hakis sshairs of militants ’ rage
PTI
LAST SALUTE Four policemen were killed on August 29 in Shopian
she says . Ashraf died instantly with the daughter ’ s clothes soaked in his blood .
Shaila says the gunmen had entered the house without anyone noticing it and had held her 13-year-old son Tabeen Ashraf hostage in a corridor , with a butcher knife to his throat . “ I didn ’ t know that when I stepped into the corridor . They put a gun to my head and I couldn ’ t do a thing . One of them asked when my husband would return , and I said , ‘ In an hour .’ But he was back in 10 minutes and had our daughter in his lap . They killed him ,” she says .
Ashraf was the third policemen killed on Eid . Earlier that day , militants had shot dead 34-year-old Fayaz Ahmad , a trainee police constable , when he was returning home after offering Eid prayers in Kulgam district of south Kashmir . Special police officer Mohammed Yaqoob Shah was shot dead in Pulwama district . And the body of a BJP worker , Shabir Ahmad Bhat , was found at Litter village in the same district , a day after he had been abducted .
A senior
Kashmiri police officer triggered an intense debate on social media when he tweeted : “ In past couple of days five Kashmiris killed by terrorists but intellectual OGWs ( Over Ground Workers ) will be mum as usual because they are part and parcel of Pakistani terrorism project that aims at destroying Kashmir .” A political analyst took a contrary view , quoting the late journalist Kuldip Nayar , who had once remarked , “ What the police , government forces and the Indian Army did to Kashmiris inside the torture centres of Papa-2 , Tattoo Ground , Cargo and other interrogation centres would put entire mankind to shame .”
Mainstream politicians joining the deb ate asked civil society to stop differentiating between ‘ good ’ and ‘ bad ’ killings . “ This isn ’ t militancy ,” says National Conference spokesperson Junaid Azim Mattu , reacting to killings of policemen . “ This is savagery and barbarism , nihilism . A hundred and one things , but not militancy .” “ Selective outrage ” is even worse , says NC vice-president Omar Abdullah . Referring to the separatists , he says leaders vocal about alleged security force excesses are silent about the abductions by militants . “ Those who blinded a generation of Kashmir have no moral authority to talk about human rights and morals ,” says political analyst Gawhar Geelani . “ Yes , the armed rebels too transgress and indulge in killings , which should be deplored and condem ned forcefully . That said , it is neit her about armed
Sub-inspector Ashraf Dar , 35 , from a village in Pulwama was one of the three policemen killed on Eid .
forces nor militants . These are , at best , symptoms .” The cure , he argues , lies in a political solution . This debate indicates the fault-lines within the society .
The spree of abductions began after the houses of two militants , Shah Jahan Mir of Jaish-e-Mohammed and Syed Naveed of Hizbul Mujahideen , were burned down in Shopian , around 60 km south of Srinagar , after militants killed four policemen in the same district . Families of the two militants accuse army personnel of barging into their houses at midnight and setting them on fire by throwing some powder .
These abductions blurred the distinction militants had been drawing between the J & K Police ’ s counterinsurgency force — the
Spe cial Operations Group ( SOG )— and its other pol icemen . This time the militants didn ’ t spare families of other policemen , who say they have nothing to do with counterinsurgency operations and harassment of militants ’ families by the SOG and the army .
It has been a common complaint among Kashmiri policemen that senior officers have been ensuring the whole force is seen more and more by the locals as the SOG , which has earned quite a reputation in tracking militants since 1994 and has a role in alm ost all counterinsurgency operations . “ They took away my son before my eyes ,” says Aashia Bano , 57 , whose only son , 19-year-old Raja Faizan Makroo , was abducted by militants on August 30 , and released the next day , as his uncle Mushtaq Ahmad Makroo is a constable in the police . “ I pleaded with them to take me instead . Now my son is back , but I cannot forget that look of his when they were taking him . This will kill me every day and night .” Now she wants to move away from her village in Kulgam .
A few days before the abductions , 790 new recruits , mostly from the Kashmir region , joined the J & K Police . At their passing out parade on August 25 at Lethpora Police Training School , where parents of the cadets were seen hugging and kissing their wards jubilantly , DGP
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