Pak Military government hijacks Muslims Conference in PoK

By:- Samuel Baid

The military Government of Gen Pervez Musharraf seems to have hijacked the Muslim Conference which emerged as the ruling party after the July 5 elections in Pakistan occupied Kashmir. First, it tooks away the party's right to elect its own leader of the legislature party by appointing Sardar Sikander Hayat Khan as the Prime Minister ignoring the overwhelming support party's President Sardar Abdul Qayyum enjoyed among the legislators. Two, the Pak Government forced on occupied Kashmir Maj. Gen. Sardar Mohammad Anwar Khan as the Muslim Conference's Presidential candidate before the party could select a candidate after the refusal of Sardar Qayyum to fight for this post. One should not be surprised if the Pak Government also replaces Sardar Qayyum as the Party President.

Pakistani Press reports suggest that Sardar Qayyum felt hurt when the Army picked up Sardar Sikandar Hayat Khan to be the Prime Minister although its was the former who streered the party to victory at the July 5 elections. The party won 30 of the 48 seats of the Assembly against 17 of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) which had ruled here since 1996. Of the 30 Muslim conference members 22 supported Qayyum for the Prime Ministership. When miffed Qayyum refused to stand for the Presidential election the same number of members wanted his son Sardar Attiq Ahmed Khan to be the party's Presidential candidate.

It will be in order to give a brief background to Qayyum -Sikandar relations here. After the June 1991 Assembly elections, Qayyum become the Prime Minister while Sikander Hayat was made the President. Soon after the elections, Sikander Hayat began accusing the Prime Minister of corruption and his son Attiq of misusing his father's position. He described Attiq as an extra constitutional element within the Muslim Conference. Hayat went public with these allegations and consequently they broke up and led their own factions of the Muslim Conference. However, the two patched up before the July 5 elections to give a joint fight to the PPP. But the developments after the elections indicate that this patchup was only politically expedient: the gulf between them remained and the party workers maintained their earlier distance.

Sardar Qayyum had served the interests of the Pakistan Establishment since 1947 although at times he showed a rebellious mood. For example, in February 1975 when Sheikh Abdullah was re-installed as the Chief Minister of the State of Jammu and Kashmir, Qayyum was unceremoniously removed as President of occupied Kashmir by the Federal Security Force of the Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhuttoo. Qayyum then wrote a letter to Sheikh Abdullah appealing to him to help liberate occupied Kashmir where, he said, people had no rights. The text to this letter was published by an Urdu journal of Srinagar "Aina".

Before the 1991 elections there were reports that the ISI and the Army wanted to drop Qayyum in favour of some new person. But since Mr. Nawaz Sharif's Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) has come to power in Islamabad Qayyum was allowed to survive. But this time, much before the elections, it had become evident that he had lost the confidence of the Army. In September last year he surprised everyone when he told a meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) in New York that Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was genuinely interested in peace in Kashmir. Later he supported the Ramazan ceasefire Mr. Vajpayee announced in Kashmir and opposed the Pakistani and the Hurriyat Conferences insistence on tripartite talks involving India, Pakistan and the Hurriyat. He was of the view that the Hurriyat should not be involved in India-Pakistan talks in initial stages.

Within occupied Kashmir, Qayyum was critical of the activities of Jehadi groups who he feared would destablise the whole political system not only in occupied Kashmir but also in Pakistan. For this reason he criticised the Jammat-i-Islami, which he said was more corrupt than any other party. Perhaps it was his campaign against the Jammat that more of its 33 candidates won in the July 5 elections. In 1996 the Jammat had one seat and none this time.

A campaign of villification was launched against Qayyum as an Indian agent. Calling somebody an Indian agent is a more threatening allegation in Pakistan than calling somebody an Acmediyya.

Amid this spate of allegations the Army did not find it difficult to isolate Qayyum. The dramatic style in which Maj. Gen Anwar was forced on occupied Kashmir was noteworthy. It was announced on July 28 that one Maj. Gen. Sardar Mohammad Anwar Khan of Rawalakot (in-occupied Kashmir) had tendered his resignation from the Army. A simultaneous report said that occupied Kashmir Government had, by an ordinance, amended the rules that prevented a Government servant to take part in politics before the expiry of two years after his retirement of resignation from Government service. The amended rules allowed a Government servant to take part in politics whenever he wanted after his retirement or resignation. The next report said Maj. Gen Anwar was going to Muzaffarabad to file his nomination as the Presidential candidate of the Muslim Conference. The party legislators were taken aback but the high command had to obey the orders from Islamabad.

