The movement in Kashmir against the land transfer order, coupled with violent attacks on the pilgrims and tourists, was bound to provoke strong protests in Jammu province and it did. The people of Jammu had hoped that the State Government would finally see reason and not submit to the separatists’ pressures. But all their hopes dashed to the ground on July 1, when the minority government revoked the land transfer order. All this ended the patience of the Jammu-based political parties, social groups and professional associations, especially the BAJ. The attitude of the Congress as a party and similar other organizations was totally different. Its attitude was on expected lines. It had no independence to act on its own. In fact, it had no other option but to operate within the parameters set by the party high command in New Delhi. The Jammu-based NC and PDP leaders also remained in hibernation during the period of agitation. They ventured out of their shells only after things in Jammu got settled down and people resumed their normal activities entertaining the feeling that they had won the battle of ideology and that they had shown the nation the right path…

BJP

The state unit of the BJP, unlike the Congress, was quite fortunate in the sense that the party high command in New Delhi had allowed it full freedom to act in the manner it liked during the days of the agitation. The reasons were obvious and the most important one was the belief of the party high command that the Amarnath land issue, if handled properly, would not only help it consolidate and expand its constituency in Jammu province, but would also greatly help the party at the national level during the general elections. So much so, it never questioned the rationale behind the independent role the local party leaders played during the agitation despite the June 30 unambiguous decision that the BJP would not undertake any activity on its own and that it would only operate under the umbrella of the SAYSS.

The most significant aspect was that the central BJP leaders, including Rajnath Singh, Venkaiah Naidu and Arun Jaitely, used to discuss matters relating to the agitation with the local party leaders at regular intervals. The purpose was to update their knowledge about things happening in Jammu and elsewhere in the state. Besides, BJP national spokespersons like Ravi Shankar Prasad, Rajiv Pratap Ruddy and Prakash Javadekar would always take the local BJP leaders into confidence before meeting media persons in Delhi…

At the national level, the BJP, apart from participating in the VHP-sponsored programmes, held a few protest demonstrations in several parts of the country. One of its major successes was the three-day nationwide protest from August 11(Daily Excelsior, August 12, 2008). In between, L.K. Advani met the Prime Minister and urged him to settle the Amarnath land row. He met him in New Delhi on August 1 (Kashmir Times, August 1, 2008).

However, of all the activities which were undertaken by the BJP at the national level to make the agitation in Jammu a success, the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha rally, organized at Ram Lila Ground, Delhi, on August 9, was quite significant because this date is very important in the history of Indian freedom struggle. On that day, in 1942, Mahatma Gandhi had launched Quit India Movement and given the call of “do or die”.

Addressing the huge rally, L.K. Advani said: “The anti-Hindu mindset is behind Jammu violence” and asked, “what is the identity of Kashmir? Is it not a part and parcel of India?” “The argument” that the land allotted to the SASB for constructing temporary structures for pilgrims would change the demography of Kashmir “is ridiculous. The fact is that the Congress-led UPA Government has surrendered before the anti-national powers”. He “congratulated the people of Jammu” and described them as “nationalists”. He strongly urged them to “save their honour” and told the massive gathering at the Ram Lila Ground that “to tolerate injustice is cowardice...” (Daily Excelsior, August 10, 2008).

… The resolution, which was adopted by the national office bearers of the party at New Delhi on August 18, 2008, should leave no one in any doubt that the BJP had made up its mind to draw political mileage out of the Amarnath land issue and paint the Congress and the UPA Government black. The resolution – apart from reiterating its demand for the recall of Governor N.N. Vohra – said that “the Congress party has a proven history of mishandling matters pertaining to Kashmir”…and that it and the government it was heading had “surrendered before the separatists” (Kashmir Times, August 19, 2008). The target was clear and the target was the Congress, its principal political rival.      

It needs to be noted that the demands put forth by all the central BJP leaders during the days of agitation used to be the same. The most notable were: Abandon “pseudo-secular” policies, rein in anti-national forces, abrogate article 370, restore the Baltal land to the SASB and preserve its sanctity, recall Governor N.N. Vohra, end discrimination against Jammu, give political power to Jammu province and set up a delimitation commission for delimiting Assembly constituencies in the state de novo.

