DENIAL OF ACCESS TO JUSTICE BY APEX COURT & PETITION BEFORE CONSTITUTIONAL HEAD OF THE STATE

Action against the petition dated 22.07.2017 by Hon'ble President of India
More details: https://www.slideshare.net/OmPrakashPoddar/acknowledgement-letter-dated-22072017-by-honble-president-of-india

More details: https://www.slideshare.net/OmPrakashPoddar/acknowledgement-letter-dated-25072017-by-honble-president-of-india-79194614

Petition dated 11.05.2016 before Hon'ble President of India PRIOR to Writ Petition (Criminal) 136 of 2016 before Supreme Court of India against Judicial Magistrate, Begusarai Bihar.

More details: https://www.slideshare.net/OmPrakashPoddar/petition-before-honble-president-of-india-dated-11052016

Petition before President of India dated 11.05.2016
https://www.slideshare.net/OmPrakashPoddar/petition-before-honble-president-of-india-dated-11052016

Acknowledgement letter dated 16.05.2016 issued by Hon'ble President of India PRIOR to Writ Petition (Criminal) 136 of 2016 before Supreme Court of India against Judicial Magistrate, Begusarai Bihar

Acknowledgement letter dated 16.05.2016 issued by Hon'ble President of India

PETITION BEFORE HON'BLE PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA WITH A PRAYER TO IMPEACH THE CONCERNED JUDGES FOR ISSUING NON BAIL ABLE WARRANT (N. B. W) DATED 08TH SEPT 2011 UNDER SECTION 83 CR.PC. IN CRIMINAL CASE COMPLAINT (P) NO 5591 OF 2013 AT SDJM COURT NO. 16 BEGUSARAI BIHAR AND KEEPING IT SECRET SINCE THEN EVEN AFTER THE ON RECORD INTIMATION TO THE CJM DIVISION BEGUSARAI IN THE SAME MATTER CRIMINAL CASE COMPLAINT (P) NO. 9P OF 2010 DATED 03RD MARCH 2011 AND AFTER THE SETTLEMENT OF THE SAME MATTER BY THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI IN MATT APPL 7 OF 2012 ON 23RD JULY 2013. WE ARE LIVING AS REFUGEE IN DELHI BECAUSE OF FORCED DISLOCATION BY THE STATE.THE PETITION WITHOUT SOFT COPY OF ANNEXURES AS HARD COPY OF SAME ANNEXURES FROM P 1 TO P 18 HAVE BEEN SUBMITTED BEFORE HON'BLE PRESIDENT OF INDIA WITH THE PETITION Sl. No. P1/ B/ 0108170053 ON 27TH JULY 2017

Petition before Hon’ble Prime Minister of India dated 23.08.2017

ACTION AGAINST THE PETITION ON 24.08.2017 BY HON’BLE PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA

ACTION AGAINST THE PETITION ON 25.08.2017 BY HON’BLE PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA

NO TIMELY ACTION AGAINST COMPLAINTS LEADING IN INCREASING THE VOLUME OF CASES BEFORE INDIAN COURTS. HENCE RUNNING THEIR SHOPS; ENJOYING GOVERNMENT BENEFITS+LUXURY & VICTIMIZING INNOCENT CITIZENS

President of India had forwarded Complaint vide PRSEC/E/2016/06805 dated 10.05.2016 to the Registrar General Patna High Court on 08.06.2016 prior to Writ Petition (Criminal) 136 of 2016 before Supreme Court of India

President of India forwarded complaint to Registrar General Patna High court on 08.06.2016

Jalil Ahmad Andrabi

On January 29, 1996, Jaleel Andrabi, a senior lawyer and prominent human rights activist, had just come back from Geneva, where he had spoken out against the rights violations in Kashmir.

The same day, a vehicle had driven up to his house. Two men walked up to the door and said their father had been set afire by the Army at Pulwama, that he had survived and been admitted to a hospital in Srinagar. They said their mother and sister were waiting outside, and wanted to consult him (Jaleel) on what could be done legally.

Andrabi asked them to meet him in the High Court. Just then, his brother Manzoor, who had gone to the doctor, returned. He told Andrabi that the only people waiting outside were three armed men. At this, the men left hurriedly in a taxi. The family made a note of the registration number—JKT 1988.

The next day, the same people came knocking at the door. By now, Andrabi was apprehensive. Andrabi’s wife was the one who went to speak to the men at the door.

As she was telling the men that they should come to court to meet her husband, Andrabi went up to the attic with a camera. The men saw him clicking photographs, and started gesticulating. But neighbours had gathered by now and the men had to flee. The next day, Andrabi released their pictures to the newspapers

In the days following the two visits, Andrabi spent much of his time at the High Court, arguing a case where he had sought to ensure that people detained in the state were not taken to jails outside J&K. The state had appealed the order and it had come up before a division bench of the High Court.

Andrabi had asked his brother Arshid Andrabi to accompany him to court. At lunch, Andrabi pointed to the man sitting on an adjacent table, a “notorious” Ikhwani (surrendered militant working with the security forces) named Sikandar. Andrabi told Arshid the man had been shadowing him for some time. He said if he could be followed to the High Court there was no way he could be safe in the state, he needed to leave for a while.

“He stayed in Delhi for over a month. He met the press, talked to a few embassies, I think he annoyed the

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government further,’’ says Arshid. In March, Andrabi came back to the Valley to be with his family for Eid.

On the day of Eid, 8 March, 1996, while heading home with his wife, his Maruti car was allegedly stopped by an Army contingent led by Major Avatar Singh near Parraypora on Airport road.

They seem to have been waiting for Andrabi. There were three vehicles parked there, a one-tonne Army truck that had ferried the 20 or so Armymen accompanying the officer, their officer’s jeep and a private vehicle, the family said.

Andrabi was asked to get out of the car and taken into custody. His wife, who could not drive, was left behind. She waved down an autorickshaw and tried to give chase, but the vehicles were moving too fast. The same evening, a case of abduction was filed at a nearby police station.

The High Court Bar Association moved a petition in the state High Court the next morning. The Army and the BSF filed replies denying Andrabi had been picked up by their men.

