Blood in the vales

Whatever the Centre's plans to defuse the crisis in Jammu and Kashmir, the dance of death goes on unabated. Since January, 254 civilians have lost their lives, reports SHUJAAT BUKHARI.

A SMOOTH boatride, amid heavy security, on the Dal Lake by the Union Home Minister, Mr. L. K. Advani, and his entourage early this month can in no way be taken as a sign that normality has returned to Jammu and Kashmir. Statistics show that the number of militancy-related incidents has gone down, but the magnitude of those that have taken place has had an adverse impact on the minds of the people.

Though the reopening of annual darbar in Srinagar was incident- free, the militants have been achieving their targets. Their general strategy now is to target the security forces only rather than all and sundry as in the early days of militancy.

In the past few months, the militants had introduced Fiyadeen (suicide squads) who not only inflicted heavy losses on security forces but managed to dominate the scene psychologically.

Now there are even suicide-bombers: a city youth tried to enter the army headquarters in Srinagar with a car loaded with explosives. The alert troops did not allow him in, whereupon he blew himself up at the entrance.

The security authorities do not agree with the view that these actions have any adverse psychological impact on the forces. ``It is a surprise element and we are always ready to accept it,''said a senior security official.

But, at the same time, the situation does not seem to be that disturbing, though it is not as conducive as it was in 1996, when the present National Conference (NC) Government returned to power without much resistance.

For the officials, incidents such as the one on May 15 in which the Minister of State for Power, Mr. Ghulam Hassan Butt, was killed with four others are only to be expected; because of the ``Pakistani gameplan to eliminate the mainstream people''.

For the analysts, the incident is loaded with a message to those even thinking of initiating a dialogue with the Centre.

However, such events hardly have any impact on the ground where Srinagar is seen receiving domestic tourists in good number as was the case in 1999 till Kargil began.

The State's Tourism Department is making allout efforts to woo tourists, preferably those from within the country, and the response so far has been encouraging.

But the fall in the number of foreign militants and the increasing local involvement is a worrying factor for the authorities.

But the State police chief, Mr. Gurbachan Jagat, is optimistic about a change in the situation. ``I think it is not going to deteriorate further,'' he says. ``Since Pakistan is adamant about continuing disturbances in the State we have to expect more but at the same time we are fully equipped to face the challenge.'' Mr. Jagat admits that in the latest round of militancy the common man has been put to a lot of hardship which ``we are trying to minimise at all levels''.

Whatever the Centre's plans to defuse the crisis, the dance of death goes on unabated. From January 1 to May 17, 254 civilians lost their lives, 18 of them women and five children. And, 124 security men and 396 militants were killed. The number of securitymen falling victim is increasing by the day.

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