According to a report in The Statesman on 5 July, security forces in Jammu and Kashmir are now facing a new challenge ~ the presence of ‘hybrid militants’, who though not listed as ultras, are radicalised enough to carry out terror attacks and then slip back into ‘normal’ life. A typical hybrid militant, security officials say, is like the boy next door who has been radicalised and is kept on standby mode by handlers for carrying out terrorist attacks when instructed.

Over the last few weeks, terrorist attacks on soft targets have increased in the Valley, including in the city of Srinagar – which, incidentally, was declared terrorist-free in September, 2020?. These attacks have come from pistol-wielding terrorists whose main purpose is to spread fear, stop economic activities and silence those who raise their voices against separatism and violence. Security officials believe these hybrid militants are working on the directions of handlers in Pakistan ~ the ISI.

That Pakistan has been involved in the growth of militancy in Kashmir is beyond question and its support to different militant groups has also been influenced by considerations of its own interests. But the roots of the problem are in India. When militancy first developed in Kashmir during the closing years of the 1980s, it certainly was the result of frustration and alienation of Kashmiri youth due to unemployment, corruption in administration and lack of good governance.

The problem was compounded by New Delhi’s policy of curbing Kashmir’s autonomy as guaranteed by Article 370 (and 35 A) ~ abolished in August 2019, by the BJP-led NDA government – and putting in place a government in Srinagar that would be pliable to the diktats of the Centre. This is as true of the present government as it was of Congress governments earlier, especially under Pandit Nehru, and his daughter, Indira Gandhi.

The dismissal of the legitimately elected government of Dr Farooq Abdullah in 1984 was engineered by New Delhi, and the succeeding government led by GM.. Shah, Farooq’s estranged brother-in-law, was put in place with strong support of the Congress leadership in Delhi as well as in Kashmir although it led to widespread protests in the Valley and threw J&K politics into instability.

Following widespread communal riots in South Kashmir, particularly in Anantnag District which, many people believe, were instigated by some disgruntled Congressmen such as Mufti Mohammad Syed, the G.M. Shah government was dismissed, and Governor’s rule was imposed. Subsequently, Farooq Abdullah was re-instated as the Chief Minister in November 1986 under the Rajiv-Farooq Abdullah Agreement.

But this accord was severely criticised not only by the old guard within both parties but also by Maulana Mirwaiz Farooq, leader of the Awami Action Committee who condemned the agreement as a sell-out to the Centre and called for united opposition to the same. Immediately after taking oath as Chief Minister, Dr. Abdullah advised the Governor to dissolve the Assembly, to pre-empt any move by disgruntled elements within both coalition partners to destabilise the government.

In the Assembly elections held in March 1987, besides the Congress and the National Conference (NC) there was a new political formation, the Muslim United Front (MUF) viewed by many as a spontaneous local political formation without any links with the Centre, as opposed to the Congress or the NC. It was supposed to do well as a debutant political party and was expected to gain between 15-20 seats. However, the elections were allegedly rigged, to prevent the Congress from losing its control over Kashmir and a coalition government was formed with the NC and the Congress.

The MUF, usually described as a fundamentalist organisation, acted as an ad hoc political party with no group ideology. Some of its leaders like Ali Shah Geelani were certainly fundamentalists who wanted to make Kashmir a centre of Islam, while some others were separatists. However, as Inderjit Badhwar pointed out, (India Today, 15 April 1987) the MUF had the support of the educated youth, illiterate working class people and farmers who were fed up with years of ‘family rule’, lack of economic development and corruption; by supporting the MUF they gave vent to their anger against the ruling establishment.

Rigging of elections, therefore, triggered the insurgency in Kashmir towards the end of the 1980s and in the early 1990s. Many of those who joined militancy were MUF supporters. The MUF leader Muhammad Yusuf, popularly known as Sayeed Salahuddin, became the head of the Hizbul Mujahideen (HM), an Islamist organisation, and head of an alliance of antiIndia militant groups, the United Jihad Council, that wants to merge Jammu and Kashmir with Pakistan; while his election manager, Yasin Malik became the head of the JKLF, in the Kashmir Valley.

