Detroying Human Rights,
Desecrating Kashmir
By David Devadas
21 June, 2004
The TribuneMuzaffar (name changed) is a handsome 22-year old who lives in a middle class Srinagar locality. Over the past couple of years, he has developed a close friendship with a married woman of the neighbourhood who is separated from her husband. Her little children are very fond of Muzaffar and enjoy outings with him, but it is of course the sort of relationship that is frowned upon in a conservative society.
Having known the young man's family for several years, I can vouch for the fact that he is not involved in any way with the secessionist movement. Indeed, he holds the view - common enough, incidentally, among the generation that grew up amid the staccato rattle of gunfire - that economic development is what Kashmiris need rather than a changed political status. Nonetheless, Muzaffar has been picked up by the security forces several times and tortured.
Each time, it turns out, his lady friend's husband has reported him as a terrorist. For although the couple are separated, the man shares the male mentality so common across the subcontinent, that she is his property and that it is his right and duty to beat up any other male friends that she might have.
The difference is that, in the peculiar circumstances of Kashmir, such a man finds it easier to get the security forces to do his dirty work for him. Any security force set to combat a guerrilla war thrives on information about who is covertly involved with one or other guerrilla group and so they lap up such tips and act on them expeditiously.
Torture being the favoured method of security forces in not just Iraq, the typical reaction to such a tip about a young man like Muzaffar is that he is picked up and bundled into a closed security force vehicle and driven straight to a torture chamber. The forces' logic is that they must extract information about the whereabouts of other members of the group and of weapons dumps before the group realises their fellow has been caught and changes hideouts. The result is that the torture victim's family is left searching high and low for him for perhaps a couple of days - or, at times, forever. Muzaffar has been treated to electric shocks and the application of chilly paste to wounds and other exposed areas of a naked body, apart from thrashing and humiliation.
When the Border Security Force has picked up Muzaffar - twice so far over the past couple of years - he has been released after the first round of torture. It does not take long for them to figure out that the fellow is innocent - at least of the sort of crime they are trying to stop. The local police, on the other hand, are a different kettle of fish. The police picked up Muzaffar on his little nephew's birthday a few weeks ago and, although they too knew the fellow was innocent, they wanted money and other favours to let him go. Given the pattern of police forces in many parts of the subcontinent, the man who had reported him had also no doubt paid them.
Muzaffar's is not an isolated case. Unfortunately, this sort of thing has been almost a pattern through the traumatic 15 years that Kashmir has spent in the grip of turmoil. Property disputes and rivalry of one sort or another have all too frequently led to such malicious reports.
The forces cannot know which complaints are genuine and which are motivated, unless they investigate. But such action only creates fresh bitterness and alienation among people who have nothing to do with secessionist politics or militancy.
One must remain constantly alert to the fact that the extraordinary powers that have been given to the security forces in Kashmir can and do lead to abuse. The powers that be should never become complacent about these extraordinary powers.
Although Dr Manmohan Singh's government intends to repeal the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA), the answer finally is to repeal all the special powers acts in Kashmir. The best road towards that is the peace process. It must not be allowed to lose momentum. The talks between the Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan over the next few days should push forward the process.