by Anam Zakaria
Unable to shrug off my confusion, I backtrack and ask him, ‘Sir, I just don’t understand… if India proposes the same four-point formula, then the end result would be the same. Why is it so important that they call it a core issue first, if the final impact is identical?’
He’s quiet for a moment. Then he says, ‘You are very young, you’ll find the answer to this in ten years.’
‘But sir, I have to write the book now so I would really appreciate if you could give me the answer,’ I laugh. The men in the room join in the laughter. The president smiles for the first time as well, before responding to my request.
‘We put our faith in Hindus at Partition. We believed that they would hold a plebiscite and until today we are starving. They are butchering our children. It is not about Muslim persecution… let me tell you that we aren’t asking for Kashmir because it’s Muslim… we are asking for it because it is ours. Even the Hindus… and Christians there are our brothers.’
I realize that I will not be getting the answers that I want. I thus decide to move the conversation forward. ‘Alright, let’s say that India accepts that Kashmir is a core issue. However, they also state that terrorism in Kashmir is a core issue for them. How do we deal with that?’ I ask him this question particularly because it is reflective of many India-Pakistan debates over the years. Each time Pakistan has raised the Kashmir issue or pushed India for a plebiscite, India has stated that its hands are tied due to ongoing ‘cross-border terrorism’. The conversations frequently result in a stalemate, with no favourable results for Kashmiris. My question seems to irk the president once more. I seem to be getting better and better at doing that as our conversation progresses.
‘How do we do terrorism? Kashmir is my right! Even I am willing to pick up a gun, and I’m saying that as the president! It is my country, I will fight for it! What terrorism are you talking about? Today you are writing a book, what if tomorrow someone comes to you and says why did you write this sitting in Pakistan? What if they say you did something wrong by writing it?’ Puzzled, I wonder what my book has to do with terrorism, but a moment later it becomes clearer. In his own way, he is pointing to the same issue that General Jehangir Karamat, the former chief of army staff, had highlighted: that the line between the freedom struggle and terrorism had become blurred and had dealt a huge blow to Kashmir. What was once a legitimate movement had been tarnished. The president echoes the same thought process. ‘There is a difference between freedom struggle and terrorism,’ he tells me. ‘There are about seven lakh Indian Army officials deployed in Kashmir5… they have the police, the administration, under their control. How can there be terrorism then? And if there is terrorism, then we should be proud that we can manage that despite all their forces being present… Osama Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda, have all come into being now. But we have been fighting for our freedom for decades. People should be ashamed for calling Kashmiris terrorists. It has destroyed our indigenous movement for us, for Palestinians, even the Sikhs.’
I have one more important topic I want to touch upon before leaving. There is a group of people not satisfied with the nature of plebiscite envisaged in Kashmir. These are the nationalists, those who want an independent Kashmir. They tell me that the plebiscite under the current resolution only gives them an option of joining India or Pakistan. I ask the president how the plebiscite—if it takes place—would resolve this issue. He is quiet for a moment and then he shakes his head, disappointed that I have put this question forward. It is almost as if he sees no point to it.
‘It’s a very sad thing,’ he tells me. ‘If you say you are the first and last woman in the world, no one would believe you. If I say I am the first and last president in the world, no one would believe me. People talk, let them talk. What good will that do? Decisions are based on majority vote, not sheer talk. If 80 per cent of people in makbooza Kashmir and Azad Kashmir say they want to stay with Pakistan, what then? Everyone has slogans but our life and death is with Pakistan. We could tell you stories too which would malign the country but why should we do that when we have no issues? Why should we damage ourselves, step on our own feet? If we leave our brother Pakistan, tomorrow India would invade us. Those who say they want independence, will they take our responsibility then? Today, because of Pakistan, because it is a nuclear power, we are safe. Otherwise, in one week Hindustan would occupy us. All this talk of independence… the attempt is to in some way annoy Pakistan,’ he takes a bite of the watermelon, mid-sentence, ‘it is an attempt to frustrate Pakistan. We cannot afford this. Humara jeena marna Pakistan ke saath hai (our life and death is with Pakistan),’ he repeats, with even more fervour this time.