However, it was the demand for delimitation commission which evoked a very adverse response from the Congress. … The Congress media department chief and former chairman of the administrative reforms committee, M. Veerappa Moily, had even gone to the extent of accusing the BJP of reviving the stand “which was taken by L.K. Advani on dividing Jammu and Kashmir into three states when he was the Deputy Prime Minister…” and that “the BJP is threatening unity of India” by raking up the issue of delimitation. He further said that “the rumour mills of both the BJP in Jammu and the Hurriyat and separatists in the Valley have converged to threaten the unity of the country” (Rising Kashmir, August 23, 2008)

It needs to be emphasized that L.K. Advani had at no point of time during his political career supported the idea of trifurcation. In fact, he was the greatest opponent of this idea. L.K. Advani had, it bears recalling, described the demand of trifurcation as a “prescription worse than the disease” and he had said so in Lucknow immediately after the formation of the Jammu State Morcha in July 2002. It was because of his opposition and the opposition of Arun Jaitley that the RSS, which adopted a resolution at Kurukshetra in the first week of July 2002 suggesting the status of statehood for Jammu, had to disband the Jammu State Morcha, which it itself floated just before the 2002 Assembly elections for spearheading movement aimed at achieving for Jammu region the status of a full-fledged state. … …

Rajnath Singh, along with Arun Jaitley, visited Jammu on July 5. The latter again visited Jammu on August 2, the day he was detained by the police for sometime. Arun Jaitley’s August 2-3 Jammu visit was significant for two reasons. One was that he violated the curfew and the other was that he addressed a very impressive rally at Hari Mandir, Rehari Colony, with hundreds of helpless army and paramilitary force personnel watching everything as mute spectators (Kashmir Times; Daily Excelsior, August 3, 2008)…  …

The BJP headquarters had, it needs to be noted, virtually become the second house of local, national, and even some international media persons, including those representing BBC and Washington Post, because it was the BJP, and not the SAYSS, which had given a definite shape to the aspirations and hopes of the people of Jammu. It was the BJP which, unlike the SAYSS, was giving an ideological orientation to the agitation. The BJP used to meet media persons almost everyday at 12 o’clock at the party headquarters, where it used to issue very lengthy statements containing its views on the prevailing situation, as also its counter arguments.... … The movement started by the BJP on occasions also appeared quite radical. For, instance, it threatened “economic blockade” on three occasions – a threat which was exploited to the hilt by the Kashmiri mainstream and separatist leaders and the Kashmir-based print and electronic media to foment more anti-India troubles in Kashmir. That the movement launched by the BJP had developed over the days a radical strand could also be seen from the Ashok Khajuria’s two-day ultimatum to the “followers of Syed Ali Shah Geelani” to quit Jammu or face serious consequences. He gave this ultimatum twice, first on July 24 and then on July 28. The immediate provocation was the Omar Abdullah’s July 22 parliament statement and the propaganda in Kashmir that the State Government was disturbing the Kashmir’s ecology, degenerating and polluting its environment by allowing certain vested interests and organizations to use the forest land and trying to change the demographic profile of the Valley.

Giving this ultimatum on July 24, Ashok Khajuria – apart from dismissing Omar Abdullah as “Jinnah” a day earlier (Hindustan Times, July 23, 2008) -- had asked what he called the “Kashmiri touts” of the NC, the PDP and the APHC and the followers of Syed Ali Shah Geelani to “leave Jammu with immediate effect”. His charge specific was that “these touts have occupied forest land at different places in Jammu and constructed houses on it” (Kashmir Times; Daily Excelsior; Indian Express; Hindustan Times, July 25, 2008). It was, however, on July 28 that he came out with a lengthy statement containing details on the forest land occupied by the various Kashmiri leaders in the Jammu’s Sunjwan, Bathindi and Sidhra areas. He revealed that a number of Kashmiri leaders had “encroached 1600 kanals of forest land in Sunjwan and Bathindi.

