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Time to demilitarise?

Over the weekend, a hundred-odd trucks will start transporting the last of 11,000 Border Security Force troops committed to counter-terrorism duties in five Jammu and Kashmir towns to peace stations in the plains. A wide spectrum of politicians in the State have been arguing that the time has come to go further and demilitarise all of J & K. Bar the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party — both have substantial political stakes in the Jammu and Ladakh regions — all the State's major political forces, both secessionist and unionist, have supported the demilitarisation idea. If the debate on demilitarisation has acquired such intensity, this is in no small part due to the unfolding politics of the India-Pakistan dialogue process. Fearing that the All Parties Hurriyat Conference may fight elections after a peace deal, the People's Democratic Party and the National Conference are seeking to pre-empt the secessionists' likely platform. Advocates of demilitarisation point to a steady decline in violence from 2002, with the focus of jihadi terror groups shifting to major Indian cities outside the State. This is good reason, they say, to free the people of J & K from the day-to-day harassment that large-scale security force deployment brings in its wake.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been the subject of not a little critical commentary in Kashmir for his flat rejection of these calls. His concerns need fair and sober examination. Experience, notably in Punjab and Tripura, shows that terrorism is best fought by well-trained and well-equipped police forces. Even the Rashtriya Rifles uses weapons and tactics that closely resemble those of the police-led paramilitary forces. However, it is far from clear that the police and the CRPF will be able to hold the ground in J & K should the Army be withdrawn. Some 58,000 Indian Army troops were withdrawn from counter-terrorist duties in 1999 — to fight the Kargil war. Terrorists who had been on the defensive for four years rapidly capitalised on the disruption of the security grid. It took more than a year — at a cost of hundreds of lives — to contain the damage. In 2000-01, a limited cessation of offensive counter-terrorism operations led to the degradation of the intelligence network as well as large-scale atrocities against civilians. If the Prime Minister's advisors have opted for caution, it is because of the steady growth of Islamist forces in Pakistan and its failure to dismantle the jihadi infrastructure. Does this mean the death of the demilitarisation idea? It should not. By pulling out the BSF, Dr. Singh has demonstrated that he is willing to step off the beaten track. Phased demilitarisation is an imperative if the peace process is to have meaning for the people of J & K. But since this experiment involves human lives, its timing and execution must be driven by cool and objective professional evaluation, not political passions.

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