‘If the greater majority wants independence, we will appreciate them,’ he continues, ‘but Madam… mujhe kehna nahi chahiye kyunki unko josh aa jayega (I shouldn’t say this because the nationalists will get excited for no reason), but the majority of them support Pakistan also. Fine, for a moment, let’s say we are upset with Pakistan. Even we cry about budgetary issues… but then why would people be singing Pakistan’s praise in universities in makbooza Kashmir? Which fauji (army official) went and told them to do that? When Hindustan does the things that it does… violating their mothers and daughters… naturally they want to join Pakistan.’
I ask him about the sixteen pro-independence books that had recently been banned in AJK. According to the news, the home department had issued the notice regarding the ban in March 2016, ‘exercising the powers conferred to it by the Kashmir Council, and then the AJK president approved the notification’.6 It is said that the books were published by the National Institute of Kashmir Studies (NIKS), a private institute in Mirpur, Pakistan-administered Kashmir. According to Saeed Asad, the founder of NIKS, clause 23 of the Kashmir Council requires that all printing press and publication businesses be registered. However, when he applied for registration, he was told to remove the word ‘national’ from the institute’s name.7 Registration is only one of the issues leading to the ban. According to pro-independence Kashmiris, the ban was used to curb any sentiment that might not fit or accentuate the Pakistani narrative.
The president, however, rejects my question altogether. ‘The books may be banned, I don’t know…,’ he says reluctantly, and then goes off on a tangent, claiming that all pro-independence sentiment is fuelled by Indian intelligence agencies.
I want to remind him that he apparently approved the notification regarding the ban but he does not give me the room to interject. He is on a mission to convince me that those who are pro-independence either do not count or are furthering somebody else’s agenda. ‘There are certain people working for the agencies… we cannot say much about them,’ he tells me. ‘They chant slogans… you don’t know, you’re too young. It is very sad that Hindustan is spending so much money to run these agencies.’ Then he adds: ‘My point is that you need to look at things holistically. Pakistan is moving towards development but certain people want to interrupt that, they want to destabilize the region. Of course, we all have some problems… we have load-shedding, our electricity and water are supplied all over Pakistan while we ourselves face shortages… our people have been displaced as a result of dams being constructed on our land. We can all tell stories if we want to…’
I’m surprised he is only mentioning all of this now, at the end of the interview, almost as if he did not want us to explore it further. I ask why he did not bring it up at the beginning, when I asked him if Kashmir had any social, political or economic grievances. He raises his voice again, ‘Grievances happen but that doesn’t mean you light fire in your own house! There are problems between fathers and sons, between mothers and daughters. Does that mean you just pick your things and leave?’ He realizes he is losing his temper again. The phone rings for him. He takes the call and when he returns to the conversation he seems exasperated by the interview. He ends it rather abruptly by saying, ‘Anyway, thank you for coming.’ I thank him for his time and leave. On my way out, a government official who was sit
ting in the room for most of the interview stops me in the corridor. He tells me, ‘The president cannot say many things or he would get into trouble. You must read between the lines.’ I head out, with his advice on my mind.
PART THREE
Beyond the Ceasefire
8
JIHADIS, FAUJIS AND CHINESE…
…and a corridor of uncertainty
On the morning of 8 October 2005, my mother shook me awake. ‘Run out of the house, run… it’s an earthquake!’ she shouted frantically. It took me a few seconds to comprehend what she was saying. I looked up and saw the fan sway from left to right above my bed. A few books fell off the rack. We rushed into the garden, fearing that the house may crumble down upon us, but the rattling of doors and furniture did not last long. After a few moments, the house became still and we went back inside. My father reached for the TV remote control and put on the news. A 7.6 magnitude earthquake had hit both sides of Kashmir. Over the next few hours, we learnt that thousands were killed in the earthquake. It is estimated that 75,000 people lost their lives (some reports cite a higher death toll of 86,000)1, the majority in Pakistan-administered Kashmir.2 Reportedly, approximately 70 per cent of the casualties were in Muzaffarabad, the capital of ‘Azad’ Kashmir.3
Almost two years after the 2003 ceasefire was implemented, disaster had revisited ‘Azad’ Kashmir. The newly opened roads and the unfinished renovations of homes, destroyed by a decade of mortar shelling, had received a severe setback. Sharjeel, my Kashmiri journalist friend who had helped me with my interviews with the women by the LoC and with the refugees in Muzaffarabad, told me, ‘The efforts to rebuild Neelum Valley had not even started when the earthquake happened. There was hardly a year of peace in between.’ Sharjeel had been badly injured in the earthquake himself. ‘I was sitting in my office when we felt the earthquake. I ran out and a broken piece of a water tank hit me just outside the building. I lost consciousness. Two men picked me up and put me on their bike but because oil had leaked all over the roads, the bike skidded and I landed on my head again. The army took me to the hospital, where they stitched me up.’ He tells me that he was the only one in the hospital who had a special SIM card in his mobile phone. Signals don’t work in many parts of ‘Azad’ Kashmir, due to its close proximity to the LoC.