Justifying his ultimatum, he further revealed that the “committee constituted by the Government of Jammu and Kashmir on August 11, 1988 (in this regard) was to submit its report within one month, but that report never came because of the pressure of those involved in land grabbing”. He went on to say that the “government had also acknowledged in the Assembly in March 1997 that encroachments in compartments 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 of the Bahu Range have taken place” (Daily Excelsior, July 29, 2008). The upshot of his whole argument was that those opposing the Jammu movement on the ground that the Baltal land was a forest land had no right to live on the Jammu’s forest land. … …

During these 45 days, the state BJP not only took the opponents of Jammu agitation head on, but also repeatedly denounced Governor N.N. Vohra and demanded his dismissal. The BJP was of the view that the Congress had appointed N.N. Vohra as Governor in order to facilitate the task of “Islamic fundamentalists” and “divide Jammu and Kashmir on religious lines”. … The BJP had taken this line on the ground that the Governor’s administration was responsible for engineering opposition in Kashmir to the land transfer, as also on the ground that his administration did not take any action against the Srinagar-based papers, which were publishing anti-pilgrimage articles. … The BJP’s specific charge was that the Governor’s administration had given unbridled freedom to the rabidly anti-India and extremist organizations like Jamait-e-Islami and Dukhtaran-e-Milat to mobilize public and preach communalism and separatism (Ibid., August 13, 2008). Yet another charge of the BJP against Governor N.N. Vohra was that his administration only “stirred up to action when there were motivated and false complaints of economic blockade of Kashmir” (Jammu Jotting, August 13, 2008). …  …

Surprisingly, the BJP remained virtually dormant and devoid of any activity between August 16 and 23, 2008. The reason was that the then Khsetriya Pracharak of RSS, Dineshji, had applied brakes. His counsel that baffled many was: “It would be better not to react”. He made this suggestion when one of the party’s media managers drew his attention to the August 23 report in Greater Kashmir that “two trucks full of swords have reached Lakhanpur and they (BJP and Sena activists) are waiting to strike” or they would use these swords to massacre the Gujjar Muslims and that there was the need for a proper rebuttal of the allegations. By August 15, the attitude of BJP general secretary (organization), Ajay Jamwal, had also undergone a change… signals that their masters in Delhi were softening their stand on the situation. Why? It is a riddle.

The BJP mustered some courage only after August 23. The immediate provocation was the Congress national spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi’s scathing attacking on the BJP and his statement which did not overrule the possibility of Kashmir becoming independent of India. But the BJP took 6 long days to express its pent up feelings. In other words, it was on August 28 that the BJP leaders met media persons and launched a bitter attack on the Congress national spokespersons Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Jayanthi Natrajan and Munish Tiwari, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Governor N.N. Vohra. … …

Congress

The position of the Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee (JKPCC) was very precarious. It was divided into four groups. One group consisted of Muslim leaders, especially those belonging to Kashmir. The other group was that of Buddhist leaders, all from Ladakh. The third was of Hindu leaders, all belonging to Jammu province. And, the fourth group was a one-man group for all practical purposes. It was the group of the JKPCC president, Saif-ud-Din Soz. The leaders belonging to the first two groups remained mum during the period of agitation in Jammu. They neither supported it nor opposed it. Their attitude was one of indifference.

The one-man Saif-ud-Soz group remained active throughout and he played double role. On the one hand, he acted as the mouthpiece of the Union Government to which he belonged and, on the other, he acted in a fashion which was calculated to make the opponents of Jammu agitation in Kashmir believe that he was with them. All of his interventions, including his suggestion that the period of pilgrimage should be curtailed to one month and his demand for the appointment of a “high level enquiry into the loss of life (in Kashmir) on August 11 due to firing by the forces”, established beyond any shadow of doubt that his heart bled only when any untoward incident took place in the Valley (Daily Excelsior, July 18 & August 14; The Tribune, August 14, 2008). He did not utter a single word during the days of agitation in Jammu which could even slightly indicate his concern over the reign of terror unleashed by the police in Jammu. 

