J A M M U   &   K A S H M I R

Farooq says no to Centre on Assembly term
Jammu, February 22
The Chief Minister, Dr Farooq Abdullah, is said to have refused the Central Government’s suggestion for reducing the tenure of the Assembly from six years to five years. Senior state government functionaries confirmed that the Chief Minister had received a communication from the PMO, suggesting to him to reduce the term of the Assembly by one year so that fresh elections could be held within next eight months.

Farooq hails ceasefire with a rider
Jammu, February 22
Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee had informed Chief Minister Dr Farooq Abdullah, on phone, last evening, that he had decided to extend ceasefire for a period of three months. Dr Abdullah had conveyed his “happiness” over the decision with a rider that steps be taken to ensure that the killing of innocent people was stopped in the state.

Withdraw security forces: Geelani
Srinagar, February 22
A former Chairman of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference Syed Ali Shah Geelani has said that the people of Jammu and Kashmir will accept nothing short of total independence. Speaking at a condolence meeting at Sonawari in Baramula yesterday, Geelani said lasting peace in the sub-continent was possible only when the Kashmir issue was resolved according to the wishes of the people of the state.

Farooq says no to Centre on Assembly term
M.L. Kak
Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 22
The Chief Minister, Dr Farooq Abdullah, is said to have refused the Central Government’s suggestion for reducing the tenure of the Assembly from six years to five years.

Senior state government functionaries confirmed that the Chief Minister had received a communication from the PMO, suggesting to him to reduce the term of the Assembly by one year so that fresh elections could be held within next eight months. The Assembly elections are due in October, 2002.

Dr Abdullah is said to have communicated to the Centre that since his ministerial colleagues, party legislators and workers are opposed to the reduction in the term of House, it is not possible for him to amend the state Constitution to have a five-year tenure for the Assembly.

It is in consonance with the decision of the National Conference that a private member’s resolution tabled in the state Assembly, seeking amendment to the Constitution for reducing the term of the House from six to five years, was rejected by the ruling party MLAs.

The government functionaries said that under the new Kashmir policy, the PMO wanted to have early elections in the state and provide a chance to those who are sitting on the separatists’ benches to participate in the poll. The idea was to have a representative government with whom the Centre could initiate talks for resolving the ongoing turmoil.

Several separatist leaders had secretly conveyed to the Centre their willingness to participate in the elections. However, the Chairman of the Legislative Council, Mr Abdul Rashid Dar, who has, of late, become an adviser to Dr Abdullah, is stated to have advised the Chief Minister not to accept the Centre’s suggestion on reducing the tenure of the Assembly. He has suggested to Dr Abdullah that he should first set his House in order and then advance the elections by a couple of months.

The National Conference leadership is not scared of facing the electorate. A year ago, it had toyed with the idea of going to the polls between September and November, 2001, but later the idea was dropped after Dr Abdullah received reports that for all excesses being committed by the security forces, especially the task force of the state police, he was being held responsible by the people.

He himself has seen people shouting anti-Farooq slogans even when it was the security forces who were responsible for extortion or custodial killings. The National Conference leaders are of the view that anti-Farooq demonstrations were being engineered by his political opponents for either forcing the Centre to dismiss the Farooq regime or forcing the Chief Minister to go in for early elections.

State government functionaries claim that since the Government of India has realised the dangerous implications of dislodging the Farooq regime, it plans to see an end to his Government through fair elections.

These functionaries feel that Dr Abdullah will be suitably rehabilitated in the Centre provided he quits on his own. But his party associates want him to first install his successor and then think of shifting to Delhi. There have been suggestions to him to install his son, Mr Omar Abdullah, Union Minister of State for Commerce, to run the affairs in his home state.

Another option being pursued by the Government of India is to hook separatist leaders of varied political hues to talks. One senior state government officer said that the Centre was following the “Harisa” (rice and mutton cooked together for a long time) policy and not the instant “Kabab” policy on Kashmir. He explained that it was part of the ‘Harisa’ policy that the leaders of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference were being kept on tenterhooks by delaying grant of passports. 

