Daily Excelsior... Editorial

PoK diaspora in U.K.
By : Prof. K N Pandita

Many Kashmir watchers in this country do not know how much active the UK based PoK diaspora has been in sowing secessionist seeds in the Indian part of.....more

It is time to wind up
for Hurriyat
By : Ajaj Ahmed

Recently the former Prime Minister of Pakistan and leader of the opposition Ms Benazir Bhutto.......more

The inscrutable ways
of Jaya Brand Politics
By: Jayant Muralidharan
(INAV Correspondent)

Chennai : Mariners know fathoming the Pacific Ocean is next to impossible. Similarly, Tamilians.....more

EDITORIAL

SIACHIN VISIT

Defence Minister George Fernandes has paid yet another visit to the highest battlefield of the world Siachin Glacier. This happens to be his fourth visit during his 10 month tenure as Defence Minister. To be precise there is no comparison between Fernandes and his predecessors as regards visit to the cold desert where temperature touches minus sixty degree centigrade in this part of the winter season. Even day temperature is minus twenty degree centigrade. The very idea of visiting snowy terrain for fear of getting snowbites deterred successive PMs and DMs not to pay even token visits. On very odd occasions whenever they visited, it used to be symbolic visit at a time when temperatures were conducive to their health and not during extremes. Perhaps the news that every third soldier positioned in the Siachin Glacier gets either killed or incurred life long disability made them quite apprehensive and scared. But not so with George Fernandes.

George admits that he has indeed been asked asto why he pays so frequent visits to Siachin. This time round he has dared to reach zero point on the LoC at Siachin and inter-acted with troops at many posts. He says that each time he visits Siachin he finds something more to learn. It is a new and novel experience. He also has first hand feel of the prevailing conditions and implementation of his earlier orders in letter and spirit. Probably he knows the type of bureaucracy he has to lead in the ministry which is known for coming in the way rather than being helpful to the needs of the troops stationed at 18000 feet where guns continue to zoom quite unmindful of the extremities and vagaries of weather. During his first visit he found that many essential inputs like snowbikes have not been supplied to the troops for increasing their mobility from one post to another. Those who sat over the files rejecting the demand for augmentation and, or replacement of ageing mobikes so essential for logistic support in snowbound areas were punished by him. They were ordered to spend a week at the highest battlefield to have the real and first hand feel of their conditions and requirements. Soon, though initially 10 snow mobikes were ordered, there is the happy news that they have been supplied with 30 which has indeed improved their battle readiness in terms of reliable and authentic logistic support and mobility. He also informs that winter stock position of all essential inputs is very comfortable this time. The base hospital where central heating system has collapsed and remained dormant for years has been revived. Not only that. At least 6254 pairs of improved quality gloves have been supplied to the troops. It is apt to recall that monthly allowance for all ranks was substantially increased for all troops positioned at Siachin which ranged from Rs 4000 to 7500 depending upon the rank. This enhancement is far beyond what was recommend by the Pay Commission. It is also worth mentioning that soonafter taking over coveted slot of Defence Ministry, George paid 6 days visit to the north-eastern State where large number of troops are positioned and where long spell of insurgency has burdened the defence forces with additional security duties besides guarding the borders. Thereafter, he visited deserts of Rajasthan which has common borders with Sindh province of Pakistan. He also happens to be the Defence Minister who for the first time was frank enough to State that all their defence preparations are China-centred which remains threat perception number of one thereby belittling the threats posed by Pakistan. Till recently all successive rulers remained Pak-centred in terms of defence priorities and preparedness. This enlargement to take cognisance of Chinese designs has helped India to defend Pokhran II tests conducted in May and theory of minimum nuclear deterrence being greatly appreciated by those who earlier opposed nuclear proliferation. This includes recognition of our security concerns by France and Russia while American stand is now less hostile.

