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This excerpt is drawn from the article "AFSPA: Licence to kill" by A.G. Noorani Noorani in Frontline, Volume 32, Number 7 (April 17, 2015) pg. 103. The entire article can be accessed here.
Excerpt 1
The Act (AFSPA) has since come up for renewal before Parliament more than once. On March 19, 1965, in the Lok Sabha, M.R. Masani made a telling point of abiding relevance. "Guerilla forces only function in a favourable political climate. So long as the people in the villages give food and supplies and harbour the guerillas, it is extremely difficult to fight them. That has been the experience with the Viet Cong, that is the experience in South Viet Nam today. It is very important therefore that the common people in the villages, who are neither on this side or that side, should be won over....
"What do we know about Nagaland and what do they know about us? I asked one of the Ministers of the underground government there to come to Delhi and meet people here. He said: Will they give me safe conduct? Will I not be arrested? I said: My friend, whether you like it or not, you are a citizen of this Union; there is the Supreme Court and there is habeas corpus. If anything happens to you while you are in Delhi, I will go to Supreme Court and get you released. He was surprised at this. He thought he was going into an enemy country. These are the barriers that have been created by history. They have not been part of the Indian nation as we have all been part of it; they feel (emphasis added) different. We have got to draw them nearer. You cannot impose nationhood by force. You have got to win their hearts and minds and that is what is being done today by all those who stand for us in Nagaland."
Excerpt 2
"None of these lessons were learnt when on July 5, 1990 Governor G.C. Saxena declared all the six districts of the Kashmir Valley as "Disturbed Area". On July 6, he promulgated the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Ordinance, 1990. It was introduced in the Lok Sabha as a Bill on August 8, 1990, with a Statement of Objects and Reasons signed by Union Home Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed. ... The debates in the parliament were lively. On August 20, 1990, Saifudding Choudhury of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) complained that the people of the country were not being told the truth about the situation in Kashmir. "We do not accept this kind of thing. In this situation, while we cannot oppose these legislations that you have brought, any power you want we have to give you. But then, see that these powers are not misutilised, and the people are further pushed away. The kind of excesses that were committed some days ago, are they to be welcomed? Is that killing the civilised way of behaviour?
"I have all respect and salutations for our armed forces. When we meet many of the high officials of our armed forces, they told us, 'If we do not have the backing of the people, then how can we succeed?' They demanded political actions for the mobilisation of the people. This is the point. On this point, I say that this kind of political interaction with the people is very much required. Then economic welfare measures are to be taken."
Excerpt 3
"P. Chidambaram's was the most comprehensive and deadliest speech. It deserves to be quoted in extenso: "Can the Home Minister [Mufti Mohammed Sayeed] honestly deny that he was an active participant in the making of the Kashmir policy of the previous government? Well, he may not be an active participant in the making of the policy of the present government, but, he certainly was an active participant in the making of the policy of the previous government....
"Who are you protecting in Kashmir? I heard Mr. Saifuddin Choudhury say, 'Kashmir will never go from India.' Yes, this government, by the madness that has possessed it, will not allow the land in Kashmir go away from India. But what about the people in Kashmir? What about their minds? What about their hearts? Every one of them stands alienated today. You will send your Army. You will send your paramilitary forces and you will protect the land. But what will you do about the people? Who is with you in Kashmir today? One hundred and thiry-seven officers sent a petition to the United Nations. I don't defend. I condemn that action. So does Mr. Jaswant Singh. But what should we do in this House? Go a step further and ask: 'Why did 137 officers send that petition to the United Nations?' What made them do it? Why did the president of the Srinagar Bar Association go underground? I do not know about it. I do not know his background. But why would the president of the Srinagar Bar Association have to go underground and why would he have to be arrested as one in league with secessionist elements? Who are these people who have turned overnight into secessionists? Who are these people who, according to this government, have turned overnight into terrorists? Who are these people who have turned overnight into those who will give comforts to the terrorists?...
