitute Kashmiri society, to share the realities they have suffered and the need for alliance toward justice. Hindu faith communities must forge relationships with social justice movements in civil society in Kashmir to oppose Hindu majoritarian dominance and insist that the Indian state demilitarize the state of Jammu & Kashmir, become accountable to international agreements, rule of law, and human rights as the first step on the road to affirming the right of Kashmir to self-determination. Universities and the press must play a strong role in addressing the history and present of Kashmir to empower students and the citizenry of India to participate as informed members of a democratic republic, whose resources and conscience are systematically misused and violated by their government. (4) International solidarities from citizens, governmental and non-governmental organizations, students, workers, professionals, public intellectuals, faith communities, and all interested parties must be organized to educate, inform, advocate, and mobilize for the liberation of Kashmir. International institutions must be both utilized and strengthened as legitimate sites able to hold nation-states legally accountable for their actions. Research, education, and publication on the reality of present-day Kashmir and its modern history must be supported by and within universities, think tanks, and civil society forums. Campuses must become sites where students mobilize themselves to exert public pressure to ethically resolve the situation in Kashmir. Resistance in all four 'sites' must struggle to establish alliances, clarify goals, mobilize resources, deconstruct desires, and carve out space where different forms of polity and community, promoting ethical dissent, may live.

To commit to these practices secures no guarantees. The process must draw from the resolve of Kashmiris to struggle for justice and strengthen this resolve through principled alliance that breaks the isolation and despair that accompanies any people subjected to brutal mistreatment. The multiple legacies that inspire and haunt us must become the very sustenance that, through sharing, nurtures our struggle. Allow me to conclude by drawing from a source common to the three Abrahamic traditions, and of universal relevance in the present, Deuteronomy 16:20, Justice, Justice, You Shall Pursue.

Richard Shapiro is Chair and Associate Professor, Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.

Articles on Shopian

Shopian: CBI On A Spree Of Manufacturing Lies
by Anuradha Bhasin Jamwal

It didn’t take a single stroke for the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to demolish the allegations of rape and murder in Shopian as a figment of imagination. It took several months to concoct a suitable story in pursuit of a conclusion that was already being gradually and selectively leaked out to the media in the last few months. The new addition is simply the ‘scientific’ presentation of the medical examination post exhumations, that trashes even the few fragments of evidence pointing to rape and murder in Shopian and jumping to the conclusion of ‘drowning’.

[read the rest here: http://www.countercurrents.org/jamwal161209.htm]

Shopian: Manufacturing A Suitable Story
Fact Finding Report By The Independent Women's Initiative for Justice

The Shopian rapes and murders epitomise the wrongs and injustices perpetrated on the people living in a militarised society. The incident not only manifests the extent of fear psychosis, denial of security and democratic rights to the people, it also demonstrates the abject refusal of those at the helm of affairs to bring the culprits of gross violation of human rights to book. Shopian is not a case in isolation. It is a leaf out of history of human rights abuse and absolute impunity that men in uniform enjoy. The latter have been accused in thousands of cases for torture, humiliation, encounters, disappearances, molestations, sexual assaults and other forms of harassment. Jammu and Kashmir has a long list of rape victims, none of whom has received justice, of missing men whose families wait for them year after year spending their lives in absolute penury and uncertainty, of killed men, orphaned children and widowed wives. Shopian rapes and murders fit into this ugly tapestry of brutalities and violations by men in uniform and a culture of impunity.

The last two decades in Kashmir and other militarised areas of J&K are marked by not just brutalities by security forces but also the unlimited protection these personnel get. Despite massive allegations, with serious evidence pointing out to the same in many of the cases against the security forces, very few cases were ever investigated. In a negligible number of cases, prosecution takes place. In none of them has justice been delivered.

[read the rest here: http://www.countercurrents.org/iwij111209.htm]

CBI’s Mission Kashmir: Manufacturing Consent On Shopian Rapes, Murders
By Anuradha Bhasin Jamwal

The CBI may have succeeded in its mission in Shopian, that of what Noam Chomsky refers to as manufacturing consent about non-existence of any violations in the twin rapes of Asiya Jan and her sister-in-law Neelofar Jan. But this is only as far as the opinion outside Jammu and Kashmir, formed by a consistent over-drive of narration of lies, is concerned.

Within Jammu and Kashmir, especially in Kashmir Valley, the exercise of manufacturing consent, however, has not only met with skepticism but also renewed bout of disappointment and erosion of already fragile confidence of the people in institutions of the State. As Majlis-e-Mushawarat Shopian, spearheading the agitation for justice in the Shopian rapes and murders case for the last nearly five months, has pointed out: “The CBI appears to be completing the unfinished business of agencies previously investigating the crime.”

[read the rest here: http://www.countercurrents.org/jamwal261009.htm]

Arundhati Roy on Kashmir

Listen to the interview at zmag:

http://www.zmag.org/zaudio/2832