A sign of desperation

IN ENLARGING THE coverage of the draconian Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act (1990) and declaring the entire State barring the Ladakh region as a `disturbed area', the Centre has, in effect, virtually played into the hands of the jehadi groups, whose subversive campaign feeds on people's disaffection vis-a-vis the official establishment. After all, the very objective of the militants in picking on soft civilian targets is to heighten public pressure and force the Government on the backfoot, provoking it to embark upon potentially oppressive responses. This precisely is what the Vajpayee regime has done by investing the security forces with sweeping powers in the matter of conducting searches, making seizures and such other operations which they deem necessary for combating insurgency. For all the seeming reasonableness of the `special law' in the context of the demonstrated `striking power' of the externally-sustained militants, its negative impact at the ground level - in areas where it has already been in operation, namely Kashmir Valley and the districts of Rajouri and Poonch - has been such as to render its application counter-productive, what with the unbridled powers vested in the security forces tending to be used as an instrument of torture and an assault on human rights. This indeed has been the case with almost every legislation that gave special powers to law enforcing agencies, ostensibly to deal with extraordinary situations, and the infamous TADA Act is a classic example. That the Government would not be averse to examining the feasibility of a `TADA-like' anti-terrorist law, as indicated by the Home Minister, Mr. L. K. Advani, is yet another disturbing testimony to the sense of desperation in the ruling establishment.

The other components of the `new plan of action', formulated against the immediate backdrop of escalation in militant attacks targeting civilians and unfolded by Mr. Advani in Parliament on Thursday, pertained more to the strategy and logistics of anti- insurgency operations, with special reference to the Jammu region. Apart from the upgrading of village defence committees and beefing up of security and patrolling of public places like the Jammu railway station, there is going to be a new initiative by the Unified Headquarters for what has been described rather enigmatically as ``fresh tactics and modified dynamic deployment (of security personnel)''. Moreover, the plan speaks of special intelligence-driven operations by security forces. If this sounds rather strange - as one thought almost the entire range of operations is essentially driven by intelligence - the point about initiating action against the ``overground supporters of terrorists'' is disquieting, although not unusual, for the reason that it will lend itself easily to harassment of the innocent. The excessive reliance on deploying additional battalions and counter-insurgency units betrays a lack of strategic clarity in the sense that the other and more critical dimensions of the challenge of militancy encountered in Jammu and Kashmir have not been appropriately factored in, if at all.

The much-hyped Jammu-specific strategy - the `highpoint' of which is the extension of the unacceptably rigorous 1990 Act - and Mr. Advani's rhetorical claim of unqualified success for anti- insurgency operations elsewhere in the State may have served, at best, as a formal reaffirmation of the Government's `resolve' to counter cross-border terrorism. But they do not answer the specifications of the `confidence building measures' that the people of Jammu and Kashmir, who stand severely alienated, crave. If anything, the stress on militaristic counter-insurgency approaches in preference to - if not to the virtual exclusion of - political concerns that lie at the root of people's alienation is bound to send a wrong signal. In fact, there is the real risk of the people getting disaffected all the more, thanks to the excesses the security forces are likely to commit under the `special powers' dispensation.

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