On 27 March, 19 days after the abduction, a college student named Abid Hussain, a resident of Kursu Rajbagh, a locality that lies by the Jhelum, went to the banks of the river early in the morning. According to his deposition, he saw a body floating down the river. It got entangled with the lines of two boats anchored ahead and drifted towards the bank. Soon, more people gathered there and pulled the body ashore. The upper half of the torso was covered with sackcloth tied around the waist by a rope. As soon as the sackcloth was removed, most of the men there were able to identify the body—Jaleel Andrabi had lived in that neighbourhood for over a decade at one point of time.

Andrabi had been shot in the head and his body bore marks of injuries that suggested he had been beaten and tortured. The post-mortem suggested he had died about two weeks before the body was found.

Arshid was among the people called to identify the body. Soon after Andrabi’s body was found, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was formed by the J&K Police; it did not take them long to connect Sikandar Ikhwani to the abduction.

On 5 April 1996, just about a week after Andrabi’s body had been found, seven more bodies were found at Pampore. Among the dead was Sikandar Ganiae, the Ikhwani. When the police spoke to Sikandar’s widow, Hameeda, she told them that Sikandar and his associates had been summoned by another Ikhwani, Muhammed Ashraf Khan alias Umer, to an Army camp in Rawalpora, headed by a man named Major Avtar Singh of 35 Rashtriya Rifles.

Six months later, the police were finally able to trace Umer. His statement was recorded before a magistrate and it implicated Major Avtar Singh in the murder of not just Jaleel Andrabi, but also Sikandar and his associates. According to Umer, in March 1996, Avtar Singh and Sikandar picked up a man dressed in a suit-and-tie and brought him to the camp. They were accompanied by “Suken, Balbir Singh, Waid, Doctor who was an Army Doctor and Mushtaq Haider etc.’’

Umer goes on to state that the man in the suit argued with these men, questioning why he had been abducted and brought to the Army camp. He was beaten up and locked in a room. Shortly after, Avtar Singh came and told Umer that the man they had picked up was a famous advocate named Jaleel Andrabi, who works against the Army. The same evening, Umer said, he heard cries and shouts from the room where Andrabi was confined. Then there was the sound of a gunshot.

For the first few days after Andrabi was shot, Umer said, the Ikhwanis did not turn up at the camp. A worried Avtar Singh sent him along with Suken and Balbir Singh in search of Sikandar. They located him and told him to report to the camp. The next day, Sikandar came to the camp accompanied by three men and a driver. They were told to leave their weapons at the gate on the pretext that the commanding officer was expected on a visit. They sat down to drink with Avtar Singh, and after an hour or so, were asked to come into the dining room. Umer, who claimed to be standing on the verandah, saw Avtar Singh, the Army Doctor and the other men named earlier overpower Sikandar and his colleagues and tie them up with ropes. They then shut the dining room door. The next day Sikandar and his colleagues were found dead.

On 10 April 1997, the SIT set up by the J&K police filed its report before the court, naming Avtar Singh. The court directed the Union government to impound the Major’s passport or prevent him from being issued one. The court also asked for the service files of the Major within four weeks.

In 2000, the SIT finally told the court what should have been verified much earlier—that Avtar Singh was still in Ludhiana. Soon after, despite the court orders, Avtar Singh was able to obtain a passport and leave the country ad settled in California (USA).

Major Avtar Singh left India after allegedly murdering Andrabi in March 1996. He went to America via Canada. He was arrested by police in California in February last year following a complaint of domestic violence by his wife.

UN deplores India’s response to human rights abuses

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Geneva, June 02  The Human Rights Council of the United Nations has deplored that India has been dodging the implementation of the recommendations for repeal and review of the draconian law Armed Forces Special Powers Act.

A statement from the UN said that India’s human rights record was reviewed by the UN Human Rights Council under the mechanism of the Universal Periodic Review, early this week in Geneva.

The review was marked by a general lack of acceptance of human rights challenges in India and a mere reiteration of domestic laws, policies and constitutional provisions by the Indian Government. The statement said answers of the government did not address the critical issues related to gaps in implementation of laws and enjoyment of rights by the people.

Miloon Kothari, the Convenor of the Working Group on Human Rights in India maintained that by employing a defensive and largely self-righteous position at the Human Rights Council the Government of India had once again lost the opportunity to constructively engage with the UN human rights system and in accepting the enormous   human rights challenges it was faced with. Vrinda Grover, a human rights lawyer and member of the Group expressed serious concern at India’s misleading response to the Human Rights Council and said India was   camouflaging the systematic impunity enjoyed by its armed forces for human rights abuse in the Northeast of   the country and Jammu and Kashmir.

Kashmiri Prisoner in Kolkata's Guantanamo Bay

State Brutality knows no Frontiers: Kashmiri Prisoner in Kolkata's Guantanamo Bay

Amit Bhattacharyya

Secretary General, Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners(CRPP)

(On 31 October 2010, the Hindustan Times, Kolkata edition published a front-page report captioned "Kolkata's Guantanamo Bay" where it was reported that on October 15,when the entire city was celebrating Saptami during the Pujas, Sheikh Farhat Mehmood, a 29-year-old Kashmiri under-trial prisoner lodged in Presidency Jail, Kolkata, West Bengal, was stripped, tortured and kept naked throughout the night in his cell: Mehboob's offence: he protested against the quality of food and demanded his basic rights according to jail rule. Following the 'punishment', Farhat observed a two-day hunger-strike in the jail. The matter was hushed up by the Presidency jail authorities. The picture of the prisoner in a naked state was published in the paper. On the next day-1 November-the Bandi Mukti Committee(Committee for the Release of Prisoners, a human rights forum  based in West Bengal) organized a demonstration against it and took out a procession comprising about 100 people and went to the Presidency Jail gate and demonstrated. They were denied permission to meet Farhat. On 2 November 2010, the HindustanTimes, Kolkata edition came out with another report which I am sending to you all for conveying the message that state brutality knows no frontiers and that there are many Guantanamo Bays in 'the land of the largest democracy of the world' also. Such acts of brutality, sadistic torture, deserve universal condemnation and should not go unpunished.)

