POLITICS-INDIA: Calls for Revenge Rise after New Kashmir Attack

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Aug 6 2002 (IPS) - The ruling pro-Hindu, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) called for stern action by the Indian government against Tuesday’s grenade and firearms attack by militants on pilgrims trekking to the remote cave shrine of Amarnath in disputed Kashmir.

Nine people were killed and 40 others injured in the attack, which New Delhi blamed on a Pakistan-based group.

“This attack proves that Pakistan is not implementing its assurances on curbing cross-border terrorism. It is time we (India) takes immediate and stern action against the terrorists, their protectors and sponsors,” said BJP spokesman Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi.

Defying heavy security arrangements for the month-long annual pilgrimage, which began on Jul.19, suspected members of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba (Soldiers of God) attacked the pilgrims at dawn as they lay sleeping in tents rigged up at the base camp of Nunwan, near Pahalgam town, in Kashmir’s Anantnag district.

Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishan Advani, who also holds the key home portfolio, confirmed that the Lashkar-e-Toiba, a banned Islamic extremist group based in Pakistan, was behind the attack. But he said it appeared to have been executed by a branch that calls itself the ‘Al Mansuriya’, which he said claimed responsibility for the attack.

Advani said the attack seemed to have the twin purposes of disrupting the pilgrimage in which more than 100,000 people had already participated and the elections set to be held in Kashmir in September.

News agencies, quoting eyewitnesses, said a four-man squad first hurled grenades over the barricaded perimetre of the camp, after which a lone gunman sprayed the inmates with automatic gunfire. The gunman was shot dead by security personnel, but the others melted away into the nearby forests.

According to officials, at least 3,000 pilgrims were camping at Nunwan, waiting to be driven in trucks on Tuesday to Chandwari for the final trek to the cave shrine sacred to the Hindu god Shiva.

Following the attack, pilgrims moving from Pahalgam town were later allowed to proceed to Chandanwari under heavy security, and junior minister of state for home I D Swami said there was no plan to stop the popular pilgrimage as a result of Tuesday’s incident.

More than 15,000 policemen and regular troops are said to be deployed along the 400-km route for this year’s pilgrimage in view of increased tensions between Pakistan and India, which came close to open war in May-June and had to be defused through the intervention of top international diplomats.

The pilgrimage up remote snow-topped mountains and alpine landscape is a favourite target for ‘jihadist’ militant groups that want to liberate Kashmir from Indian rule and secure it for Pakistan, whose military ruler President Gen Pervez Musharraf has pledged to put an end to cross-border terrorism.

The Indian government has announced that it would, in September, hold state assembly elections in Kashmir, whose possession is disputed by neighbouring Pakistan. Pakistan holds and administers a third of the territory.

Pahalgam, a popular centre for winter sports and tourism, also serves as base for the annual pilgrimage to the cave shrine, famed for a natural waxing and waning ice stalagmite that is worshipped as a phallic symbol by Hindus for fertility and prosperity.

‘Jihadists’ also launched a grenade attack on an army base in Handwara town, which resulted in a firefight with troops in which a soldier and two of the attackers, also said to be members of the Laskhar-e-Toiba, died.

India has said that it would not withdraw some 700,000 troops it has deployed on the border with Pakistan until it could verify that cross-border infiltration has been stopped according to promises that Musharraf made — and confirmed to U.S. Deputy Defence Secretary Richard Armitage in June.

The troops were deployed in response to an attempt by what India says are Pakistan-linked militants to blow up Parliament while it was in session on Dec.13, using a car-laden with explosives.

The plan failed owing to faulty wiring on the charge, but the militants shot dead seven policemen guarding the building before they were shot dead.

Pakistan responded to the troop build-up with the deployment of at least 30,000 of its troops backed with armour on its side of the border. Meanwhile, ‘jihadist’ attacks continued, including a massacre of 31 people at a military camp near Jammu with the victims being mostly wives and children of soldiers.

Following assurances by the international community that Pakistan would restrain ‘jihadist’ groups from operating from its territory, India’s election commission announced last week four-phased elections in Kashmir starting Sep. 16 and ending Oct 1.

But Pakistan itself has been the victim of extremist attacks, the latest being one on a Christian missionary school at Murree, 70 km north-east of Islamabad on Monday, which left six people dead.

The attack appeared to be aimed at Western interests, especially since previous attacks have been blamed on Islamic militants angry at Pakistan’s support for the United States in its ‘war against terrorism’.

A British High Commission press note released here Tuesday said: “The horrific attacks on pilgrims on the ‘Amarnath’ pilgrimage and on a Christian school in Muree in Pakistan demonstrate the high prices paid by Indian and Pakistani citizens over years of terrorist violence.”

“These incidents, which follow earlier attacks in other cities in both countries, further underline the need for sustained action by all concerned to take effective action against terrorism,” the note said.

New Delhi said the smooth conduct of the elections, which Pakistan opposes, would be a “litmus test” of Musharraf’s promises to end cross-border terrorism and the winding up of ‘jihadist’ camps set up in its territory.

India’s Election Commissioner J M Lyngdoh had earlier invited journalists from around the world to observe and report on what he said would be free, fair elections.

Lyngdoh, however, said India would not allow the participation of official foreign observers. “In this day and age there is no question of the white man coming to observe what the native is doing,” he said, while announcing the poll schedule on Friday.

India has also rejected Powell’s suggestion asking for the release of Kashmiri political prisoners, but has encouraged the formation of a ‘Kashmir Committee’ of prominent lawyers and journalists to engage political leaders in Kashmir in a dialogue.