It was the third group which played one role or the other during the movement. Till towards the end of July, the attitude of the Jammu-based Congress leaders, including former ministers, without any exception, towards the movement in Jammu remained quite hostile. In fact, all of them gave their unstinted and unqualified support to the July 1 Cabinet decision, which had led to the mass upsurge in Jammu. They would say that the “decision was rational and most suitable to the needs of the yatries”; that the pilgrimage to Shri Amarnath could not be sustained by the SASB as it could not bear the expanses of huge staff on yearly basis; and that “it is not possible for the SASB to provide adequate facilities to the yatries and as such the government had to intervene in the interest of visiting devotees” (Daily Excelsior, July 13; Kashmir Times, July 19, 2008).

The only intervention which indicated for the first time some opposition to the Kashmiri leaders was the one made by former minister Gulchain Singh Charak on July 29. He held a press conference at his residence on that day and denounced Omar Abdullah for what he called his July 22 parliament “provocative” statement that “they (Omar Abdullah and Hurriyat leaders) won’t allow (anyone) to take away even an inch of land…” He said that “Kashmir is nobody’s jagir, the land belongs to the people of Jammu and Kashmir, the land belongs to India and Dogras acquired this land after making supreme sacrifices” (Kashmir Times; Dainik Jagran, July 30, 2008)…

The truth, in short, is that all the Jammu-based Congress leaders opposed tooth and nail the Jammu movement. They opposed it on four specific grounds. Firstly, the movement had been engineered by the RSS, the BJP and the VHP for political gains. Secondly, the movement was patently communal. Thirdly, the agitation would lead to the division of the state on communal lines. And, lastly, the “prolonged atmosphere of bandhs, hartals and violence is causing lot of hardships to the people” and “it has caused great economic loss to different sections of society, besides loss to the daily earners, labour class, shopkeepers, traders, students, transporters etc” (Ibid., July 31 and August 3, 2008).

The attitude of Ghulam Nabi Azad, too, was identical. …

Things started changing dramatically after August 2, with former Congress MLA from Akhnoor, Sham Lal Sharma, extending his support to the SAYSS. He went all the way to Geeta Bhawan to extend his support to the SAYSS. … Sham Lal Sharma’s unexpected plunge motivated leader after leader to come forward and support the movement, and even take on the Congress central leaders, especially the party’s spokespersons. Significantly, this change of heart rattled many. The Kashmir Times, which, on August 3, carried a very lengthy story on it. It was titled “Cong leaders join the gang too”. …

… two members of Parliament, Madan Lal sharma and Lal Singh, met the Prime Minister in New Delhi on August 4 and asked him to intervene in the matter so that the Congress remained in the reckoning in the state. … Their suggestion was that the management committee of the Shrine Board should be reconstituted by nominating “local prominent figures representing Jammu province and members of minority community representing the Valley” (Kashmiri Hindus) and Karan Singh, Member of Parliament and former Union Minister, appointed as the board’s chairman. They also suggested that Governor N.N. Vohra should be recalled...

A day later, Karan Singh also came out with a five-point formula. (Indian Express, August 6, 2008). He had not spoken a word on the issue till then. His solution was: recall Governor N.N. Vohra and appoint in his place General J.J. Singh, who belonged to Marwah area in Doda district; reconstitute the SASB; appoint former Supreme Court Chief Justice A.S. Anand as chairman of the Shrine Board; provide adequate facilities to pilgrims; and management of facilities by the Shrine Board during the period of pilgrimage. He, in addition, suggested compensation to the family members of those got killed in police action. …

But one of the most significant observations of Karan Singh was the one he made on August 19 during his meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. According to his spokesperson, Karan Singh told the Prime Minister that “the situation in Jammu is worsening and the conflict is between the nationalist and anti-national forces” and that “he asked the Prime Minister that it is moral duty of the nation to protect the nationalist people” (Early Times, August 20, 2008). …

Likewise, there was rift in the JKPCC over certain remarks of Syed Ali Shah Geelani. Geelani had, it may be recalled, addressed a rally at Srinagar on August 20 where he said that he would not accept anything short of accession to Pakistan and that the people of Kashmir were Pakistanis because they believed in the teachings and tenets of Islam. …