The said report is as follows:

"Protests over Jail Stripping" ht Impact

Kolkata: The jail department initiated a probe on Monday, even as it denied any incident of stripping of a prisoner inside Presidency Jail. On Sunday, Hindustan Times reported a case of stripping of Sheikh Farhat Megmood, a 29-year-old under-trial from Srinagar, inside his solitary cell on the night of October 15.

The situation has taken a curious turn, with the Srinagar Bar association calling a press conference at the Sadar Court at Lalchowk, Srinagar, on Tuesday to condemn the incident.

"Such incidents should be condemned and the guilty must immediately be punished. We've called a press conference to highlight the issue", said Ajaj Dadar, vice-president of the association.

"We've initiated a probe. There's been no torture or stripping. It may be that, somehow, the inmate took his own pictures on a cell phone and sent it out", said BD Sharma, ADG(Prisons) at Writers Buildings.

However, Sharma could not clarify several pertinent points. Even if his point is accepted, why would Mehboob strip himself? How could he take his own photograph when he was trying to cover himself with both hands? How could someone enter the cell of a high security prisoner with a cell phone and take his naked picture?

On the question of a cell phone being sneaked into the solitary cell, Sharma said, "We're looking into it. We have to look after so many thousand inmates and have just a handful of staff". He, however, said the department would write to the government to spped up Farhat's trial.

On Monday, human rights organization Bandi Mukti Committee demonstrated outside Presidency Jail demanding that the jail authorities stop treating inmates brutally. The organization took out a rally to protest against the incident. About 100 activists marched to Presidency Jail and demonstrated against the atrocities.

Chhoton Das, secretary of the committee, said, "We've submitted a deputation to the jail superintendent. We wanted to meet the inmate, but were not allowed. Our main demand is punishment of the person guilty of torturing Mehmood".

Paradise on Fire: Violation of Human Rights in Kashmir – by Sanman Kaur Grewal

Following armed hostilities in 1947-1949 between India and Pakistan and intervention by the international community, the region once known as the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir was divided. Commencing no later than October 1947, the Kashmir dispute has proved the most protracted territorial dispute in the United Nations era. An implacable, deadly struggle is going on half a world away in India’s mainly Muslim territory of Kashmir, where Indian military and Para-military forces are trying to crush forces seeking independence or union with Pakistan. Continuous conflict between India and Pakistan over Kashmir is leading to violation of human rights, birth of rebels and destruction of peace in the name of unity and integrity of India.

Kashmir’s political status has been in dispute since partition of sub-continent on August 15, 1947. During British rule over India, the state of Jammu and Kashmir was one of more than 50 autonomous princely states owing allegiance to Britain. At the time of independence, the rulers were advised to join, by means of an instrument of accession, either of the two new dominations, India or Pakistan, bearing in mind their state’s geographical position and the religion of their inhabitants. In October 1947, prompted a local Muslim uprising that drew armed support from Pakistan, the Hindu Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir chose to place his mostly- Muslim subjects under the jurisdiction of India, and then called in Indian troops who recaptured most of his lost territory.

In January 1949, a United Nations-brokered cease-fire left Kashmir divided by a military cease-fire line (Line of Control) into the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir and Pakistan controlled Kashmir known as Azad Kashmir and the Northern Territories. . Shakti Bhatt  states “Indian government has steadfastly held on to its official stand that Kashmir is undisputedly an integral part of India and Pakistan on the other hand blames India of acquiring it through fraud and violence“ (2003, p. 215). For past 60 years, Indian and Pakistani forces have continuously confronted each other over this tense cease-fire line, with their bitter rivalry exploding into war in 1965 and 1971 (Kargil war), and nearly providing the flashpoint for a third conflict in 2001 possibly involving nuclear weapons.

Although both sides contributed in spreading violence in Kashmir, but the violence caused by India’s military and the Para- military forces allied with them, is even more destructive and abhorrent. Unlike any other great democracy, Indian soldiers are not held to any higher state of conduct. In Kashmir, poorly trained military troops are torturing civilians by extra judicial killings, murders and rapes which is leading to spread of lawless state terrorism. It’s surprising that India still claims itself to be world’s largest democracy.

India’s human rights violations in Kashmir are systematic, deliberate, and officially sanctioned. India has never prosecuted even one of its 700,000 military and paramilitary personnel there for human right abuses, and its laws grant legal immunity for any actions aimed at suppressing Kashmiri dissent or support for self-determination. Information compiled by various human rights organizations like London based Amnesty International, New York-based Asia Watch and other humanitarian organizations establishes that a massive complain of brutal oppression has been launched by the Indian army since January 1990. Various estimates are given of the death toll of civilians so far. Making due allowance for unintended exaggerations, the figure into tens of thousands. Countless individuals had been maimed and thousands of women molested and assaulted. Not a word of condemnation has been uttered at the United Nations; not even a call on India to cease and desist from committing its atrocities.

The overwhelming presence of Indian military and paramilitary forces in Kashmir reminds Kashmiris that they are not free and are being enslaved by Indian forces. This feeling of being slave leads to the birth of rebels in the valley. These rebellions are no other than common people who are victim of continuous torture and abuse by the military and paramilitary forces of Indian government. These people are killed ruthlessly as the government recognizes them as terrorists, but government never wants to accept that it itself is responsible for the birth of rebels in the valley. It’s very natural that after tolerating continuous violation of human rights, one raises his voice to achieve his basic freedom. Usually targets of military shots are common people (shopkeepers, children, women, school going students, etc.) who had not even touched any weapon or something that would spread terror or any kind of violence. They are being shot and then left for bleeding, after their death they are being recognized as terrorists by the so-called democratic nation.