Maj. Gen Anwar got 36 votes in the election of August 1 as against 18 of his PPP rival Latif Akbar. The electoral college consisted of the 48 members of the newly elected Assembly and six of the "Azad" Jammu and Kashmir Council. According to the 1974 Interim constitution of occupied Kashmir, the Prime Minister of Pakistan is the chairman of the Council, but since there is no Prime Minister in Pakistan at present, Gen Musharraf, being the Chief Executive, is the chairman, He has nominated five persons on the council from Pakistan. In addition to them the Minister for Kashmir and Northern Areas Affairs can also vote in the Presidential election although after the formation of the council in 1975 there was no provision for such a Ministry.

The Council also has six members elected by the occupied Assembly including its Prime Minister. The President of occupied Kashmir is the vice-chairman. Thus the total strength of the council adds up to 13.

The background to the formation of this council, or for that matter the very production of the 1974 constitution for occupied Kashmir by Mr. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was that Sardar Qayyum as the President of this territory had joined hands with his opponents in Pakistan and introduced some Islamic laws to embarrass Mr. Bhutto. The most damaging for Mr. Bhutto was the declaration of Ahmediyyas as a non-Muslim minority in occupied Kashmir in April 1973 through a resolution of the Assembly. This was the time when Mr. Bhutto's opponents were demanding that Ahmediyyas be declared non-Muslims in Pakistan. There were charges that Mr. Bhutto had won the 1970 elections with the money and active support of Ahmediyyas who then occupied high positions in the country.

The constitution Mr. Bhutto designed for occupied Kashmir drastically limited its Assembly's power to legislate. Under this constitution, the Assembly cannot make laws pertaining to foreign affairs, defence, currency, foreign trade and foreign aid. The AJK Council, which virtually acts as the upper House of occupied Kashmir, does not allow the Assembly even to make those laws about which there is no constitutional restriction. For example, a few years ago some members of the Assembly wanted to adopt a resolution permitting schools in occupied Kashmir to teach Kashmir history. That was not allowed. Critics of the Pakistani control over this part of Kashmir say that Kashmiri children do not know who are their heroes. They are taught that Pakistani heroes are their heroes. They are even made to sing the Pakistan national anthem as their own.

Thus the elected Assembly does not mean anything to the people of PoK. It consists of members who take an oath before the elections that they support the ideology of Kashmir's accession to Pakistan. In 1996 more than two dozen nominations were rejected by the Election Commission because the candidates refused to sign this undertaking. Again, for the July elections the Election Commission rejected 80 nominations on the same grounds. Those who protested are still in jail. Among them is Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) Chief Amanullah. Thus the Assembly does not represent all sections of the Kashmiris society. The present Prime Minister Sikander Hayat told Nawa-i-Waqt in 1992 that the Government in Occupied Kashmir was no more than an ineffective municipal administration.

Despite all these restriction on the occupied Kashmir Government and Assembly, there is the Article 56 in the 1974 constitution which allows the Pakistan Government to remove any Government in this territory. We saw in 1991, before elections, how then Prime Minister Rathore was bodily carried from Muzaffarabd to a jail in Rawalpindi by Army men because he had begun to defy the Pakistani Establishment. He was released only after a new government was installed.

Sardar Qayyum, when the agreed to the nomination of Maj. Gen Anwar as Muslim Conference's Presidential candidates without as much as a whimper, he must be thinking of the plight of Mr. Rathore in 1991. Sardar Qayyum was then the President of occupied Kashmir. Mr. Rathore belonged to the ppp.

Curing passengers of green channel phobia

By Deepak Arora

A beaming Anand Kumar has just landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA). He is a happy man. He is back home after his first-ever trip abroad to Hong Kong with his wife and two little children. He collects the baggage and walks through the green channel at the airport.

Jacques Borker, a Parisian and a tourist, arrives at Delhi and is out of the airport quickly after passing unhindered through the green channel. So does Neeta Malhotra, a Non-Resident Indian. She is back in India from Washington for a three-week vacation with her two daughters-Pooja and Ruchika.

They are among the thousands of people who pass through the green channel as a routine. Unhindered. No questions asked: thus giving a new humane face to the Customs and to the country-India. Gone are the days when a person dreaded returning from abroad. There was always a lurking fear of the men in whites. However, the situation has taken a turn for the better. At present as many as 98 per cent of passengers make use of the green channel. In other words, out of 18,02,130 incoming passengers arriving at Delhi as many as 17,66,058 use the green channel facility.

Says Mr. R K Gupta, Commissioner (Customs), Delhi: "Our aim is to project the friendly and humane face of the customs. We are here to facilitate passengers' fast movements, if he or she is clear from security of smuggling concerns." However, this does not mean that men in white have altogether stopped checking passengers. "We do so at random," says Mr. Gupta. "We now have better equipment in the form of X-ray machines and hidden cameras. The staff is better trained and have been equipped to trace suspicious looking passengers."

As a result, nearly 250 passengers were caught for misusing the green channel in the past two months. Such a catch to about 0.1 per cent of the total people using the green channel.