It is also to be recorded that within these 10 months many exercises have been held and definite plans drawn to sharpen teeth of all the three services in terms of sophistication and addition of State-of-art weapon systems. Many of them are already in place. Others are in the pipeline. By any reckoning he is by far the most assertive and successful Defence Minister who has relentlessly followed even miniscule details to give the troops the very best treat in terms of weapon-systems, salaries and perks besides moral support par excellence. Siachin visit brings the people of India and the troops much closer in terms of most horrendous and inhospitable conditions at the highest battlefield wherein troops have successfully thwarted all attempts made by Pakistan to occupy some posts there.

UNUSUAL

President K R Narayanan's note to Chief Justice of India to consider appointment of more Judges to High Courts and Apex Court from amongst SC/STs and Women is quite unusual. President is the first citizen of India and derives his powers from the Constitution as figurehead President guided largely by the combined wisdom of the cabinet. His first duty is to safeguard Constitution and not allow any one to transgress the same. It is as well mandatory and obligatory on President himself not to say or do anything that tantamounts to exceeding his constitutional brief. It is one thing not to be a rubber-stamp President. It is quite another to practise one-upmanship. Constitution clearly prescribes in writing the appointment of Judges has to be purely on merit. Some guidelines and rules are already available to ensure that such appointments are not politicised, regionalised or exposed to casteist dispensation. Even without President's suggestion, there are at least three Judges recently appointed who belong to SC/ST category. But that is on their own respective relative merit. President himself belongs to this category and yet he unanimously got elected with massive support from the electorate. He hates to called as SC President. He is just President in the truest democratic sense as also as laid down in the Constitution. Concept of reservation even at the highest judicial level as Apex Court and High Court Judges is unconstitutional. Soon it would also be suggested that Election Commission should also have SC/ST members. And never forget that OBCs and minorities too would be seeking Judgeships in proportion to their population. One shudders to think of the resultant judgments once highest courts are exposed to such reservation treat. Entry at the initial stages in all services apart, they must work up to occupy the highest judicial slots like President himself has done to become the First Citizen of India. Such suggestions in writing made by the President is clearly beyond the constitutional brief and has already led to politicisation when Mayawati of BSP welcomes it. So is the reaction from the leftists. Mulayam would also like it to be for the minorities as also OBCs. As thing stand the nation has many problems on hand and President has to exercise his constitutional powers and safeguard the same without any deviation or transgression. It must be recognised that India has a democratic dispensation where President is constitutional figurehead and not Presidential form of Government where President also exercises all executive powers.

PoK diaspora in U.K.
By : Prof. K N Pandita

Many Kashmir watchers in this country do not know how much active the UK based PoK diaspora has been in sowing secessionist seeds in the Indian part of Kashmir. The ISI, through a master stroke, managed to rope in sections of this nearly four lakh-strong PoK diaspora in Great Britain. The story of Mirpuris going to UK as stokers in the ships goes back to the days of World War II. The British rulers of India, generally, did not give first preference to them for recruitment in the Indian army. That privilege was reserved for the Pothwaris. Poor as the Mirpuris were, the end of the World War II opened their fortune. The British needed cheap labour to rejuvenate their industries and the Mirpuri stokers came handy. Thus began the bee-line of Mirpuri youth all the way from the hilly tracts of Mirpur to the industrial towns of Bradford, Luton Southall etc. Through the sweat of their brow, they earned their bread, and those who were thrifty, saw a prosperous life dawning upon them. Now they are financially strong, making enormous remittances of foreign currency to the Pakistani exchequer.

But Pakistan government paid only scant attention towards the development of POK. After integrating Northern Areas into its territory, Pakistan used the POK people as hewers of wood and drawers of water. They were deprived of economic and social development. The region continued to remain neglected despite enormous foreign exchange remittances. Mangla Dam produced electricity but only to lit the big towns of Pakistan and run her industry. The displaced landholders could not be rehabilitated for decades. Naturally, the deprivation has reverberated among POK diaspora in UK. They became restive and Pakistani rulers understood it.