The following excerpt has been taken from the journal Pro and Con (2004, pp. 264-267). In 2003, President Parvez Musharraf addressed to the UN General Assembly “India cites cross-border terrorism in order to reject dialogue. It knows full well that the Kashmiri struggle is indigenous. It is India that violates international law by refusing to implement Security Council Resolutions and by perpetrating gross and consistent violations of human rights in Kashmir. Once again, I invite India to join Pakistan in a sustained dialogue to resolve the Kashmir dispute.” In reply to the president of Pakistan, Indian President Mr.Atal Bihari Vajpayee had nothing to say except “We totally refuse to let terrorism become a tool of blackmail. When the cross-border terrorism stops, or when we eradicate it, we can have a dialogue with Pakistan on the other issues between us.” This conversation clearly proves that India does not want to look at problems of Kashmir; instead, it just wants to keep hold on Kashmir forcibly forever.

The role of press in Kashmir is also an important topic in continuous dispute. The Indian press is a great reason behind the fact that inspite of high scale violations of human rights in Kashmir the public opinion remained silent up to large extent. In her book, Kashmir: A Tragedy of Errors, Tavleen Singh has gone so far as to state that the press was the main reason why the alienation of Kashmir began. There is no doubt in the fact that reporting fairly on Kashmir situation is really dangerous as the Indian government does not want to represent its true picture in front of the world. So press is just working like a slave for the government. This is the reason behind regular news on Kashmir just focus on death of military personnel or militants. No newspaper gives the account of death of ordinary people in the valley or rapes and murders.

A south Indian writer, Teresa Joseph (2000, pp. 53) states “Although human rights organizations, both national as well as international, and also other media sources have documented in detail gross human rights violations in Kashmir by both the militants and the security forces, the general reader does not get any such picture of the situation from the mainstream Indian press.” So it can be easily concluded that Indian press has never tried to figure out the true picture of Kashmir.

The issue of Kashmir is becoming more complicated day by day. Since 1989, around 1 lakh Kashmiri people have been killed in fake encounters and this number dwarfs the killings in Northern Ireland, Palestine, Bosnia, and Kossovo which have brought the world to tears and revulsion. Killings in Kashmir have become so commonplace that they are reported like car accidents in the United States. There is nobody to reprobate Indian government for making the beautiful Kashmir a hell. The most perplexing phenomenon regarding this situation is that it has been allowed to arise and persist in a territory which, under international law, does not belong to any member state of the United Nations and whose status is yet to be decided by the people of its land. It is interesting to note that when Kashmir issue erupted in 1947-48, the United States of America stated that future status of Kashmir will be decided by people of the territory but now while Kashmir is undergoing such a miserable condition, the United States is silent on this issue. Actually India declares itself the world’s most populous democracy and offers support to America in pursuing terrorists. In exchange, the United States remains silent when India kills innocent Kashmiris who crave self-determination and its achievement through peaceful protest.

If the silence persists, there would be only this explanation that a Kashmiri life is viewed as less worthy than other lives. Indian government has given complete rights to its military forces to kill or abuse people in Kashmir in whatever way they want to in order to suppress the movement for freedom. After killing the ordinary people, government states them as terrorists and there is nobody to investigate the causes and effects of conditions caused in Kashmir. As long as India continues to isolate Kashmir from the rest of the world, it will never end violent acts on that unfortunate land and restore the rights and freedom of the people of Kashmir. Brown and Davidson suggest that “The U.S. should recognize that the Kashmir dilemna is an instance in foreign policy in which there is a national interest, the diffusing of a potential nuclear war, and a humanitarian concern, ending the murders of civilians by atleast one side of the hostility” (1994, p. 2)

The following questions are on mind of every Kashmiri person: For how many years will children in Kashmir grow up in fear and shadow of guns of the security forces? When will they be allowed to play in kinder gardens freely as the normal children do? How many Kashmiri girls are still to be raped or molested before achieving freedom? What number of women is required to be widowed before living a peaceful life in Kashmir? Is there anybody who can answer the above questions? The Indian government seriously needs to think about the answer of above questions. The solution of sufferings of these sufferings is both urgent and vital. It is far more serious area than any other area in the world. For finding a right solution of problem, three parties need to interact with each other and create an environment of understanding among them. These three parties are the Government of India, the Government of Pakistan and the Government of Kashmir. Although, the most important party is the people of Kashmir as their decision will be a right decision for humanity and human freedom. The only thing that governments of India and Pakistan needs to forget is their self interests and try to make the life of people of Kashmir beautiful by giving them their fundamental rights and freedom for life.

More details: http://www.sikhsiyasat.net/2010/08/18/paradise-on-fire-violation-of-human-rights-in-kashmir-by-sanman-kaur-grewal/

Criminal Justice Department, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico, U.S.A.

Human rights group makes startling disclosures on unmarked graves

Rameez Makhdoomi/Ajaz Ahmad War/Sheikh Gulzaar

Srinagar : In a startling disclosure made by the International Forum for Justice/Human Rights Forum J&K, Mohammad Ahsan Untoo, Chairman, with reference to letter written to JK Human Rights Commission has disclosed with list that the Police Investigation Wing of Jammu and Kashmir  Human Rights Commission (JKHRC) has only visited 38 graveyards across north Kashmir and found 2730 graves, out of which 2156 are still unidentified. But the fact of the matter according to this forum is that in Lolab area alone there are more than 38 graveyards which have unmarked graves and mass graves.

Another startling disclosure made by the International Forum for justice/ Human Rights Forum J&K is that the security agencies in the last 22 years have been responsible for killing many civilians in fake encounters. In Devar village of Lolab area, the said human rights forum states that they have documented 37 cases of fake encounter killings, where according to International forum for justice human rights j&k ,33 local civilians were killed in fake encounters and branded as foreign militants. Also 4 local Kashmiri militants from Devar have been killed in fake encounters and branded as foreign militant.

Another ground breaking disclosure made by this human rights group is that amongst the victims of fake encounter killings one of the striking cases is of Kareem War (65) S/O Aziz War R/O Dilbagh, Devar, Lolab, who was killed in a fake encounter by 18 Rashtriya Rifles (8 Sector – Cherkoot) and Special Operations Group of J&K Police and was branded as Afghani militant. Shockingly, three of his sons Baktiyar War (24), Mohammad Shareif War (21), Lateef Ahmed War (27) were also killed by the same agencies. Mohammad Shareif War was branded as Bangladeshi militant, Lateef War was branded as Pakistani militant and Baktiyar War was claimed as unidentified militant. Four members of this family have been killed in fake encounters and branded as nationals of 3 different countries. The father and his three sons who have been killed in the fake encounters, is not the only injustice which has happened to the family, but Kareem War’s other son Sharief ud Din War was disappeared by army in 1998. According to International forum for justice human rights forum J&K,the family members of Kareem War are still awaiting justice, even after truth has been established according to the information gathered by International Forum for justice human rights J&K.