Giving an example, he said, last month the preventive staff caught two suspicious but gentleman-looking persons going through the green channel. On examination of their baggage, it was found that they were carrying suitable goods beyond the exemption limit of Rs. 12,000. What surprised the staff was that they willingly agreed to pay the duty of Rs. three lakh. Normally, passengers do not pay such high duty easily. They crib and plead. This made the staff more suspicious and took them for physical examination. Hold and behold, what was found. Each carrying 22 mobile phones bandaged on their legs.

Speaking on the concerns in the developed countries, Mr. Gupta said the prime worry abroad is security and drugs. It must also be remembered they have better security gadgets such as X-ray machines and other equipment. In fact, all there baggage belts have X-ray machines which makes it easier to identify the suspects." As compared to that "we not only have to deal with security, threats, and drugs and narcotics, but also smuggling of goods, wildlife products and fake currency. Despite that the green channel walk-throughs have increased from 60 to 65 per cent way back in 1991-92 to 97 to 98 per cent in the year 2000-01."

In fact, the red channel counters have also come down from 11 in 1991-92 to five in 2001-01. The five red channels also include a separate priority counter for senior citizens, unaccompanied minors and single passengers accompanied by children. Besides, the customs have also opened a facilitation counter each for tourists and NRIs for declaration of gold, silver, currency and traveller cheques and mishandled baggage.

The Customs have also become less intrusive over the year with the liberalising of import regime. With cheaper and better quality goods and brands available within the country, passengers are bringing in less and less of imported goods. The other factor, which prevents people from cheating, is the increase in the free baggage allowance. Says Mr. S P Srivastav (Chief Commissioner Customs): "there has been an increase in free baggage allowance from Rs. 3,000 in 1991-92 to Rs. 12,000 at present." This allowance is comparable with most airports in the developed and developing countries. Besides that the Government has allowed professionals such as doctors, journalists and photographers to bring in professional tools like stethoscope, blood pressure machine, laptop and camera without paying and duty. Besides, the baggage duty has also been brought down gradually from 255 per cent in 1991-92 to 210 per cent in 1992-93 to 155 per cent in 1993-94 to 60 per cent in 2000-01.

It may be pointed out that the tradition of charging customs duties at ad valorem has been there in India for a long time. In Kautilya's time, the general import duty was 20 per cent ad valorem. During the time of the Moghuls, import duties upto 5 per cent ad valorem were being levied. During the British rule also, import and export duties were being levied at ad valorem rates on many items. Tradition of imposing customs duty on imported merchandise based on the actual value of the imported merchandise has been prevalent in India since the Artha Shastra days, over 2000 years ago. The General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade (GATT) is now following the same system.

For better facilation of passengers, officials advise that if you are going out India and you intend taking out with your articles of high value such as a camera, laptop, video camera, video cassette recorder or jewelry, be sure to ask the Customs Officer, at the time of your departure, for an Export Certificate for such articles. He will examine these and certify that they are being taken out of India by you. Keep this certificate safe with you and when you return to India, show it to the Customs Officer who will then be able to pass these free of duty. The advantage of having the E.C. is that the concessions you are entitled to, when you return, are not affected.

For Indian residents and foreigners residing in India, the duty-free concessions are for used articles of personal wear, excluding jewellery but including one wrist watch, articles of personal use for taking care of the daily necessities of life. For those coming from Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar of China the allowance is Rs. 3,000 for those of 12 years and above and Rs. 750 for those below 12 years. As for as cigarettes, cigars, tobacco and alcoholic liquors go, one may include in this duty fee allowance 200 cigarettes or 50 cigars or 250 gms tobacco and alcoholic liquor and wines upto one litre each.

The items not allowed fee firearms and cartridges of firearms exceeding 50; cigarettes exceeding 200 or cigars exceeding 50 or tobacco exceeding 250 gms; alcoholic liquor and wines in excess of one litre each; any article that does not accompany you (i.e unaccompanied baggage); gold in any form other than ornaments; silver in any form other than ornaments. A passengers who has been residing abroad for over one year is allowed to bring jewellery, free of duty, worth Rs. 10,000 in the case of male and Rs. 20,000 in the case of a female. A person is allowed to bring in 10 kg of gold and 100 kg of silver after a stay of six months abroad. The duty on gold is charged at the rate of Rs. 250 per 10 gms and for silver Rs. 500 per kg, which is to be paid by the passenger in convertible foreign currency.

Although the Customs have become more friendly over the years, they warn that any non-declaration, misdeclaration and concealment of imported goods is an offence and could result in confiscation, fine, penalty and even prosecution. Possession of narcotic drugs, import of firearms as baggage and taking out exotic birds, wild orchids and wild-life, both flora and fauna, is strictly prohibited. -CNF