BLUNT BUTCHER
JAMMU: The PDP-BJP Government’s goodwill gesture of amnesty to 634 stone pelters has not gone well with new breed of perpetrators, as this Eid-ul-Fitr also witnessed repeat of what has been happening all these years in the Kashmir Valley. Stone pelting seems to be more lucrative and attractive avocation than the ‘Eidi’ (in terms of amnesty) offered by the coalition government, which may have benefitted the ‘seniors’ in the stone-pelting business but not inspired youngsters at all.
Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti must be a dejected person but not the Hurriyat hawk Syed Ali Shah Geelani, whose edict of ‘peaceful’ protests after Eid prayers manifested in ‘magnificent display of brick-bat’ at Safakadal near Eidgah in Srinagar, Hyderpora and Anantnag. The stone ‘revelry’ left 21 persons grievously hurt, which included a photo journo and a senior cop.
The ugly development, within a day of her government’s gesture to let free the already booked stone pelters, must have come as a rude shock to the Chief Minister who had set a deadline for the State police to work-out amnesty package. And the police obliged, as is tradition in this State. Instead of taking a stand against these goons, who are paid agents of the enemy country, the police facilitated olive branch to them. Had the investigating agencies compiled charge-sheets, many of them would have been behind bars by now. But, Jammu and Kashmir has a different yard-stick towards anti-national elements, right from Syed Ali Geelani to street urchin stone pelter. They are being pampered and given space, in a mistaken belief of wooing them to negotiation table some fine day. What an irony, the man who calls shots from his palatial Hyderpora residence against sovereignty of the nation and keeps inciting young people to wage war against the Indian Union by way of new-found Intifaada, in the shape of stone pelting, seeks release of stone pelters and other prisoners, giving them the tag of ‘political entities’. And, in response, the government entertains by reversing the process of law.
On the withdrawal of cases against 634 stone pelters, a question can be asked whether any of them had sought the mercy. If so, have they expressed remorse over what they did during those crucial years, which led to death of over a hundred youth in the Valley? A question can also be asked whether anyone of them has given an undertaking of ‘good-behaviour’? Nothing of the sort must have happened and who knows how many times they might have repeated their pastime of stone pelting while roaming free on bail during these years.
The PDP-BJP government also owes an explanation as to how the cases of these stone pelters were even processed when the previous government had set a cut-off date for amnesty. By showing a bravado of being soft towards anti-Indians, the BJP partnered PDP led government has discarded the precedence of ‘continuity’ in the administrative functioning. They have opened up a Pandora box which may lead to similar wrongs in the near future. If it is stone pelter today, it may be a chronic secessionist tomorrow. The appeasement knows no limits and the present dispensation can go to any extent in winning hearts and minds in Kashmir. This ‘mistaken’ doctrine of ‘winning hearts and minds’ has brought the State to present morass, where anti-national elements take maximum benefit of weak kneed governments, both at the Centre and the State. They know that any of their crimes will not entail punishment but rather these will be rewarded back by way of packages.
The hide and seek of successive governments, event the one partnered by ultra-nationalist BJP, is going to boomerang. By providing oxygen to law breakers, they are encouraging law-abiding citizens to take to violence for achieving political objectives. Anti-national activities are being incentivized. Public memory is still afresh as to how chronic stone-pelters were rehabilitated with jobs in police over three years ago. The first batch of the stone-pelters turned recruits had openly defied the command and refused to come out of Manzigam Training Centre to perform Amarnath Yatra related duties. They had even ransacked their barracks and administrative block of the Centre. This ought to have happened and this shall keep happening, as long as law is not allowed to take its own course.
Today’s stone pelting incidents, soon after the Eid prayers in Srinagar, should normally have sounded an alarm to those at the helm but given the tradition and experience, they will soon get into the business of finding ways and means to rehabilitate the perpetrators and actors, the substitute of gun-wielding terrorists.