The revelations made by this human rights group certainly are quiet sensational and will demand answers from those who are at helm of affairs.

Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) Kashmir

Srinagar, April 28 : In disputed state of  Kashmir, the activists of Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) held a monthly sit-in at Municipal Park in Srinagar demanding the whereabouts of their dear ones disappeared in custody.

A spokesman of the APDP talking to media men demanded an international, independent investigation into all fake encounters and human rights violations by Indian troops in the Jammu and Kashmir.

He pointed out that history of Indian army in Jammu and Kashmir stood testimony to the fact that it had never cooperated with the police, judiciary or civil administration in investigations of human rights violations perpetrated by the troops.

The APDP was founded in 1994, when large number of parents used to visit the High court to file or to pursue the Habeas Corpus petitions. The relatives used to take the individual efforts in a disorganised manner.

Finally the Patron, a practicing lawyer and a Human Rights activist with the help of chairperson, herself the victim of Enforced disappearances put them on collective forum for collective efforts. The APDP technically is not a human right group but the association of the sufferers wronged by the functioning of the state, who are campaigning for knowing the whereabouts of their missing relatives. Any person victim of the disappearances could be the member of the association.

The association has no political affiliations or political positions. It is an independent group seeking justice from the state

“In last 20 years army has forced the police to file its version in the FIRs and Macchil fake encounter is one of the recent expose of human rights abuses by the army as well as of how the police are forced to register false FIRs. Despite the media expose army continues to refuse cooperating with the police and civil administration in the investigations,” he deplored.-KMS

Beauty and The Wounds of Kashmir : Paul Barrow

One of Virginia Woolf's well-known quotes, which she wrote in 1929, is that "the beauty of the world has two edges, one of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder." Perhaps nothing could be more descriptive of Kashmir. During a visit to Kashmir many years ago, Prime Minister Nehru described what he saw: Like some supremely beautiful woman, whose beauty is almost impersonal and above human desire, such was Kashmir in all its feminine beauty of river and valley and lake and graceful trees. And then another aspect of this magic beauty would come into view, a masculine one, of hard mountains and precipices, and snow-capped peaks and glaciers, and cruel and fierce torrents rushing to the valleys below. It had a hundred faces and innumerable aspects, ever-changing, sometimes smiling, sometimes sad and full of sorrow … I watched this spectacle and sometimes the sheer loveliness of it was overpowering and I felt faint … It seemed to me dreamlike and unreal, like the hopes and desires that fill us and so seldom find fulfilment. It was like the face of the beloved that one sees in a dream and that fades away on wakening. Georges Bataille, the French novelist, has also said, "beauty is desired in order that it may be befouled, not for its own sake, but for the joy brought by the certainty of profaning it." As of its beauty, of its anguish and it's befouling, in Kashmir, there isn't any shortage of evidence. There's been a little brouhaha in India recently over the release of videotape on YouTube of what appear to be Kashmiri men being paraded nude in front of women and chldren by Indian soldiers. Obviously, authorities have protested, called the tape a fraud, and said that it was released merely to embarrass the army. Copies have been removed from Facebook and YouTube. The tape, however, is still available online, The above photo is used as a profile on Facebook by several Kashmiri freedom fighters. Source unknown. and doesn't lie. Fraud, not likely. Embarrassment, yes. Amnesty International has called for an investigation into the incident. It is inconclusive as to how recent it is or exactly where the video was shot, but it has in all likelihood been videotaped by a cellphone, which dates it as fairly recent, and there is language that is used in the tape that is uniquely Kashmiri. It is also clear that it is an operation conducted by an armed force of some kind, and probably CRPF troops. This is a huge crime, not just an embarrassment. This was in fact a sharp-pointed attack upon religious beliefs and sensitivities that has been compared widely among Kashmiris to Abu Ghraib. Another video that is in wide distribution is of a man who has been beaten, is nude from the waist down, and is being carried on the back of another man while he is taunted and threatened with sodomy as another attempts to poke a stick up his anus. The tyranny of one religious culture over another is obviously different from intellectual disagreements within a culture between liberals and conservatives such as in the abortion issue where there are nitpicky debates about which trimester life begins. The question of a victim hasn't left the debate, even if liberals, for the moment, have the upper hand. People have just agreed to shut up about it. Imagine what a bunch of Qur'an-burning American fundamentalists would do. In this case, nobody's agreed to shut up about anything. The extreme quality that sets their differences apart from the usual mainstream kind of politics is as difficult for Americans to comprehend as it is for Kashmiris to understand why no one else seems to give a damn. However, it is a particularly odious basis for dispute, because it creates opportunities for abuse where differences are not merely cultural but religously based, where not only shrines to one's deepest faith get trashed, but all of the little symbols and habits as well that mark those differences. Religiously based terrorism is only one aspect of this problem. Consider this: on August 2, Greater Kashmir reported that in one hospital in Srinigar, out of 31 patients with gunshot wounds, 14 of them were shot in the head. Just a couple of weeks ago, a friend in Kashmir told me that his cousin, 18, was shot that morning along with four other friends while playing carom in the street. One was 25, the rest were younger than my friend's cousin. All of them shot, two in critical condition. They were not engaged in protest of any kind. They were simply playing in the street. A police jeep drove up, two men got out and simply started shooting. Another man ran up and tried to grab the gun of one of the policemen. He was simply pushed away and arrested. There was no curfew at the time, although that is unusual, because curfews have been almost constant since June 11 in which the people cannot leave their homes during daylight hours. Thousands of mass grave sites of unknown victims are everywhere. "BURIED EVIDENCE: Unknown, Unmarked, and Mass Graves in Indian-administered Kashmir a preliminary report" by Dr. Angana Chatterji, Professor, Social and Cultural Anthropology, California Institute of Integral Studies, with others, documents this and says that "The Indian state’s governance of Indian-administered Kashmir requires the use of discipline and death as techniques of social control. The structure of governance affiliated with militarization in Kashmir necessitates dispersed and intense forms of psychosocial regulation. As an established nation-state, India’s objective has been to discipline and assimilate Kashmir into its territory. To do so has required the domestication of Kashmiri peoples through the selective use of discipline and death as regulatory mechanisms. Discipline is affected through military presence, surveillance, punishment, and fear. Death is disbursed through “extrajudicial” means and those authorized by law. Psychosocial control is exercised through the use of death and deception to discipline the living. Discipline rewards forgetting, isolation, and depoliticization." Stories of torture abound. It's been widely reported that soldiers arrest all the men in a neighborhood, and then go back and rape their wives. A very thorough Catalogue of Indian Atrocities in Kashmir documenting some of the abuses in the early 90s was done, and such acts continue without letup. In his introduction, Dr Ayyub Thakur, President of the World Kashmir Freedom Movement, states that "It is common practice for the paramilitary forces to walk into a quiet village/town and start shooting indiscriminately, killing innocent and unarmed civilians - all under the pretence of crack-down operations against the Freedom-Fighters. In most cases, innocent civilians are killed, women gang-raped and properties set on fire." In one case, called the Khanyar Incident, "a peaceful procession carrying the dead bodies of persons killed in Dachhigam incident and those killed at Saidkadal locality were being brought for burial, reciting verses of Holy Quran, [and] the armed forces deployed in the area started indiscriminate firing on the mourners and killed about twenty unarmed civilians and injured more than fifty two persons." Personal accounts reported to me indicate that attacks upon funeral processions and emergency vehicles are also quite common even today. The attack upon a peaceful protest just this past Wednesday leaving more than 80 people injured and many dead is reported to have been unprovoked. This is a war upon a people by a people. This is oppression by its very name. This is a war of dominion. This is a war against popular will. This is a war against religious sentiment. This is a war not only against democracy and against self-rule; this is a war against common decency and consideration, against the right to even be human. This is a war against every possible difference that could be imagined between people. And it is being committed by India against Kashmir. Even more incomprehensible is that its not even really about them. They are but grist in a global mill that churns pure evil. In "A Visit from the Footbinder," a story by Emily Prager, Lao Bing says, "Beauty is the still birth of suffering." I can certainly see the conception; but I'm not sure that I see the child. Paul Barrow is Director of Policy and Communications for United Progressives.