Farooq hails ceasefire with a rider
Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 22
Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee had informed Chief Minister Dr Farooq Abdullah, on phone, last evening, that he had decided to extend ceasefire for a period of three months. Dr Abdullah had conveyed his “happiness” over the decision with a rider that steps be taken to ensure that the killing of innocent people was stopped in the state.

The Kashmir Chief Minister while endorsing the Prime Minister’s decision on ceasefire said that these three months should be utilised on mounting pressure on the USA, the United Nations and other world bodies to force Pakistan to stop aiding crossborder terrorism.

While hoping that the next three months would usher in peace the Chief Minister conveyed on phone to the Prime Minister that the security forces be encouraged to strike at the militant hideouts so that the rebels were not in a position to carry out massacres of innocent people.

The past three months of ceasefire has witnessed increase in rate of killing of National Conference workers and innocent civilians, he told newsmen here today and added “this needed to be taken care of by the security forces.” He expressed his worry over the rate of killing of civilians during the ceasefire period and said that the rate had increased by 135 per cent.

He said he was happy that Mr Vajpayee had given another chance to the peace process to reach its logical conclusion. He hoped that the separatists and the militants would respond to it. He said there should be no mercy to the killers of innocent people and the security forces should take decisions on their own so that militants, especially foreign mercenaries, were not allowed to fortify their bases and carry out one carnage after another.

On the other hand chairman All-Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC), Prof Abdul Gani Bhat said that “extension in ceasefire will be meaningless if it is not supplemented with suitable measures for resolving the Kashmir dispute which alone will allow India to buy peace in the state.

He said that if “killing of people in the custody of security forces continued extension in ceasefire will be meaningless.” In this context he alleged that 28 civilians had been “killed in custody in various parts of the Kashmir valley during the past three months.”

Prof Bhat said that extension in ceasefire be also backed by immediate grant of passports to the five-member Hurriyat team which plans to visit Pakistan for discussing the Kashmir issue with Islamabad and the leaders of militant outfits, start of dialogue with the Hurriyat to be followed by resumption of Indo-Pakistan in which the APHC leaders be involved.

The state unit of the BJP has stated that further extension in search of peace would not yield results unless the security forces were allowed to smash the militant hideouts.

Surprisingly the peoples, reaction to the ceasefire extension lacked euphoria one witnessed when non-initiation of combat operations against the militants were enforced on November 27 last.

There was no doubt, relief evident on the faces of common people but many including Nazir Ahmed, a trader and Abdul Majid, a government employee, were sceptical of the end results of the ceasefire. They said there had been no positive response from the militants and a section of the police and other security agencies.

Common people also wanted measures for building public confidence. Abdul Majid said that when people continue to remain sandwitched between the guns of security forces and the militants peace initiative would not have reached its logical conclusion.

Nazir Ahmed pleaded for economic package for the state which could usher in a better atmosphere. He said people faced severe problems on account of drinking water and electricity crisis. Poverty and unemployment remained untackled and in case the state government imposed fresh taxes in the Budget proposals next month the entire peace process would be derailed. He explained that militants tried to exploit the difficulties of the people and the Government of India should treat Jammu and Kashmir state as a special area for liberal economic package in the shape of more jobs and additional power supply.

One senior police officer, who wished to remain unidentified, said that if the troops improve border management and bring the rate of infiltration from across the LoC to zero level the security scenario would witness fast improvement. He said there was need for deploying additional forces on the border and in the border villages so that not a single militant infiltrated into the state. If that was done, he added, ceasefire was bound to succeed. 

Withdraw security forces: Geelani 

Srinagar, February 22
A former Chairman of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC) Syed Ali Shah Geelani has said that the people of Jammu and Kashmir will accept nothing short of total independence.

The recent demonstrations against the government and security forces should serve as an eye opener for all those who claimed that people’s support for the freedom struggle in Kashmir was waning. UNI