ISI came out with a novel scheme to defuse the growing discontent among the Mirpuri emigres. They were told to lend their financial, logistical and moral support to a secessionist movement in Kashmir valley following which, the entire Kashmir would be their property. They would acquire territorial depth and would become masters of their destiny in the liberated State of Jammu and Kashmir. This mantra worked well with the partly deprived and partly ambitious Mirpuris in UK. One among them, Amanullah Khan, who could speak Kashmiri, gradually assumed important role in the scheme of things. Thus was laid the foundation of Kashmir Liberation Front with Hashim Qureshi (now based in Amsterdam) as its organizing chairman. Amanullah Khan became its chairman. This was the brain-child of ISI. And when that organization conveyed to the organisers of KLF that the plan was to lure the Kashmiri youth, train them within a week or two, provide them with arms and send them back to the valley to rise in armed insurgency against what they called the occupational forces of India, the reality dawned upon many.

The option of armed insurgency was not approved by some of the early idealogues of the movement and they were gradually sidelined. But there were others who readily accepted the proposal and began towing the ISI line. Amanullah Khan was the foremost among that leadership.

In some sections of ISI and Pakistani ruling circles, it was believed that only Maqbul Bhat could be the true leader to lead the movement started by the KLF. Among the KLF cadres, there was a strong pro-Maqbul Bhat lobby. But at that time he was in the Indian prison in New Delhi. The KLF activists in London began pondering over the ways of engineering the escape of Maqbul Bhat from Tihar jail. A number of options were discussed at a secret hideout in Luton where Amanullah Khan would preside over the meetings. They also tried to acquire the services of Hashim Qureshi who had some experience in connection with the Ganga hijacking episode.

As these secret meetings continued to be held in UK, and Amanullah Khan was the central figure, he realized that Maqbul Bhat's release from the Indian prison or his engineered escape would naturally throw him in the background and political exile. Nobody would pay him any attention when Maqbul Bhat was on the scene. He decided to play his role and not allow his leadership to be wrested from him.

The crafty Amanullah Khan decided to hatch a conspiracy that would ultimately culminate in Indian authorities executing Maqbul Bhat forthwith. Though death penalty had been served on Maqbul Bhat, but his mercy appeal was pending before the President of India. Reports say that the President was in no hurry to sign the warrant because the the sleuths were hoping to make use of the prisoner.

Amanullah Khan had another compulsion to contrive the ouster of Maqbul Bhat. During the 1970s, when Shiekh Muhammad Abdullah was out of power, his son lived in London and occasionally fraternized with the POK diaspora. In 1974, when Beg-Parthasarthi negotiations were going on, Dr Farooq Abdullah was extensively touring POK and he and Amanullah Khan often spoke the same language from the same platform. But in 1984, the position of Dr Farooq Abdullah had radically changed. Amanullah Khan had no hope of being accepted as a State level political leader in Kashmir. But with the KLF (later on JKLF) cadres euphoric about Maqbul Bhat, Amanullah Khan found that he was about to lose POK ground as well. This made him take the crucial decision.

It is said that some of the more sober but less ambitious cadres in UK-based KLF categorically rejected Amanullah Khan's conspiracy of kidnapping the Indian diplomat Mhatre in London, and later on compassing his killing at a sequestered place. On the day on which Mhatre was kidnapped and thereafter murdered, the dissidents in KLF were sent away from Luton by Amanullah Khan under one pretext or the other.

The die had been cast. Within a short time of Mhatre's murder, the President of India signed the death warrant of Maqbul Bhat. Thus was Amanullah Khan relieved of a potent rival. Perhaps no other machination could have been successful to contrive quick liquidation of Maqbul Bhat. We are told by highly dependable source that when the news of execution of Maqbul Bhat in Tihar jail was flashed in London, the dissident cadres had a scufle with Amanullah Khan, and he was openly accused of precipitating the execution of Maqbul Bhat for nothing but his self-aggrandisement.

India Abroad of December 18, 1998 came out with a news item saying that one Marsha Singh, a British lawmaker of Indian origin, has demanded the release of two Pakistanis convicted in the 1984 murder of Indian diplomat Ravindra Mhatre in London. The Labour party MP comes from Bradford West constituency in North England. His demand has come after the British Home Secretary, Jack Straw turned down an appeal for the release of the two men, Qayyum Raja and Mohammad Riaz convicted in Mhatre murder case.

