Rhetoric and reality

The BJP is stepping up the heat on Kashmir - with potentially dangerous consequences.

PRAVEEN SWAMI
in New Delhi

FOR an empirical index of the state of India-Pakistan tensions, one need only consider agricultural wages along the border in Jammu. On May 8, the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Pakistan Rangers met at the Inayat Syed post in the R.S. Pora sector to negotiate a truce so that the first harvesting of crops in over a year could be carried out. Long-suffering farmers on both sides of the border had forced the ceasefire. Bar one instance of exchange of fire, in which a farmer, Desh Raj, sustained injuries, this stretch of the border has so far remained quiet. But the farmers know that there are risks involved; so do the migrant labourers from Bihar and Orissa they have brought in. Wages start at Rs. 100 a day, Rs. 40 above the rate elsewhere. And in the wake of Union Home Minister L.K. Advani's May 18 warning that Pakistan's proxy war against India would "prove costly" to that country, wages touched Rs. 110. In the Suchetgarh-R.S. Pora-Akhnoor belt, the scene of three wars, citizens understand just how short-lived peace can be.

Advani's burst of aggression makes it possible that this summer could be the most volatile since that of 1990, when many observers believe Pakistan's support for terrorism in Kashmir almost led India to respond with a conventional military assault. Advani's statements sought to link the Pokhran nuclear test with India's strategic position in Kashmir. The Minister proceeded from the assumption that India's "decisive step to become a nuclear weapon state has brought about a qualitative new state in India-Pakistan relations, particularly in finding a lasting solution to the Kashmir problem." Inviting Pakistan to "join India in the common pursuit of peace," he warned that "any other course will be futile and costly for Pakistan." "Islamabad has to realise the change in the geo-strategic situation in the region and the world." Although "we adhere to the no-first-strike principle," Advani said, "India is resolved to deal firmly with Pakistan's hostile activities." On just what "firmly" meant, the Minister was blunt. He said: "We should not shy away from our strengths; nor would security be neglected because of international disapproval."

THE Minister's remarks came after the Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition Government's first major meeting on Kashmir. Defence Minister George Fernandes, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, the State's new Governor Girish 'Gary' Saxena, Chief of the Army Staff V.P. Malik, Cabinet Secretary Prabhat Kumar and Special Secretary to the Prime Minister Brajesh Mishra had gathered in New Delhi on May 18 to contemplate responses to the escalation of violence in the Jammu region and the string of communal massacres by terrorists in Rajouri, Poonch, Udhampur and Doda. While other participants in the meeting made no public remarks after it ended, Advani's hardline posture was conspicuous. For one, his statements came on the eve of the Department of Jammu and Kashmir Affairs reverting to the control of the Union Home Ministry. The Department had, in 1993, been appropriated by the Prime Minister's Office in the wake of a running battle between the then Union Home Minister, S.B. Chavan, and his deputy, Rajesh Pilot, on Kashmir policy. Although the reversion of the Department was in itself unexceptionable, Advani's statements appeared to mark a major departure from the thrust of India's Kashmir policy over the last five years.

Advani's hawkish polemic was endorsed by Abdullah. The National Conference Chief Minister spoke of the need to "teach Pakistan a lesson". "We are no longer weak," he told reporters. India, he asserted, had to tell Pakistan that "while we want peaceful coexistence, it cannot be on your terms." Abdullah's endorsement of Advani's stand may have been driven by the fact that the Home Minister flatly ruled out negotiations with the secessionist All-Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC), whose chairman, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Defence Minister George Fernandes had sought to meet during a recent visit to Jammu and Kashmir.

SHANKER CHAKRAVARTY
After a high-level meeting on Jammu and Kashmir in New Delhi. (From left) Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, Union Home Minister L.K. Advani, Union Defence Minister George Fernandes, Jammu and Kashmir Governor Girish Saxena and the Chief of the Army Staff, General V.P. Malik.

Pakistan's reaction to Advani's remarks was sharp. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told journalists that his Government took strong exception to the Home Minister's threats. An official release also asserted that any Indian "misadventure" would invite a "swift and telling reply". "Pakistan is prepared to defend itself," the statement read. "The world leaders and their emissaries are urging Pakistan to exercise restraint. In the situation manifestly made clear by the Indian Home Minister's threat to Pakistan, it is the urgent task of the world leaders to direct advice for restraint to India."