Kashmir: 'It's a very dangerous situation for India'

Sinagar, 9 October: Ever since the flare-up in Kashmir worsened, veteran diplomat Howard B Schaffer, author of The Limits of Influence: America's Role in Kashmir, has been a much sought after expert in think tank circles in Washington, DC, reports rediff.com

In an interview with rediff.com's Aziz Haniffa, Schaffer says if Delhi continues to be in denial, and Islamabad is tempted to stoke the fires as it always has, the Kashmir situation could unravel fast.

What is your take on the flare-up in Kashmir? Is it the so-called 'intifada' of two decades ago all over again?

It's a very dangerous situation for India because I believe this is a very genuine expression of thorough dissatisfaction with Kashmir's connection to India, launched by young people who can remember only conflict in their lives -- when you consider that the conflict began just about 20 years ago with the outbreak of the insurgency and the people who are involved in it now cannot remember any kind of stable situation.

And, they are convinced from various points of view -- the economic, political and cultural -- that they have no future as part of India, that their economic futures look very dim. Obviously, they don't trust the Indian authority and they seem to have turned their backs on all of the political leadership, both in the pro-India parties, which are taking part in the political process, and on the Hurriyat group because the Hurriyat people, it seems to me, seem to be sidelined and they are in the situation of leaders who are hastening to catch up with their followers.

I hope that India will follow through with the political efforts that have now been undertaken following the visit of that all-party group to the state a week ago. But what's very important is this -- that the record would indicate that India announces efforts to reform and then these peter out when the situation in the valley calms down. I hope that won't happen now.

Twenty years ago, too, when the insurgency first began, it was an indigenous movement; but then it got contaminated?

Yes, then too, 20 years ago, it started as an indigenous movement. The Indian side admitted that it was an indigenous movement but the Pakistanis moved to take it over. And, their efforts to take it over were quite brutal because people to who they looked for support and whom they supported turned on -- at Pakistani direction -- those who favoured independence and not an amalgamation with Pakistan. Now, so far at least, no evidence, credible to me, has been brought to light that the Pakistanis are involved. But the ISI will be strongly tempted to fish in these troubled waters, just as they did 20 years ago.

What is the distinct difference between then and now? As you said, these are young guys who grew up -- as you say -- knowing nothing but conflict, suppression, repression, etc. But you still find the old guard like Syed Ali Shah Geelani making the tough provocative statements as if he calls the shots and is pulling the strings?

I don't believe so for all his talk, because as I said, I believe the Hurriyat leaders have not been at the centre of things. They've been completely sidelined, (but) they've been trying to get back into controlling position. You hear interviews with these young people and they are seemingly acting on their own. Now Geelani is trying; he declares boycott days, shutdown days, but I think the difference to me is that this seems to be a very spontaneous movement by people without solid political background.

Why is it so dangerous? Couldn't the argument be made that this is a bunch of kids who started pelting stones at the Indian troops who probably overreacted?

It's dangerous for the reason that the Pakistanis will again be tempted to intervene and -- coming at a time when India-Pakistan relations continue to be tense in the wake of the Mumbai attack -- that this could create the possibility of another confrontation.

You indicated that the Indian government seems to have made the right moves, with the all-party delegation giving pretty much an objective report to Delhi and there being some genuine efforts to address some of the grievances?

I believe the Indian response has been useful although it is very belated. After all, the troubles began on June 11 and it wasn't until mid-September that the Indians recognised that the situation was serious enough to lead them to take what was an unprecedented step of sending an all-party group to Kashmir. Obviously, they wanted to diffuse the responsibility and the blame among other political parties in India.

