The Way to Correct Mistakes

By Paramanand Soobarah, "More shootings in Jammu and Kashmir" - Mauritius Times - Mauritius
Weekly Issue 329, Friday, August 15, 2008

More shootings in Jammu and Kashmir

In retaliation for the reversal of the decision to grant some land for the purpose of creating reception facilities for Hindu pilgrims at the Amarnath Shrine in Kashmir, the Hindus of Jammu blockaded the road to and from Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir [India].

This was a serious blow to the economy of Kashmir and of India, as all the produce of that state is routed to other Indian cities through Jammu. Last week a number of Hindu activists were killed in police firings; the number is not clear as the killing of a Hindu is not a great matter for the present government of India.

It would have been unreasonable to expect the Kashmiris to take this lying down. A large crowd including traders decided to march towards the Line of Control that separates the Indian and Pakistani parts of Kashmir; if they could not send their produce to Indian cities, they could try sending them to Pakistani ones: they have to live. They were stopped by the Police who fired live bullets at them: thirteen Muslims have been killed in the scuffle. Tension in Kashmir is at an all-time high.

The killing of protestors and rioters by police is a shameful crime wherever and whoever by it is committed. It is a matter of great shame that a country that sends satellites around the earth and is planning an expedition to the moon does not have the right equipment for crowd control. Even Israel uses rubber-coated bullets against Hamas rioters.

The normal device used against determined rioters is the water canon. In America they have developed a device that emits rays much like those of microwave cookers that can repel crowds very effectively. If set to work on a serious project, Indian scientists can without any doubt develop devices that control rioting crowds without have to kill or maim any rioter.

The best weapon any government can have against rioting is not to allow any situation to develop into a riot.

It is when politicians and two-way communications between the authorities and the public fail that rioters take over. In the present case it might have been possible to get away with the question of the land for the pilgrims if the plot were smaller, just the amount needed for the facilities, with the rest being a park accessible to everybody, whether a pilgrim or not.

All governments can make mistakes, but the way to correct mistakes is also an important matter.

If Chief Minister Goolam Nabee Azad had been allowed to negotiate with the Muslim protestors about the matter, he could have come up with a face-saving solution.

There certainly is a minority among the Muslim protestors who are not interested in reaching any peaceful solution with the Indian government: they have their own mission from across the border. The way things were handled has only served to make matters worse.

There is no saying how matters will end. No people have ever accepted to live quietly under gun law for ever. But in this case there seems to the added complication that the nature of the people seems to have changed, from Sufism to militant Islamism.

Is Kashmiriyat gone for ever?

[On this topic, read also: http://sufinews.blogspot.com/search?q=Arjimand]

[Picture: Portrait of Maharaja Gulab Singh, former Governor of Jammu of the Sikh Empire of Ranjit Singh, in 1847. (Artist: James Duffield Harding). Photo from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jammu_and_Kashmir].