Marsha Singh is one of those British Sikhs of Indian origin, who have made a common cause with the Kashmiri secessionists and pro-Pak separatists in UK. They have been lobbying for Kashmir's separation from Indian Union. Actually, there is a large Pakistani electorate in Bradford West constituency, and Singh cannot afford to lose this vote bank. Prior to Marsha Singh, Max Madden was returned from that constituency. He was a known India baiter and particularly on Kashmir, he never hesitated to issue outright anti-India statements. The Pakistani emigres in a few clusters in Great Britain are trying to make full use of their vote to force the candidate take an anti-India stance on Kashmir. Marsha Singh is not the only, lawmaker who is prepared to sacrifice truth and facts for self-aggrandisement. Many of that ilk have preceded him and many may follow him. He cannot be singled out.

The Mirpuris have realized by now how they have been used and misused by the ISI. Many of them have also realized that they became an instrument for the destruction of thousands of Kashmiri youth. This shall weigh heavy on their minds. But, of course, there are still some among them, who fail to acknowledge the truth and facts.

It is time to wind up for Hurriyat
By : Ajaj Ahmed

Recently the former Prime Minister of Pakistan and leader of the opposition Ms Benazir Bhutto expressed her wishful thinking of persuading the UN to grant the Hurriyat conference an observer status on similar lines as the PLO.

She made this utterance despite knowing that the Hurriyat conference neither represents the opinion of Kashmiri Muslim masses in the valley; nor can it ever claim to represent Kashmiri Pandits, Hindus, Dogras and Buddhists of the state of Jammu and Kashmir.

When seeking an observer status for Hurriyat, similar to that of PLO, the elected government of Azad Kashmir would need to be disbanded before such a move could even be contemplated. The chances of such a dramatic action ever taking place on the Indian side of Kashmir are virtually ZERO. The fact is that Hurriyat never had any mandate from the people Kashmir to act as their representative body.

This could be seen as yet another example of treacherous designs of the Pakistani politicians towards Kashmir. Not content with the destruction and devastation of Kashmir already caused through a decade of proxy war and exploitation of the Kashmiri Muslim sentiments through Hurriyat ; Ms Bhutto now wishes to seek blessings of the UN to endorse this ISI created political instrument of terror as a representative body of the Kashmiri people!

In 1993, amid the growing culture of bloodshed and violence in Kashmir, Hurriyat conference was first conceived across the Line of Control as a part of the wider game plan of ISI to bolster their militancy driven anti-India campaign in Kashmir. As soon as the alien philosophy of violence and gun culture took its foot hold in Kashmir politics, ISI launched its hand picked political platform on the Indian side of Kashmir under the banner of All Parties Hurriyat Conference. To give an impression to the outside world that Hurriyat was a moderate Kashmiri political forum, young Omar Farooq was conveniently chosen as its chairman, while ISI and the Jamaat-e-Islami controlled all its operations in the background.

Similarly, to create an illusion of a unified Kashmiri political platform a hand picked shadow Hurriyat was launched in Pakistani held part of Kashmir. It is a different matter that not a single legitimate political party in Azad Kashmir is a part of the shadow Hurriyat and there seems to be very little co-ordination between the two Hurriyat's!

It is well known that Hurriyat leaders on the Indian side of Kashmir have amassed massive amounts of wealth, built palatial palaces for themselves and established lucrative businesses in foreign countries for their kith and kin...thanks to the ongoing movement in Kashmir!

However, the people of Kashmir can never forgive Hurriyat for its role in crippling the economy of Kashmir through frequent calls for strikes (hartals) and prolonging the suffering of Kashmir by tearing apart its centuries old traditions of religious tolerance and communal harmony.

Similarly, the Hurriyat leaders in Azad Kashmir enjoy a lavish lifestyle serving their role as masters of the "base camp" to collect donations ( mostly from UK and Saudi) and to infuse a spirit of holy jihad into those unfortunate Kashmiri youth who were lured to the gun.

