The Writing On The Wall

“We do not recognise UJC. They are carrying swords. We do not accept diktats,”

Ansari said that his organisation was not in favour of enforcing orders on others and will leave it to the people of Kashmir to decide about the elections as per their “conscience”.

“Why are we people targeting Lone for contesting elections? Have you forgotten the late Sheikh Abdullah also contested elections after heading the Plebiscite Front,” Ansari said. The Hurriayt yesterday said it would not boycott the elections. ( business standard)

Hurriyat’s imminent failure.

Update:

Malik Sajad’s cartoon on Greater Kashmir depicts the situation more precisely than the writing on the wall.

And don’t miss the color at Malik Sajad’s site: of nostalgia and the shattered truth of Kashmir.

 

He Never Knew!

“I was surprised to learn that most of people in New Delhi were unaware of the plight of Kashmiris. They think Kashmiris are terrorists and fighting against Indian rule without any rhyme and reason,” Geelani said. “A senior doctor in Delhi’s leading hospital was in tears when I told him about the Kashmir dispute and the suffering of Kashmiris at the hands of Indian security agencies. I told him under India’s so-called democratic system troops violated the chastity of hundreds of Kashmir girls and killed thousands of youth in the past two decades. He was shocked and he plugged his ears with his fingers.” (greater Kashmir)

Mr. Geelani you realise all this now!? They year we are living in is 2009, you know that, right? It actually took you a couple of visits and a two month stay in Delhi to understand something which has been obvious since like forever!

And Mr. Geelani is candid:

“The group told me that they had never heard this side of Kashmir dispute. I invited them to Kashmir and told them you should have courage to hear the reality and suffering of Kashmiris. But I cautioned them not to forget their identity cards otherwise they wouldn’t escape wrath of the troop,” said Geelani.

And laughs, when he needs not to!

“Now I have got a handful of supporters in New Delhi,” Geelani (laughing) said, “Truth will one day prevail upon the World. Sacrifices of Kashmiris will not go waste.”

Perhaps those are the only supporters he will ever have, in sometime.

Bells And Bullets

Bells

Bullets

They said the “leaders are human beings with personal problems.” (greater kashmir)

I was always made to believe that leaders are not ordinary human beings. I was told wrong.

But there is something that resonates true every time:

“…remember that as resistance decreases, suppression increases and the peace offered by suppressive regimes is often no more than the peace of prison or of the grave…” (niccolo machiavelli)

 

His Masters Voice

Zahoor told the gathering that the present separatist leadership has failed to carry forward Maqbool’s mission. He disclosed that he is joining the separatist camp under the guidance Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Yasin Malik, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and others. (etalaat)

They failed, however I shall still call them my masters!

Yasin Malik and Ammanullah Khan fell apart from each other many a moons ago and yet Ammanullah Khan’s representative wants to work under the leadership of Yasin Malik. It is sad that everybody out there is cashing in on Maqbool Bhat, perhaps a revolutionary,knowing in their hearts that they want anything but what Maqbool Bhat wanted. Hashim Qureshi, the prime accussed in the Ganga Hijacking Case, runs a Maqbool Bhat Trust in Srinagar. He hijacked a plane of India and the same government is letting him stay free – but we do have another killer free as well: Bitta Karate! That is India’s democracy in Kashmir: killing innocents and protecting the killers, for the Killers can help them one fine day; the innocents will always demand one single thing: Azadi!

 

Then The World Would Mourn, Then It Would Forget

 

A minute mourns and then forgets

My heart to my Kashmir indifferent seems

And while thou native were riddled with bullets

My long dead soul was chasing dreams

While blood oozed and they watched unconcerned

While thou were gasping for each labouring breath

While we joked in colleges in Mughal gardens sauntered

In Dalgate youth approached its untimely death

Riddled by Central Reserve Police Force

Then dropped a grenade in thy bag

This is the Heaven’s secret curse

An Angel given terrorists tag

How long on that pavement thy body bled?

How long resembling humans had their fun?

Thou went left dreams, parents half dead

Dark earth and sky, gone is their sun

Time has ceased what Happy New Year?

Mirth has left the home in paradise

Home were empty eyes look for their dear

Home where walls still echo with painful cries

Home where mere pain Eid would bring

Home where sacrifice already has been done

Home where thy memories forever would cling

Home where celebrations for Eid would be none

But killing innocents has a reward of its own

One lakh rupees and promotion I fear

And in my time conditions have honed

And protesters get killed everywhere

Thou college student and so am I

Though thou shot dead, I am not – yet

Tomorrow they might then they will lie

Then the world would mourn then it would forget.

(In Memory of Ghulam Mohammad Sheikh, 22; Riddled With Bulets on 9th August 2006, click here to read the post)

(poem courtesty of greater kashmir)

 

Kashmir Government Not Powerful Enough To Name An Airport

Although there should have been no hesitation in naming it after the saint, as Sheikh ul Alam does not represent any radical political belief concerning the Kashmir politics; he being a character that belongs to an era when there was no India, no Pakistan and of course no Kashmir conflict, forms a benign symbol.

If this symbol of Kashmir’s national being is disallowed expression at a place which is supposed to be visited by people around the globe, it strengthens the suspicion that India is always scary of Kashmir emerging as an entity that has its own history and symbols of national being.