Now, some of the steps that have been taken are good ones, but it is much too early to make a judgement as to how far the Indians will be prepared to go to offer concessions that will be meaningful to the Kashmiris. They have once again talked about economic efforts, but these things have happened repeatedly in the past and the Indians will tell you quite rightly that India has invested a lot of money in Kashmir. But the trouble has always been that the money has gone into the wrong pockets.

As far as political changes go, we have to see what they are going to do about the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. It's good that they are releasing a bunch of youngsters from jail, that they are going to try to be less combative in dealing with these stone-throwing incidents, that people who have not committed serious crimes will be let off.

These are all good things, but again, we've got to see where it all leads to. And, the problem remains that -- and polling confirms this and this is incredible -- after 63 years as part of India, Kashmiris remain alienated and want to be outside of India. They no longer are interested in joining Pakistan. I mean, who would be interested in joining Pakistan?

But it is amazing that so much time has passed and so many Indian efforts have been announced but this sense of alienation continues all the way through society among Muslims in the valley.

The Killing of Shiekh Abdul Aziz and First Kashmir-Wide Curfew in 19 Years

Saheed-e-Azemat Sheikh Abdul Aziz and relatives of missing and imprisoned people participate in a protest against Human Rights violations in Srinagar, summer capital of  Kashmir . The people fear that their missing relatives might have been killed and buried in hundreds of recently discovered unmarked graves in Northern Kashmir. Amnesty International too has urged India to launch an urgent inquiry into nearly 1,000 unmarked graves found during the past two years by Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Societies. / Javed Dar

Srinagar, Jully 29: The Killing of Shiekh Abdul Aziz and First Kashmir-Wide Curfew in 19 Years

On August 11, 2008, about 300,000 people from across  Kashmir, along with trucks loaded with fruit, began marching toward several points on the 778-kilometer Line of Control to cross over into the Pakistani side of Kashmir, in their bid to reach Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir. Indian security forces opened fire at the marchers at several places to break up their protests, killing 10, including senior Pro-pakistani Kashmiri leader (commonly known as Baba-e-Jehad-i-Kashmir) Sheikh Abdul Aziz who was also a prominent member of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference and was also a member of the co-ordination committee of ethnic and religious nationalities struggling for right to self-determination under the chairmanship of Justice Ajit Singh Bains formed in Delhi on March 23, 2008.  “Sheikh Aziz was a friend of Sikhs and supporter of Sikh cause for independence,” Over 1,000 people were arrested, and hundreds of wounded were hospitalized at different hospitals across the Kashmir valley. As the protests continued, over 3000 truckloads of fruit were destroyed, allegedly by Indian security forces.

Protests calling for freedom from India continued through August and September in different parts of  Kashmir, with dozens killed and hundreds injured. However, a government-brokered agreement with the Hindu protesters of the Jammu region was reached, under which the land allotment to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB), which had been cancelled due to protests by Kashmiri Muslims, was revived in a different form.

The Jammu and Kashmir government, with the understanding of some Muslim and Hindu leaders, leased the land to the SASB for the limited pilgrimage season, giving them no proprietary or title rights. The Hindu leaders called off their stir after signing the lease agreement. The agreement said: "The Shrine Board  may use the land for erecting temporary prefabricated accommodation and toilet facilities and for shopkeepers to set up shops."  This second reversal by the government in its decision to allocate the land to the Hindu shrine has been rejected by the Kashmiri leaders, fuelling a continuation of anti-India protests. The demonstrations are the biggest since 11th august, 2008 when violent anti-India protests killed about 72 Kashmiri  muslims. (Writer-South Asia)

Human rights excesses in disputed Kashmir highlighted in London

London, July 28: Dr Angana Chatterji, co-convenor of the International Peoples Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Jammu and Kashmir narrated human rights excesses in Occupied Kashmir and called for improving the monitoring of humanitarian situation in the valley.

Dr Angana Chatterji, while addressing a composite gathering at Kashmir Centre London, said that the disturbing concept of zero tolerance for non-violent dissent evolved round fear, surveillance of the ordinary Kashmiri irrespective of age or gender, discipline and punishment. 

This has proved to be a sustained and widespread offensive with mass and extra judicial killings in Kashmir by the military and paramilitary institutions as brought out in evidence in the report ‘Buried Evidence’ by the International People’s Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Indian administered Kashmir, she added.

Dr Chatterji reported that the disproportionate number of special forces in the occupied territory gave the impression that the armed forces were more powerful than the occupation authorities and that the reality in Kashmir was one of militarised controls and that Kashmir was not a dispute but a conflict zone.

She stressed the importance of cultivating alliances with credible institutions and organisations, adding these needed to be formed and developed as there was at present no monitoring was going on in Jammu and Kashmir, therefore, no sustained visibility.

Dr Chatterji emphasised that there needed to be a sustained outcry from the international media and that the international community needed to play a proactive role in establishing alliances with organisations, which were seen to be acceptable.

Representatives from Amnesty International, the Economist, Conciliation Resources, Asian Affairs and community activists also spoke on the occasion.

At the end, the Executive Director of Kashmir Centre London, Professor Nazir Ahmad Shawl presented his book ‘Speaking Silence’ to her.(Writer-South Asia)

KASHMIR-DEAFENING CRIES AND PIERCING SHRIEKS

Srinagar , July 16: Kinza Fatima, a sixteen years old Kashmiri girl wrote to me three weeks back, “Death and blood, cries and shrieks, injured, smashed and emaciated bodies of our dear and near ones; what else we are left with? You writers! Keep on writing but be sure that no one among the Indian Army deputed here in the valley of Kashmir, is going to read what you write. The world around us is deaf and dumb; there will be a time when you would realize that you have been wasting the energy of your words. Your words could never bring back my brother because he is now somewhere in the realms beyond your imaginations, high above the sky.” She further said, “My seventeen years old brother Ahmed Ali was kidnapped by a team of the Indian Army one evening while he was on his way back to home six months ago. We tried our best to locate where they had detained him but we could find nothing. Five days later we found scattered parts of his body floating in a clear water stream.” The most painful sentence of her mail which really watered my eyes; “Dear writer, do you know why the people of valley get frightened when they see a shrieking crowd of wild crows circling around a mountain top: because their circling and  shrieking indicates the presence of some dead body brutally thrown  there by the Indian security forces.”