While on the political front shadow Hurriyat serves as a propaganda machine for consumption of the Western politicians, journalists and activists. Hurriyat members frequently go on trips to Geneva etc. selling Pakistan's Kashmir policy of tripartite talks and right of self-determination, while using the human rights violations in Kashmir as a moral weapon against India.

If we take a closer look at the components of Hurriyat amalgam it is quite obvious that all the historical resistance forces of Kashmiri struggle are outside the Hurriyat fold. It is also a well known fact in Kashmir that none of the present Hurriyat constituents, except Omar Farooq, command any support of the people; his following stems mostly from his hereditary religious position as the Mirwaiz of Kashmir which he inherited following his fathers assassination.

Hurriyat's unrepresentative nature was fully endorsed in 1996 state elections when despite their door to door calls for boycott of the polls and the ISI created climate of terror and intimidation, the turn out of voters was more than 40 percent.

So who does the Hurriyat actually represent in Kashmir?

Most ominously when one takes into account the charges of political killings against some of the Hurriyat constituents and the allegations of corruption levelled against them, they ought to be charged and punished for bringing untold suffering to the people of Kashmir. Regrettably, India's failure in Kashmir becomes apparent when people like Yasin Malik with murder charges hanging over his head are seen roaming freely, even getting a helping hand from New Delhi!

Ms Bhutto's plans for rescuing the dying Hurriyat should not come as a surprise to any one, considering the news report- Benazir's Booty (The Sunday Times -London) which highlighted how Bhutto family had looted colossal amounts of national wealth from Pakistan when she was in power. Some of that wealth undoubtedly trickled into the Hurriyat coffers through ISI conducted foreign trips and hawala transactions. Quite naturally, Ms Bhutto would like to regain her political power and replenish her dwindling stores of wealth; who else but the Hurriyat leaders of Kashmir would be willing to welcome and embrace her?

However, given the criminal background of some of the Hurriyat leaders and their dismal public standing on both sides of Kashmir, Ms Bhutto would be very unwise even to dream of proposing a UN observer status for the Hurriyat outfit. She should instead concentrate on inventing some other gimmick to get more political mileage out of the severely battered and bruised Kashmir issue.

As far as the Hurriyat and its leaders are concerned, the people of Kashmir have nothing to thank them about, it is through their policies of violence and terror dictated from across the LOC, today peace loving Kashmiris all over the world are suspected as terrorists and their legitimate struggle for freedom has been branded as a "terrorist movement" aided and abetted by Pakistan. For well over a decade Hurriyat and its sponsors have played with the aspirations of secular Nationalistic Kashmiri forces and misled the common people of Kashmir.

There are no reasons why they should not be held accountable for colossal loss of human life and destruction of Kashmir.

It is time for the Hurriyat to wind up and go.

The inscrutable ways of Jaya Brand Politics
By: Jayant Muralidharan (INAV Correspondent)

Chennai : Mariners know fathoming the Pacific Ocean is next to impossible. Similarly, Tamilians know fathoming Jayalalitha Jayaram's political mind is next to impossible. There can't be a better example of this than the unilateral decision of Czarina of Tamil Nadu politics that she one fine morning decided to snap ties with her poll allies. It is, however, slightly ironical that while Ms. Jayalalitha has been castigating the BJP for not taking its allies into confidence or evolving a mechanism for consensual decision making, she has herself not thought it necessary to discuss issues with her allies before announcing the break. Of course, in recent times her relations with the front partners -- PMK, TRC and MDMK -- had considerably deteriorated though the onus for much of the mistrust rests on the imperious lady of Poes Garden. In any case, there has not been much love lost between Mr. Gopalasamy Vaiko's MDMK and her, especially since he refused to toe her line on a variety of contentious issues. Mr. Vaiko has withheld demonstrations of support to her over Ms. Jayalalitha's progressively whimsical demands; he has categorically refused to pressurise the BJP-led coalition Government at the Centre by using sudden and strategic threats.