Difficult to reconcile that if PDP passed a resolution and sought clearance from the then Prime Minister, A B Vajpaye, why Airport Authority of India did not respond to it? If for such an ordinary and harmless thing it takes concerned authorities in India so long, in case they really are unaware of the whole matter, then how is Kashmir going to solve its bigger problems through an institutionalised mechanism that is in place in the shape of state administration! The reluctance of certain sections at Delhi as alluded to by some sources, smells of the traditional politics of Delhi to disallow any kind of expression to Kashmir’s collective self. It is here that the right wing Sangh Parivar and ‘secular’ Congress finds a reason to join hands.

Both NC and PDP talked of sub-nationalism in their political campaigns in the recently concluded Assembly elections, if they cannot get an Airport in their state named the way they want it, they better stop talking about bigger things like demilitarisation, cross LoC trade, autonomy, self rule etc. It only makes a laughing stock of them.

(etalaat editorial)

Ban Ki-Moon And Kashmir

Ban described the Kashmir stand-off as the most important issue of South Asia…(hindustan times)

India is destined for a tough time on Kashmir, internationally. The recent fair elections seem to have had the least effect at the international front.

Hurriyat’s Lies

The Hurriyat Conference has claimed that it is closing district offices, slashing the pay of its employees and laying off employees as a restructuring measure in wake of the recent assembly elections. Mirwaiz has also claimed the global recession to be a cause of its financial cutbacks and layoffs.

The Hurriyat, whose death is inevitable, believes, as do the mainstream politicians, that Kashmiris suffer from short term memory loss. It was in October 2007 that Hurriyat had shut down its district offices because of the financial crunch it had been facing for some time and had planned then to lay off its employees. Recent elections, restructuring and introspection are mere deceptive words being used by an organization which is failing within and outside Kashmir.

Nothing Ground Breaking, It Was Expected Years Ago

From a previous post, I Can Kill Everybody , of this blog, written October 25, 2006:

Killing in Kashmir is not uncommon but gradually it appears that the police and the army see themselves as reincarnations of God on earth. Be it the illiterate gun totting policeman or his superior office, they both think that they are the Greater Beings, created to maim and kill the children, the young, the old and the women of Kashmir.

The Jammu and Kashmir Police has turned over the past decade and a half from an organisation supporting the freedom struggle to a people more than happy to kill innocents and it will continue to grow evil.

It has already graduated from beatings innocents to killing them, now they just need to expand their reach and increase the innocent death toll. Once India is confident that the police have been trained well to behave as colonial masters, as is the attitude of the army at present; it can reduce the presence of the army, flash a happy face to the world, confident and satisfied at the thought that the same role is being played by someone else.

Lessons from the colonial masters, the British, has always inspired India: import officers who can act and behave as colonial masters, obtain the major chunk of the force from the local population and impose evil through them.

The new Chief Minister hinted at increasing the role of the Jammu and Kashmir police as if that were a respite to the Kashmiris. Their deployment has already started and 20 police companies are ready to take charge of the Srinagar city- which already has enough respite as compared to the towns and villages of Kashmir that bear the burnt day in and day out. Once the police passes, what the Director General of Police called a litmus test, the Jammu and Kashmir police will then be the only force at the forefront. No surprises the police is all too eager to pass the litmus test! And Kashmir will remain, for sometime to come, a low intensity conflict zone – simmering within.

One may recall that one of the election planks of the PDP in 2002 was the disbanding of the Special Task Force in Kashmir. They were disbanded by being absorbed into the local police, which will now be taking charge of Kashmir.

A person with a gun will remain dreaded for Kashmiris, the name tag matters the least.

Kashmiris Pay 5 Times More Than Cry Babies

Kashmiris Pay Rs. 1.1 Million For 5,000 Traffic Violations; Cry Baby (Jammu) Pays Rs. 0.7 Million For 14,000 Violations!

The tip of the economic subjugation ice-berg!

…21206 violators were challaned across the State that included…13539 in Jammu Province, 4620 in Kashmir and 3047 against the offenders on Jammu-Srinagar highway. The IG said that Rs 34 lakh were released from the violators.

In Jammu revenue of Rs. 6.36 lakh was realised, while 4620 challans in Kashmir province realizing revenue of Rs. 11.95 lakh…Rising Kashmir

And the cry baby keeps crying!

Obama And Kashmir

So it’s probably safe to say that after the euphoria of their lobbying victory has died down, Indian officials will probably feel Holbrooke’s breath on their neck. Some Indian analysts are already predicting this. C. Raja Mohan writes in the Indian Express that “reworking the India-Pakistan relationship will be an inevitable and important component” of Holbrooke’s plans. “Whether India likes it or not, Washington will devote substantive diplomatic energies towards the subcontinent, and New Delhi will be drawn into this dynamic.” TIME

Kashmir, may have a chance after all!

Lee Hamilton, veteran Democrat leader and vice chairman of the 9/11 Commission, on Kashmir:

“We certainly need to work with Pakistan and India to resolve the Kashmir problem. The United States can’t resolve that, but we can encourage the two parties to address it,” he said, adding that resolving the Kashmir conflict would require tough diplomacy.
Daily Times

Also read David Miliband’s article.

Liquid Baron To Represent Kashmir!

Days after a visit to Kashmir, which was followed by denial of interest in Kashmir politics; Vijay Mallaya, the Liquor Baron has been nominated by the National Conference for the Rajya Sabha seat. Surprisingly, some local newspapers, forgot or chose not to publish this news.