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Kashmir : India pulls out 5,000 troops

	February 13, 2006

As part of efforts to give impetus to its peace process with Pakistan, India last week announced that it had pulled back some 5,000 troops from Jammu and Kashmir and said it was willing to withdraw more forces if the security situation in the state improved further.



Subsequently, it was made clear that the 5,000 soldiers were part of forces deployed in Kashmir during the 1999 Kargil conflict, and that they had been pulled back only after they were replaced in areas near the strategic Pir Panjal mountains by units of the Rashtriya Rifles counter-insurgency force.



Military officials said the troop withdrawal followed consultations at the highest levels of the Indian Army and the Defence Ministry as well as a review of the ground situation in Kashmir, where violence by terrorists has come down following the fencing of the Line of Control (LoC).



The troop pullback involved a brigade - or close to 5,000 troops - that had been moved from West Bengal to the area south of the Pir Panjal range during the Kargil conflict.



These troops had now been sent back to their original bases near Darjeeling and Kalimpong in West Bengal.



Confirming the troop cut, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters on the sidelines of an Army conference: “We are not withdrawing (one brigade) as such but redeploying them to the northeast.



“The decision has been taken in view of the fact that the level of violence (in Kashmir) has come down. It is a routine exercise undertaken after a review of the situation in the state. Last year we had reduced troops voluntarily.”



The Army Chief, Gen. J.J. Singh, said further withdrawals could be considered. Singh pointed out that some forces had been moved from the Kashmir Valley to the Ladakh region that borders China.



But Gen. Singh made it clear the Army had no plans to lower its guard in Kashmir. “There will not be any lowering of our guard. We have force levels in Jammu and Kashmir to ensure maximum flexibility in counter-insurgency operations,” he said.



The troop levels could “always be decreased and increased in short time, depending on the situation”. Gen. Singh said the Army had the “upper hand” in Kashmir and this has given it the “opportunity to re-adjust force levels”.



India and Pakistan have moved forward in the past five years to mend ties, opened rail and road links and encouraged people-to-people contact between the two countries. But Islamabad says peace can only return to the region after the “core issue” of Kashmir is resolved.



India has unilaterally cut its troop strength in Kashmir in a phased manner over the past two years. Close to 10,000 troops were withdrawn in 2005.



Pakistani and Indian forces deployed on the frontiers in Kashmir have been observing a truce since late 2003.



In a related development, field commanders have been told that custodial killings will not be tolerated. The Army Chief is reported to have taken serious note of the large number of allegations of such incidents and told the field commanders involved in counter-insurgency operations in Jammu and Kashmir that such incidents will not be tolerated in future.



It is learnt that the two Corps Commanders, Lt. Gen. S.S. Dhillon and Lt. Gen. Sudhir Sharma, have already passed strict directives to the Brigadiers and Sector Commanders to implement the orders of the Chief of the Army Staff in letter and spirit.





Kashmiri youth keen on joining Army



Defying threats from militant groups, more than 10,000 Kashmir youth turned out at an Army recruitment rally in Srinagar last week. Observers say that the turn out was a clear hint to the separatists that their ideology and plans have no relevance for the Kashmiri people and youth.







Besides the Muzaffarabad-based jehad Council, the Hizbul Mujahideen militant outfit had dished out threats to the family members of those youth who participated in the Army recruitment rally. While the Jehad Council of Lashkar-i-Toiba and Al Badr had directed the Kashmiri youth to stay away from the recruitment rally, Hizbul Mujahideen had threatened that the family members of those youth who participated in the rally, would be pushed out of the valley after locking heir houses. Observers say the role the Army played in carrying out relief and rescue measures during the Oct. 8 earthquake has convinced many in Kashmir that the troops are not their “killers.”



Even response to a recruitment drive for the Territorial Army during the last one year has been phenomenal. Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad is confident that return of peace and normalcy to the state will mainly depend on engaging Kashmiri youth in gainful employment.





Curfew in Leh and Kargil after clashes



Reports of alleged desecration of the Quran led to clashes between Buddhists and Muslims in Leh and later in Kargil town of Ladakh, in Jammu and Kashmir, last week. The authorities imposed curfew to control the situation. Leh and neighbouring Kargil had been tense after the Holy Quran was reportedly taken out of a mosque at a place called Bodh Kharbu earlier last week. Reports said that the Ashoura procession in Leh was attacked despite the presence of hundreds of police and paramilitary men. The violence later spread to Kargil town where an agitated mob set ablaze the house of a senior police officer forcing authorities to clamp curfew and call the Army.