Why civilians confront the army in Kashmir

The government’s silence in the face of simmering anger in Kashmir is throwing into dangerous confrontation two crucial canada goose outlet price protagonists the army versus unarmed Kashmiri civilian mobs.

uk canada goose The army, on the one hand, must intensify counter infiltration operations to keep militants at bay until snow closes routes across the Line of Control. uk canada goose

And with nothing to show for months of violent street protests after the killing in July of popular local militant Burhan Wani, Kashmiri separatists have little choice but to up the ante, if necessary by confronting the army directly.

Canada Goose Parka On Wednesday, February 15, a day after four army men were killed and several others injured in three encounters in North Kashmir, army chief General Bipin Rawat bluntly warned that stone pelting Kashmiri mobs who interfered in army operations would be fired upon. Canada Goose Parka

Calling such mobs ‘over ground workers of the terrorists’, General Rawat also warned that civilians waving Pakistani or Islamic State flags would be canada goose outlet ontario treated as ‘anti nationals.’

These strong words had been carefully calibrated.

The army, highly experienced in counter insurgency operations, faces a worrying new challenge from canada goose outlet toronto flash mobs of Kashmiri civilians, who hurl stones at soldiers moving to cordon a suspected militant hideout, or closing in for the final engagement.

canada goose factory sale This facilitates the militants’ getaway. Alternatively, like on Tuesday, it distracts soldiers at a critical moment, causing additional casualties. canada goose factory sale

Since insurgency broke out in the Kashmir valley in 1990, even through sustained spells of violent civilian protests, mobs had prudently avoided direct confrontation canada goose outlet in usa with the army and its counter militancy wing, the Rashtriya Rifles.

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Most seminal confrontations with civilians have involved the central armed police forces, CAPFs, or the J police, JKP.

buy canada goose jacket From the bloodbath in Srinagar in May 1990, when some 50 Kashmiri mourners at Mirwaiz Mohammed Farooq’s funeral procession canada goose outlet toronto factory were shot dead by a panic stricken Central Reserve Police Force detachment that feared it was being overwhelmed to the three summers of violent street protests across Kashmir in 2008, 2009 and 2010, it was always CAPFs or JKP that came into direct confrontation with civilian mobs. buy canada goose jacket

canada goose clearance sale Even through periods of extended bitterness, the army and civilians extended unusual courtesies to each other. canada goose clearance sale

Army posts were seldom directly targeted and army convoys moved with relative freedom.

There were two reasons for this. First, violent civilian mobs were largely an urban phenomenon; and the police, not the army, controlled the valley’s big cities.

Second, Kashmiri separatist leaders realised there would be bloody costs to directly confronting the army, since that would be responded to, not as civilian protest, but as a threat to the territorial integrity of the Line of Control, which the canada goose jacket outlet uk army guarded.

Few Kashmiris would admit this, but there is a grudging public respect of the army’s operational restraint and ‘winning hearts and minds’ campaigns that have materially uplifted living conditions in remote border areas ignored by the state government.

IMAGE: The confrontations with the army began in 2014 2015 with unarmed locals pelting stones at soldiers in cordons. Photograph: Umar Ganie

This balance, canada goose outlet 80 off however, began changing in 2014 2015, when the first civilian flash mobs appeared in rural South Kashmir and challenged ongoing army cordon and search operations.

Inexorably, incidents grew of unarmed locals pelting stones at armed soldiers in cordons and of interference in actual firefights.

canadian goose jacket This mindset change across rural Kashmiris is blamed on two reasons. canadian goose jacket

Firstly, after the mass agitations of 2008 2010, Kashmiris expected an outreach from New Delhi, including a political dialogue.

canada goose black friday sale Not www.canadagooseisverige.com only did the United Progressive Alliance betray that expectation, but, since 2014, the National Democratic Alliance government inflamed Kashmiri opinion with ‘anti Muslim’ confrontations like the beef ban, the Dadri lynching and the ‘love jihad’ controversy. canada goose black friday sale

As bitterly resented were a series of local controversies, internal to Kashmiri politics, that separatists presented as an assault on the Kashmiri identity such as allegations that New Delhi was transforming the valley’s demographic profile by sponsoring ‘Pandit Colonies’ and ‘Sainik Colonies’.

Sinha to Modi: ‘You need to take bold steps in Kashmir!’

Further, Kashmiri youth were bitter canada goose outlet store uk at the abject failure of armed militancy, with new militants often surviving less than a month in the field before being gunned down by the security forces.

canada goose clearance The frenzy after the gunning down of Burhan Wani last July, more a social media star than a dreaded militant, reflected public bitterness at an underdog swallowed by the maws of a pitiless security establishment. canada goose clearance

Many of those pelting stones at an army cordon are driven by the frantic need to rescue a young man whom they know intimately.

The army, however, does a dangerous job, in which it already imposes numerous restraints on itself to canada goose outlet factory make COIN operations less hazardous to the public such as abjuring the use of mortars, artillery, helicopters canada goose outlet or air power.