POLITICS-INDIA: Not Much Expected from Govt.’s Kashmir Cease-fire Offer

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Nov 20 2000 (IPS) - The Indian government has made another peace bid in Kashmir by ordering its troops not to pursue Kashmiri militants during the Muslim holy month of Ramzan beginning late November, but not much is expected out of this.

Even the government does not expect this to bring the armed separatists back to the negotiating table, which they deserted some months ago when New Delhi refused to include Islamabad in the peace talks.

“The holy month of Ramzan during which the Prophet Mohammed exhorted one and all to live in peace and harmony is soon approaching and the government has therefore instructed the security forces not to initiate combat operations against militants in Jammu and Kashmir during this pious month,” said Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee said, while announcing the cease-fire Sunday.

“I hope that our gesture will be fully appreciated and all violence in the state and infiltration across the Line of Control (which runs across the disputed province that is partially under Pakistan’s administrative control)…will cease and peace will prevail,” the premier added.

A truce, unilaterally announced in July by the Hizbul Mujahideen, the leading Kashmiri militant group, led to talks with senior Indian government officials. But the talks collapsed when militant leaders subsequently insisted that Pakistan be party to the discussion.

Mirwaiz Omar Farooq , leader of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference (AHPC), an umbrella body of separatist groups in Kashmir, said the Ramzan cease-fire was a “good gesture”. But he insisted that it be followed up with tripartite talks between New Delhi, the militant groups and Islamabad.

Leading Pakistan-based militant groups, such as the Al-Badr and the Lashkar-e-Toiba, which bitterly opposed the July militant cease- fire offer, have rejected the Indian government’s Ramzan offer.

Al-Badr spokesperson, Mushtaq Asgari declared that militant activity would be stepped up during the holy month which begins Nov.26. “All important wars take place in the holy month of Ramzan,” he was quoted as saying.

The Pakistan government was still to make an official comment on the cease-fire. India and Pakistan have fought two wars over the former princely state, which joined India after the subcontinent’s 1947 partition by departing colonial British rulers.

Pakistan claims India’s only Muslim-majority state and describes Indian troops in Kashmir as an “occupying force”. India accuses Pakistan of training, arming and sending militants into its troubled province, which is reeling under a violent secessionist movement for the past decade.

Farooq Abdullah, the chief minister of India’s Jammu and Kashmir state, said he was not surprised at the rejection of the cease-fire offer by the hard-line militant groups. “Their bread and butter depends on killing people. These organisations will be sidelined by the whole world,” he said.

Members of Indian Parliament, which opened for its winter session Monday, generally praised the initiative. Ghulam Nabi Azad, a senior national leader of the main opposition Congress party, who belongs to Kashmir, said the move would be welcomed by the people of Kashmir.

However, Basudev Acharya, a senior leader of the opposition Marxist Communist Party of India, accused the government of lacking a “well-defined policy on Kashmir”.

The government too admitted it was not expecting much. The decision was taken to make the life of people in Kashmir easier during Ramzan, senior government ministers said.

“…dialogue is always two-sided. We do not know what the other side wants. Last time we entered into a dialogue, it got scuttled,” Defence Minister George Fernandes was quoted as saying.

Political analysts say that the Ramzan cease-fire is meant to show to the international community that New Delhi is willing to go out of its way to find peace in Kashmir.

The Sunday offer followed New Delhi’s permission to a leading Indian Kashmiri separatist leader to travel to Pakistan for his son’s wedding.

Hurriyat leader Abdul Ghani Lone was allowed to visit Pakistan with family members, friends and supporters. His son was married to the daughter of Amanullah Khan, the London-based leader of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), one of the oldest Kashmir separatist outfits.

“To all those nations clamouring for a resumption of the Indo- Pak dialogue, Mr. Vajpayee is saying that it is up to them to prevail on Pakistan to allow the peace process to move ahead in Kashmir,” wrote leading media foreign policy analyst, C. Raja Mohan.

“If Pakistan indeed responds positively it should be possible not only to revive the talks between the government and the various militant Kashmiri groups but may also create the basis for a resumption on Indo-Pak ties,” he added.

The Indian government insists that talks with Pakistan, snapped since last summer’s undeclared Kargil war, can begin only if it has proof that Islamabad’s support for the Kashmir militancy has stopped — a view endorsed by Western governments.