This mail of innocent Kinza Fatima must be very much agonizing for all those who have a humane heart. I personally feel that it is something very easy to pen down the brutality and portray the hardships the people of Indian occupied Kashmir have been facing for more than seventy years but almost next to impossible is to bear these atrocities even for a single moment. It is simply the courage and determination of the people of Kashmir which has still kept them energetic and alive. If it were the Americans or the British or the Israelis, they would have lost all their hopes very long ago, in the very beginning. Ask the innocent children of Kashmir; ‘who is going to be our saviour?’

The people of Kashmir are of the opinion that it is nothing but the presence of the Indian army in the valley which has deprived them of their basic human rights. But the Indian Army Chief General V.K. Singh has a different point of view in this context. In his recent statement he said, “The basic reason behind the flare up in the Kashmir Valley is the failure to build on the gains that had been made by the security forces in the ‘troubled state’. The army had brought the situation under control to a certain level from where other steps should have been taken to carry forward the process and bring peace in the Valley. There are people who are passing instructions on phone. They have to be identified. The situation in the valley of Kashmir is nothing but the result of the loss of confidence.” This statement of the army chief has many important points which require a very keen type of analysis. First of all he has admitted that there is a situation of ‘flare up’ in the valley. Secondly he has admitted the failure of the security forces and thirdly he has accepted that Kashmir is a troubled state. And above all is his admittance of the fact that the people of Kashmir have lost their confidence in the government of India and the Indian forces. The situation can be very easily improved if all these factors pointed out by the Army Chief are taken care of sympathetically.

Farzana Versey is a Mumbai-based author and columnist. Here is an extract from her recent piece of writing published in the Countercurrents. ‘It does not need to be reiterated that the Kashmir issue is a complex one, but when the armed forces fight civilians, it is not only a matter of separatist aspirations. It is also about a badly-administered state that is not providing basic infrastructure and opportunities to the citizens. The freedom of individuals to express their own anger is being manipulated by various power centers, it is a precious irony’. 

Sumit Ganguly holds the Rabindranath Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations at Indiana University at Bloomington. In one of his recent articles he states, ‘The problem that the government confronts has no military solution. The anger that has spilled out into the warren-like streets of Kashmir's villages is not the work of Pakistan-supported jihadi terrorists or organized indigenous separatists. Instead it is the spontaneous outburst of a generation of young Kashmiris who have witnessed much hardship over the last two decades of the insurgency. This anger has its roots in economic stagnation. The coalition state government has done little to attract investment into the troubled state. Kashmiris, especially young men, have limited employment opportunities’.

Let us put together the statement of General V.K.Singh, the opinion of Farzana Versey and the analysis of Sumit Ganguly to form the real picture of Kashmir. The only reason behind is nothing but injustice and human rights violation. The Indian political and military hi-ups are never ready to pay any heed to the actual root cause. They always try to deny the facts and mitigate the situation by commenting the Kashmir issue as an internal affair of India. Kashmir has never been an internal affair of India; it is the actual bone of contention between the two neighbouring countries India and Pakistan. It is because of the Kashmir conflict that India is always eagerly ready to drag Pakistan into every incident of terrorism which takes place on the Indian soil. The Mumbai attacks of 2008 are the worst example in this regard. The Indian hi-ups are mistakenly of the opinion that Pakistan is supporting the people of Occupied Kashmir through different jihaddi groups. They are also of the opinion that all these groups are trained and financed by the ISI. The Indian Minister for External Affairs S.M.Krishna also expressed the same thoughts during his visit to Pakistan in the second week of July. He said that the peace process could never be successful unless Pakistan puts behind the bars the perpetrators of the Mumbai Blasts. He also criticized the statements made by Hafiz saeed. Same type of comments was made by the Indian Home Secretary G.K. Pillai in Indian Express. He said, ‘The ISI did not have "just a peripheral role" in Mumbai assault. They (ISI) were literally controlling and coordinating it from the beginning till the end’. As far as Hafiz Saeed is concerned, he has always been the most favourite target of the Indian politicians and Indian media. This religious scholar is being continuously blamed for his connections with the Kashmiri militant groups which are fighting against the Indian atrocities in the Indian Occupied Kashmir. These groups have nothing to do with Pakistan same in the manner as those of the Naxalites and the Maoists. All these groups are nothing but the ‘Indigenous Protestants’.

The South Asian Region can become a peaceful paradise if an amicable solution of the Kashmir issue is sought on urgent and compassionate grounds. This is the only way to compensate and pacify the innocent Kinza Fatima who is helplessly mourning over the brutal murder of her brother Ahmed Ali.(Kashmir Watch)
Kashmir Watch columnist can be reached at: alisukhanver@hotmail.com

PPP Chairman, Er. Hilal Ahmad War, Arrested from his Maisuma residence today early in the morning by State Police

Srinagar, Jun 28: A heavy contingent of J&K Police headed by Dy.S.P. East (Kothibagh) raided the Maisuma House of People’s Political Party (PPP), Chairman, today early in the morning and arrested the party Chairman Hilal Ahmed War. War’s arrest is seen as a preventive measure by the State police against a possible ‘Sopore Chalo’ march that the Hurriyat (M and G) had announced. Chairman PPP, while endorsing Hurriyat (M and G‘s) call had urged the people to take to the streets and register a peaceful protest in the form of a rally. “People should come out in large numbers in response to Hurriyat’s call peacefully,” said War.

The PPP Chief has been lodged in Police Station Rajbagh. A party spokesperson condemned his arrest in strong words saying it amounted to State oppression and a denial of right to ex-pression. “This highhandedness of the State shows the times we are living in. If one is not even allowed to demonstrate peacefully, it leaves a big void for violent demonstrations,” said the PPP Spokesman. Mr. War had urged youths to make sure no stone-pelting incident occurred. (Writer-South Asia)