Panun Kashmir

… Some of the prominent organizations of the Kashmiri Hindus, which enriched the mass movement in Jammu intellectually and ideologically, included the Panun Kashmir of Ajay Chrungoo, the Panun Kashmir of Agnishekhar, the Panun Kashmir Movement, the All State Kashmiri Pandit Conference and the Jammu and Kashmir Vichar Manch. Ajay Chrungoo and his colleagues M. K. Teng, M.L. Koul and O.N. Trisal on occasions more than one described the controversy over the transfer of Baltal land to the SASB as a “broader design of the Islamic fundamentalist forces”. “The controversy of land allotment under the garb of ecological destruction or demographic assault is basically a continuation of the process that was initiated with the forced exodus of Kashmiri Hindus from the Valley” and the “recent controversy gives an insight into the fundamentalist and Talibanized psyche of the civil Muslim society in the Valley”, they repeatedly said…

The main refrains of leaders like Ajay Chrungoo were that Omar Abdullah’s speech was targetted purely at communal fundamentalist regimes in the Valley; that through his speech, he was probably “trying to convey to the people in the Valley that he can be as communal and as fundamentalist as Mehbooba Mufti and Syed Ali Shah Geelani”; that for six decades, the NC tried to “put on camouflage of secularism while pursuing strindently communal politics in Jammu and Kashmir”; and that his speech in the Parliament “blatently conveyed that even the third generation Abdullahs lives up to the organization’s communal legacy”. They also questioned Omar Abdullah’s concept of nationalism and would ask: “Which Kashmiri identity and Kashmiri nationalism Omar Abdullah is talking about? They also posed two more straight questions. One, “is denying the temporary allotment of land for building temporary infrastructure an expression of the nationalism? Two, “or is it linked with building Islamic fundamentalist society in Kashmir? (Kashmir Sentinel, October 2008). …

Yet another significant aspect of their whole intellectual campaign was the attempt on the part of the Kashmiri Hindu organizations to establish that the mainstream Kashmiri Muslim leaders were more dangerous than the separatists as they masqueraded outside the state as secularists and democrats and as they had connections at right places in New Delhi and they did succeed. Their argument was that the mainstream leaders were wrecking the Indian state both from within and outside. It was in this context that Ajay Chrungoo said on July 26 that NC president Omar Abdullah was more dangerous than Syed Ali Shah Geelani. What had made him go public and say all this was the July 22 Omar Abdullah’s Parliament speech. He repeatedly asserted that Omar Abdullah was a communalist of communalists and that what he did in the Parliament was a classical example, which indicated the kind of leverage the likes of Omar Abdullah had in the Indian establishment (Dainik Jagran, July 27, 2008). It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that he hit the nail on the head. … …

Bar Association Jammu

One of the most prominent organizations of the professionals, which played a significant role in the movement, was the BAJ. Its role was significant all the more because Bhupinder Singh Slathia, Additional Advocate General and a well-known Congressman, headed this organization. …

… Their focus was mainly on two issues – the Baltal land and the plight of Jammu. Everywhere they stated that the BAJ was fighting for land restoration and for an instrument that could end the menace of age-old discrimination with the people of Jammu. Everywhere they demanded the recall of Governor N.N. Vohra, saying he had violated the Shrine Board Act to meet the demand of anti-national and fundamentalist forces (Ibid., July 11, 2008). On occasions, the BAJ came into direct confrontation with the civil administration. Its grouse was that it had deployed army in almost all the civilian areas in order to “preventing people from holding demonstrations” and this action of the administration was as undesirable as it was deplorable (Daily Excelsior, August 4, 2008).…

Excerpted from Chapter 4 of Conflicting Perceptions, by Prof. Hari Om, Yak Publishing Channel, Jammu, 2009 [Pages 417; Price: 975/-]

P.O. BOX 130, Wadha Vehra, Pacca Danga, Jammu – 180001

Ph: 0191 – 2549919, 0191 – 2566163