ON May 20, United States State Department spokesman James Rubin did just that. Advani's remarks, he said, indicated that India was "foolishly and dangerously increasing tensions with its neighbours, and is indifferent to world opinion." He added: "We call upon India to exercise great caution in its statements and actions at this particularly sensitive time, with emotions running high." Rubin's language, against which New Delhi protested, was evidently driven by concern that Advani's posture may make it near-impossible for Sharif to resist domestic pressures to carry out a nuclear test in response to those at Pokhran.

Despite the furore his remarks provoked, Advani continued to push ahead. In a May 20 statement, he elaborated on his earlier remarks. "Up to now," the statement said of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism, "India's reaction to such provocation has been essentially reaction." "At the meeting two days ago, it was decided that further misadventures on Indian territory shall be dealt with in a pro-active manner." "Terrorism," Advani proclaimed, "must be and shall be crushed without any false pity."

A day earlier, Minister for Tourism and Parliamentary Affairs Madan Lal Khurana had made similar noises in Srinagar, ironically enough in the course of a visit to improve tourist flows to Jammu and Kashmir. If Pakistan wanted a war, the BJP leader said, it should let India know "the time and place". Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee promptly reprimanded Khurana for this incredible statement and asked Ministers not to comment on matters of foreign policy, but no similar restraint was applied to Advani. As important, others in the BJP hierarchy and its affiliates, ranging from K.L. Sharma to Farooq Abdullah, continued to broadcast a variety of threats to Pakistan.

But what was the actual content and purpose of Advani's remarks? Curiously, those present at the May 18 meeting on Kashmir say that they were taken aback by Advani's subsequent statements. "A pro-active response to terrorism was discussed," one official told Frontline, "but that was in the context of dealing with mercenaries in the difficult Rajouri-Poonch and Doda-Udhampur belts." "Nothing," the official insisted, "was said about cross-border operations."

The principal outcome of the meeting was that a five-member group was appointed to suggest new counter-terrorism strategies. The team, led by Special Secretary M.B. Kaushal, reliable sources told Frontline, is made up of Jammu and Kashmir Director-General of Police Gurbachan Jagat, BSF Director-General E.N. Rammohan, Director-General of Military Operations Lieutenant-General Inder Verma, and the Intelligence Bureau's A.S. Dulat. Given seven days to prepare a report, the group's discussions focussed on upgrading force strengths and weapons, improving coordination, as well as developing rapid deployment strategies, including the possible setting up of helicopter-borne rapid response units.

If Advani's polemic on counter-insurgency did not reflect the content of the meeting, other aspects of his assertions were even more mystifying. The Home Minister's ideas were anticipated in an interview given to Frontline in March by Lt.-Gen. Krishan Pal, the General Officer Commanding of the Army's 15 Corps in Srinagar (Frontline, April 3, 1998). "If a country is bent upon exporting terrorism," Lt.-Gen. Pal said, "you need certain strong responses." "We have to say, if you do not stop sending terrorists here, well, we know where the camps across the Line of Control are and we will attack them." Pakistan acknowledged last May the existence of 38 training camps, according to the Pakistani daily News International, while Indian intelligence reports suggest that at least 86 are operational.

Pakistan's Information Minister Musahid Hussain provoked outrage by visiting a Lashkar-e-Taiba camp at Murdike, near Lahore, on April 24. But the principal problem with cross-border assaults on these camps from Indian territory is that very few of them are within striking range. Any effective assault would involve deep incursions into Pakistan territory, leading possibly to a full-scale war.

Even more befuddling than the rhetoric on attacking training camps is the talk of hot pursuit into Pakistan territory. The key problem of counter-insurgency work is that terrorist groups active in Jammu province, and along the mountain heights surrounding the Kashmir Valley, is the terrain. Put simply, soldiers and police personnel are unable to respond rapidly enough to the presence of terrorists. This problem is underlined by the inability of troops in the Jammu region to contain border infiltration adequately. There have been instances of terrorists withdrawing into Pakistan after facing fire, but generally only when efforts by that country to infiltrate terrorists are met with fire at the border. Hot pursuit would do nothing either to bring about the key tasks of reducing infiltration across the border or to push the core task of engaging terrorists in difficult mountain terrain. The sole consequence of Advani's pronouncement has been to strengthen Pakistan's military establishment and its right-wing political allies, undermining Sharif's tentative efforts to cooperate with an India-Pakistan rapprochement. Kashmir, far from being helped to become a secondary concern in India-Pakistan dialogue, is again part of its core agenda.