Her vengeful demand for the removal of Union Minister of State for Petroleum Vazhapady Ramamurthy from the Council of Ministers had, similarly, pushed her ties with both the TRC and the RMK to the brink. That is why few really believed PMK leader Ramdoss's contention that the front partners would "stick to the AIADMK" even as they opposed any move to topple the Central Government. The break, therefore, was expected for some time. At any rate, the Front's internal structure was blatantly undemocratic, designed to cater to brazen one-upwomanship. And over the last few months, the ties steadily became artificial while the strains increasingly difficult to reconcile.

Most certainly, the court cases should be uppermost in the mind of Jayalalitha as she makes any of her political moves. For, with the Supreme Court's green signal to the special courts to go ahead with the trial, she finds herself in very difficult circumstances. Even if one assumes that the Karunanidhi Government in the State has been very vindictive and has slapped too many cases against her, legal circles believe that at least a couple of the six cases she is being tried in, would stand judicial scrutiny.

Of the cases wherein charges have already been framed, the cases relating to the granting of permission to construct a multi-storyed hotel complex in the Kodaikanal hill resort, in violation of the relevant rules, could be disposed of in the next three-four months, it is felt. If a conviction is handed down even in a single case, she will stand automatically disqualified from contesting any election for six years thereafter. And so, the argument goes it is in her interest to see the prosecution is asked to go slow if not botch up the case altogether before the next elections are held. Hence indeed she has been turning heaven and earth to have the Karunanidhi Government dismissed and a friendlier regime put in place ever since her victory in the last round of Lok Sabha elections.

Now there are two options before her. She could either force an early election or try and put together another government at the Centre which would be more sympathetic to her plight and do whatever it can, whether it is dismissing or arm-twisting Karunanidhi, towards furthering that end. According to sources close to her, she is not much excited about facing another round of elections, especially so when the alliance she had so assiduously forged only a year ago is in tatters.

Besides, she is not sure how the people would react to her now in the context of her mercurial behaviour towards the Centre. After all she had campaigned on a platform of "a stable government and an able prime minister". Even otherwise an election is always a gamble. So, ideally, she would like to see a "friendly and more assertive government" at the Centre which she perhaps believes only Sonia Gandhi could provide.

But then, she finds in Sonia Gandhi a tough customer. Sources say that so far despite several messages sent through couriers like Mani Shanker Aiyer and even Sharad Pawar, the Congress president has refused to commit herself to any positive action on her behalf though she might be willing to take her help in the case of elections. It is in such circumstances that Jayalalitha has embarked on what seems to be a course of separation from the BJP coalition. "Act now, act fast, I have come more than half way", she seems to be telling Sonia Gandhi.

Sonia Gandhi might have her own compulsions, like wooing Moopanar back into the fold. Evidently, because Jayalalitha realises full well that Sonia Gandhi's magic alone, if there is one such, might not be of great help in the elections, she has started wooing Moopanar himself who has been one of her bitter critics and whom she had, in her typical style, accused of involvement in the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi at a public meeting, in the presence of the then prime minister Narasimha Rao.

While the AIADMK chief would have no more her allies like PMK and MDMK, she has said that she is willing to consider favourably any feelers from the TMC. However, TMC leaders assert that there is no way Moopanar would join hands with Jayalalitha at any point of time though he would not mind supporting a Congress-led government at the Centre even if the AIADMK were to be part of it.

Be that as it may, what happens if Sonia persists in the idea of going for the polls instead of getting into the toppling game? Well, Considering it a risky strategy, Jayalalitha would seek to prop up the Vajpayee Government as long as the could put up with and extract maximum possible mileage in the process. That is why even now, when she has such an endless checklist of grievances against the BJP, and it has fared so badly in the elections, she says she would not topple the Government.

This is quite contrary to the signals which emanated from her quarters that she was only waiting for the Assembly elections, and the BJP's defeat, to pull the rug from under Vajpayee's feet. But she would not act because Sonia Gandhi is not responding. And the latest gestures are aimed at goading the apparently cold or cautious Sonia Gandhi into acting and getting the BJP regime out of the way, some way or the other. Even if the elections are held, it could still be alright for her. The AIADMK chief seems to believe that Jaya plus Sonia plus Moopanar should prove an unbeatable combination and hopes that Sonia too would think so. And victory in election before a court verdict has its own dynamics after all.