After the 2003 ceasefire, the Special Communications Organization (SCO), which officially works under the federal ministry of Information Technology—and is maintained by the Pakistan Army—, had initiated a new SIM card, SCOM, which allowed mobile phone calls in Kashmir. It should be noted that communication channels are very weak all over ‘Azad’ Kashmir even today, particularly in areas close to the LoC. In Neelum Valley, I’m told by residents that more than 50 per cent of the areas are cut off from all modern communication channels. It was only a few years ago that a handful of places in Neelum Valley got access to internet and mobile services through the SCO. These include Athmuqam, Shardah, Kel, Kundal Shahi and Jura. But there are other places that don’t even have a landline connection. Locals also tell me that the establishment controls communication, shutting it down whenever it likes. When I last visited Neelum Valley in 2017, the women I interviewed told me that mobile and internet facilities had been barred a few months earlier, when the LoC was witnessing cross-fire and the locals had tried to protest against it.
‘It was still very rare then to have the SIM. It used to cost Rs 3,500 (approximately $35), so it was a big deal to own one,’ continues Sharjeel. ‘Everyone in the hospital used my phone to make calls to their family. I also used it to call the bureau chief of Reuters in Pakistan, who was my colleague, and told him I was injured and needed his help. He had me flown to Islamabad, where I was properly treated at his expense. I received the injury on 8 October and I was back at work on 24 or 25 October.’
Many others were not as fortunate as Sharjeel. A refugee I had spoken to in the Manakpayan camp in Muzaffarabad told me that twenty people died in his camp, while 150 people lost their lives in another camp. Basic infrastructure—roads, schools, hospitals—was in ruins. The main road to the refugee settlement I had visited is still wrecked; the small chairlift continues to dangle above the dangerous river.
The earthquake resulted in one of the largest humanitarian efforts the world has seen in recent times. Emergency aid trickled in, as did relief workers. Several Pakistanis made tours to ‘Azad’ Kashmir with truckloads of food, blankets and clothes. Neelum Valley, which had barred outsiders’ entry for years due to the conflict, now invited them to its debris. Alongside ordinary civilians and aid workers came religious relief organizations—as did militant outfits. The Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), previously operating in ‘Azad’ Kashmir as Lashkar-e-Taiba, made its presence felt in the area once again. Hardline Sunni organizations—some of them responsible for militant attacks on the minority Shia Muslim community—also entered or solidified their presence in the region. In retaliation, Shia relief organizations also made their way into Neelum Valley. Using relief work as an excuse to make inroads in Kashmir, some of these organizations have tried to garner support for jihad in the years after the earthquake.
I am told that some Sunnis and Shias converted to the other sect to seek help from such sectarian organizations. Sectarian frictions, which were already plaguing Pakistan, began to make a place in Kashmir. In 2009, a suicide bomber detonated his suicide jacket in the middle of a Muharram procession from Neelum Valley to the Imambargah, Pir Alam Shah Bukhari, situated in Muzaffarabad.4 The month of Muharram holds special significance for Shias and the Imambargah is a sacred place of worship for the community. In 2016, hand grenades and explosives were planted in a shrine in Neelum Valley. Fortunately, the police thwarted the plan to blow up the shrine, but the deputy commissioner told reporters that Kundal Shahi, where the attack was to be executed, had witnessed sectarian clashes in the recent past. ‘It seems as if the saboteurs wanted to create sectarian rift in the area,’5 he said. Such attacks were relatively new to Kashmir but may no longer remain rare. Today, some of these militant relief organizations have a special standing among the Kashmiris. Many sing their praises. ‘They were there to help us when the government wasn’t,’ ‘Azad’ Kashmiris tell me.