WHAT the real consequences of the BJP's polemic will be is hard to tell. Contrary to speculation, there is no firm evidence that it has immediately translated into a more aggressive military position on the border. From May 19, a day after Advani's statement, sustained fire on Indian positions was reported from the Kanzalwan and Machal sectors in Kupwara. It appears probable, however, that the fire had nothing to do with Advani's statements, and that it was generated to enable infiltration. Fifteen groups of terrorists are believed to be waiting to cross into India, while at least four are reported by intelligence sources to have already done so this summer. Exchanges of fire along the Line of Control (LoC) in summer have been common for several years. Prolonged battles along the LoC in Kargil claimed several lives last year. On April 30, George Fernandes came under attack during his visit to the Siachen Glacier, in line with Pakistan troops' traditional response to high-level visits to the area. Officials say that at the same time there has been no significant increase in the strength of divisions deployed along the LoC by India or Pakistan.

SANDEEP SAXENA
Army personnel keep vigil at a forward post in the Akhnoor sector.

The real danger in the BJP's posture is that it could lead to a creeping escalation of tensions along the border, the consequences of which the Government does not appear to have thought through. The April 27 massacre of 21 villagers in Bindha Mohri Sehri, metres across the LoC in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, is a case in point. Coming days after the slaughter of 29 villagers at Prankote by the Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Bindha Mohri Sehri killings are widely being described as a retaliatory action by India's security forces, executed through pro-Indian militia members. Although Pakistani claims that an Indian-made watch and a dagger were found at the scene are implausible, many people believe the theory that Indian security personnel were involved in the killing. There is no evidence that senior officials in the Ministry of Defence were involved in ordering the reprisal, but such actions are the outcome of a certain climate generated by the BJP-led Government. The consequences of such small-scale actions along the LoC could, in the long run, prove dangerous.

Hawkish rhetoric on Kashmir evokes a sense of deja vu. But what is different about the BJP's posturing is that it comes in the wake of the Pokhran tests and seeks to establish a linkage between India's Kashmir policy and its nuclear capability. This preposterous position, however comforting it may be to the BJP's core political constituency, is not without its dangers. Plans to engage Pakistan militarily in May 1990 had the sole consequence of inviting U.S. intervention in Kashmir. Since then, the U.S. has consistently used Kashmir as a pretext to exert leverage over both India and Pakistan. Now the BJP appears to be inviting further U.S. intervention.

What is most dangerous about the BJP's position is the linkage that it establishes between India's nuclear capabilities and its Kashmir policy, underpinned by the argument that Pakistan-backed terrorism cannot be contained without a military confrontation. The immediate consequence of this position could be to invite further U.S. intervention in the region. The U.S. Army Chief of Staff, Dennis Reimer, visited Udhampur and Leh on April 16. And Northern Command chief Lt.-Gen. S. Padmanabhan expressed delight over the fact that "the chief of the most powerful Army in the world visited the most active Army in the world."

Adventurism could also undo the gains of sustained counter-insurgency work and political mobilisation. The formation of a political party by Shabbir Shah and calls for an end to violence by the Amir (supreme leader) of the Jamaat-e-Islami, G.M. Bhat, illustrate the crumbling of the secessionist platform. But this summer's round of kerb-side macho strutting could well revive the legitimacy of marginalised far-Right figures.

It is instructive that the position that the BJP is now advocating was considered and rejected by the V.P. Singh Government in 1990. Violence engineered by infiltrating terrorists had begun as part of the Pakistan Army's Operation Topac, a covert campaign funded with drug money and weapons generated on the Afghanistan warfront. Operation Topac, which sought to tie down Indian troops in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir in a low-intensity war, was designed by Pakistan's military dictator Zia-ul-Haq in April 1988, months before his death in an air crash. To some people, a military confrontation appeared to be the only way to contain this Pakistan-backed offensive. But war as a policy option was rejected because of the huge costs and possible nuclear carnage it would have led to. Why the concerns that led to the rejection of that option in 1990 are no longer relevant, L.K. Advani alone can explain.

Table of Contents

Home | The Hindu | Business Line | Sportstar