The JKLF was seeking independence of Kashmir; thus its popularity soared and within two years it became the ‘vanguard’ of the insurgency movement as hundreds of disgruntled Kashmiri youths, recruited by the JKLF and other militant outfits, went to Pakistan across the LoC for arms and military training. Buoyed by its success in Afghanistan, Pakistan was waiting for an opportunity to destabilise Jammu and Kashmir, by instigating widespread insurgency.

Besides the JKLF and the HM, there were also many other indigenous insurgent groups such as Al Barq, Al Jehad and Muslim Janbaz Force, operating in Kashmir during the height of the insurgency. The JKLF, though composed of Kashmiri Muslims, professed a secular ideology, and wanted to establish Kashmir as an independent state, whereas the other militant groups were Islamists and wanted Kashmir’s merger with Pakistan. For tactical reasons, Islamabad initially supported the JKLF, but its support gradually shifted to the Islamist militant groups.

The militancy reached its peak in the early 1990s and continued till the middle of the decade, aided and abetted by Pakistan from where hordes of jihadis belonging to the Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM), Laskar-e-Toiba (LeT), Harkat–ul–Ansar (HuA) and Harkatul-Mujahideen (HuM) and sundry other proPakistan militant organisations including the battle hardened Talibans, infiltrated to the Indian side of the LoC to support the separatists and militants. Attacks on Indian security forces increased from 89 in 1989 to 1098 in 1990 and in 1992 there were 3413 reported incidents of violence, the highest in the history of Jammu and Kashmir.

The number of attacks on security forces declined gradually after that and came down to 708 in 2008. In response to the murders, kidnapping, extortion and violence perpetrated by the militants, the police and the security forces often resorted to extrajudicial action and kept people under detention without trial for long periods, thereby alienating a large segment of the Muslim population in the Valley who, for the first time, sided with the separatists.

The human rights situation deteriorated sharply and according to the US State Department’s country profile on human rights, based on published sources, in 1991 alone 2,300 people were killed in Kashmir including 900 civilians, 1300 alleged militants and 155 members of the security forces. The Kashmiri Pandits living in the Valley for generations became targets for attack by militants ~ particularly by the jihadis ~ and they had to leave their homes in search of safety and security.

The much talked about Kashmiriyat – a tradition of harmony and tolerance based on Sufi culture lost its significance. The insurgency movement during its first phase was led by the local militants as becomes clear from the number of casualties of local and foreign militants during the period 1990-2001. During 1990 -93, for example, 3,393 local militants were killed compared to 130 foreign militants, while in 2001, 710 local militants were killed compared to 1,032 foreign militants.

The ideologies of these various militant outfits were different and there were also turf wars. By the middle of the decade, however, militancy was on the decline; Assembly elections were held in 1996, with 53 per cent turn out, which itself was a landmark event against the background of violence of the previous years and an elected government was put in place under the leadership of Dr. Farooq Abdullah. By the end of the decade, a semblance of normalcy was restored with peaceful elections to the Assembly, held in 2002 and 2008.

There were several reasons for the decline in militancy during the first decade of the present century. First, the local youth became disenchanted with continuous violence which disrupted normal life and desired peace; this was also the desire of the common man. They became more concerned with bread and butter issues and were prepared to use democratic means for resolving their problems.

Another cause for the decline in militancy was that foreign militants were finding it more difficult to get shelter in local homes which was reflected in the larger number of foreign militants being killed in encounters with security forces. Perhaps a contributory factor was the improvement in India-Pakistan relations, particularly during the years 2003- 2007. The government had also adopted some measures to ameliorate the peoples’ grievances.

But it was a fragile peace as the controversy over the Amarnath Shrine land transfer issue revealed in 2008. On 26 May 2008, the Government of India and the Jammu and Kashmir government reached an agreement to transfer 99 acres of forest land to the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board (SASB) in Kashmir for setting up temporary shelters and facilities for Hindu pilgrims which sparked violent protests in the Valley. Six people were killed and 100 injured when police fired on a crowd in Srinagar protesting against the land transfer and this fuelled further protests and violence. Wilting under pressure, the state government revoked the land transfer decision on 1 July.

(To Be Concluded)

(The writer is Professor (Retd.) of International Relations and a former Dean, Faculty of Arts, Jadavpur University)