According to a Human Rights Watch Report:
In the first seventy-two hours after the earthquake, thousands of Pakistani troops stationed in Azad Kashmir prioritized the evacuation of their own personnel over providing relief to desperate civilians. The international media began converging on Muzaffarabad within twenty-four hours of the earthquake and fanned out to other towns in Azad Kashmir shortly thereafter. They filmed Pakistani troops standing by and refusing to help because they had ‘no orders’ to do so as locals attempted to dig out those still alive, sending a chilling message of indifference from Islamabad. Having filmed the refusal, journalists switched off their cameras and joined the rescue effort themselves; in one instance they shamed the soldiers into helping. But unlike the death and destruction, the media were not everywhere. The death toll continued to mount.6
The Human Rights Watch report further states that:
Militant groups were the first on the scene dispensing relief goods and other aid after the earthquake… As the Pakistani military prioritized the rescue of its own personnel, it probably sought the assistance of its closest allies in Azad Kashmir, the militant groups. These groups, which had undoubtedly suffered the loss of personnel and infrastructure themselves in the earthquake, won much local appreciation for their rescue and relief efforts. This public relations coup could not have been possible without logistical support from sections of the Pakistani military’s intelligence apparatus. For example, one of the first groups to set up operations was the Jamaatud-Dawa—the Lashkar-e-Taiba group operating under a new name. In January 2002, the Pakistani government had banned the LeT as a terrorist group. However, in the aftermath of the earthquake, President Pervez Musharraf went out of his way to praise its relief work and brushed off calls to restrict its operations. The Pakistani mi
litary apparently saw the earthquake as an opportunity to craft a new image for the militant groups rather than as an opportunity to disband them.7
A new face, a new character, hidden under the grab of relief efforts and charity, would allow these militant organizations to survive in the post-9/11 years despite the resulting crackdowns; it would allow them to function effectively, in a way that was accepted by people in and out of ‘Azad’ Kashmir.
According to academic Saroj Kumar (an assistant professor of History at the University of Delhi and the author of the book, Fragile Frontiers: The Secret History of Mumbai Terror Attacks), though the JuD has been on the watch list in Pakistan since 2003, the government has been reluctant to take action, largely due to the humanitarian relief the organization has provided. The organization apparently re-cultivated its space in ‘Azad’ Kashmir after the earthquake. In his book, Saroj Kumar writes: ‘… the first rescue team to arrive on the scene was… a group of fifteen militants… (they) reportedly brought their own medics… rescued several villagers… dug graves… ferried supplies to remote villages… the JuD camps were the first stop for the hundreds of villagers…’8 The relief and rehabilitation work ‘firmly established the LeT’s presence in the area’. According to Kumar, ‘Azad Kashmir’s Prime Minister Sardar Sikandar Hayat met JuD chief Hafiz Saeed at the PM House in Muzaffarabad and thanked him on behalf of the Azad Kashmir government.’
No wonder the president of AJK, during my interview with him, had emphatically stated that the LeT (a slip of the tongue on his part for the JuD), had played an instrumental role in earthquake relief efforts. Ten years later, when another earthquake struck Pakistan and ‘Azad’ Kashmir, the JuD was at the forefront of the relief efforts again. For ordinary civilians and recipients of aid, such organizations have become the face of rescue operations, their only hope amidst disaster. For the organizations, such natural catastrophes provide the perfect opportunity to cash in on the grievances of the local people. Relief camps become breeding ground for regrouping volunteers and raising funds for militancy both in and out of Kashmir. According to Dawn, within three hours of the 2015 earthquake, a single Lahore-based JuD worker had already raised Rs 1,000,000 (approximately $10,000) for relief supplies.9