"Sir, PUCL [People's Union for Civil Liberties] sent a group in Kashmir and they gave a report. When it comes to Delhi riots or when it comes to Punjab, every voice from that side, the Treasury Benches, thumps the table and speaks in favour of whatever PUCL has discovered as a violation of human rights. But when PUCL has submitted a report on Kashmir, it was condemned as a busybody and is (sic) poking its nose, meddling with the affairs of Kashmir and creating greater trouble. Mr. Tarkunde is a very respected jurist. He was one of the patron saints of the Janata Dal and he still remains to be one of the patron saints of the National Front. What is Mr. Tarkunde going to say about what is going on in Kashmir? Sir, a group of enlightened, committed citizens constituted themselves into a Committee for Initiatives in Kashmir. Earlier, they sent out a team of four men in March 1990. That group submitted a report and we raised that issue in this House. The government and the Home Minister would not give us any reply on the contents of that report. In June 1990, the same committee sent a team of four women to investigage into the impact of militarisation of the Kashmir Valley and the lives. Has the Home Minister read this report? If only 10 per cent of this report is right, the Home Minister should resign, not out of a sense of responsibility but out of a sense of deep sorrow and sharing of this sorrow with the people of the Valley. It is not possible to read this report. If I read a few paragraphs, it will us shock us into a shame out of which we will never emerge. I do not want to read the things that have been done to women and children. But if you will permit me, let me lay it on the table of the House. Have you seen the barbarism that is going on in Kashmir, Mr. Home Minister, even if 10 per cent is right? If it is not right, what is your long arm of the law doing to those people who have spread this information? Why don't you prosecute them? This has been with me for several days. I have tried to see if I can read some paragraphs. It is not possible to read. It is written in such a detail that it is not possible to read the indignity that has been heaped upon the women in Kashmir...
"Sir, there have been instances in the past where individual jawans in paramilitary forces have acted beyond the limits of law and decency.
"The question of human rights in Kashmir cannot be brushed aside. You cannot hold the land and lose the people. Your Army, your BSF or your CPRF can hold the land for us but it cannot hold the people. And, as long as the overwhelming impression of anyone who visits Kashmir, I have not in the recent past, who speaks about it or writes about it is that there is large-scale violation of human rights in Kashmir...
"The Home Minister has reported to have said in June 1990 that the time to resume the political process has arrived. If the time to resume the political process has arrived, then what are you doing today? The promulgation of the Armed Forces Ordinance, the replacement of the ordinance by a Bill seems to go directly to conflict with your purported statement that the time to resume the political process has arrived. ...
"All this is not irretrievably lost. But let me conclude by saying this: If you go down the same road that you have taken this country, particularly in the matter of Kashmir, for the last eight months, I am afraid it will be irretrievably lost; and nothing that you do, nothing that you say, nothing that your friends will say, none of this table-thumping, none of this posturing is ever going to retrieve. Today, it is perhaps not irretrievably lost. But if you go down the same road, it will be irretrievably be lost."
Chidambaram was referring to the "Report on Kashmir Situation" by V.M. Tarkunde, Rajinder Sachar, Amrik Singh, Balraj Puri, Inder Mohan, Ranjan Dwivedi, N.D. Pancholi and T.S. Ahuja. They conducted a probe under the auspices of the PUCL, Citizens for Democracy, Radical Humanist Association and Manav Ekta Abhiyan. It was published on April 22, 1990."
A clearer and succint expression of this angst finds expression in the words of Akhu Ronid Chingangbam of Imphal Talkies (extracted from "Ballads for the Homeland" by Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty in BLink in the Saturday edition of BusinessLine dated 26 September, 2015).
"... Don't you have brothers?
Don't you have commanders?
Don't you have captors?
...the air smells of gunpowder
From my window I can only see widows
My mama doesn't want me to sing sad songs
A.F.S.P.A.
Why don't you f*** yourself..."
Imphal-based Chingangbam says he can't help but draw from reality when writing a song. As a child, he saw "protests on the street every time a person went missing, supposedly picked up by the Indian Army." As a young man living in Manipur now, he says nothing has changed. "Just the other day, I had to zip home because a curfew has been clamped. What else can I think of then?" he asks.
Hope however has not vanished, not as yet. Chingangbam is working on "A native tongue called peace," a set of songs for harmony. The project, funded by an Assam-based NGO, will have Chingangbam creating music with residents of a children's home in Imphal. The children belong to the warring ethnic groups of Manipur. In the coming months, the children will also collaborate with big bands like Soulmate and Indian Ocean.
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