Author: Sandhya Jain
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: October 17, 2006
Dr. Farooq Abdullah's staggering assertion
that the sessions judge who awarded the death penalty to Afzal Guru for his
role in 2001 attack on Parliament could be murdered by Kashmiri terrorists
carries the implicit threat that the High Court and Supreme Court judges who
upheld the verdict could meet a similar fate. This follows fear scenarios
raised by Dr. Abdullah and State politicians like chief minister Ghulam Nabi
Azad and Hurriyat leader Yasin Malik that the Valley will burn if Afzal is
executed, particularly in the month of Ramzan. These arguments have not merely
communalized the crime and punishment of Afzal Guru; they have made him the
symbol of the obduracy and cussed non-nationalism of Kashmiri Muslims.
It is high time the rest of India looked at
the mote in the eyes of its Kashmiri Muslim citizens. Decades of evasion and
double-talk have inured us to the duplicity of politicians across the political
spectrum, but now, with clemency for Afzal also linked to a possible disruption
in the so-called peace process with Pakistan, it is time to ask some hard
questions. What is the citizenship of Kashmiri Muslims and what is the purpose
of the peace process America has imposed upon New Delhi if not to cede territory
to Pakistan at some future date? Is this why the UPA wanted to withdraw from
Siachin?
Are Pak-friendly separatists like Yasin Malik
complicit in the gameplan to take all of Kashmir to Pakistan, or will a future
Pakistani 'occupation' surprise them? Do they really believe an 'independent'
Kashmir, one that is not the stooge of the Christian West, is viable and possible?
Their dangerous game strengthens my belief that jihadi Islam is only a mercenary
tool of Western neo-colonialism. It is no threat to India; our high calibre
police and military forces can tackle it any day, provided they are not betrayed
by the pusillanimity of politicians who can be browbeaten or blackmailed by
external agencies.
As Kashmiri Muslim politicians have made Afzal
a case of Kashmir vs. the rest of India, the nation has to choose between
surrendering or rising to the challenge by abolishing the obnoxious Article
370 without further ado. This is both desirable and possible, as Arvind Lavakare
has argued in his thoroughly researched The Truth About Article 370 (Rambhau
Mhalgi Prabodhini, 2005). MLAs refusing to vote out the Article may be given
the opt-out clause offered to Muslims in 1947. As Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru perpetuated
Mr. Jinnah's occupation of a portion of Kashmir at the instance of former
colonial Lord Louis Mountbatten, there is no justice in eternally privileging
of Kashmiri Muslims, especially after their shameful treatment of the State's
Hindu community.
The demand for abolition of Article 370 should
logically have come from the BJP, but the continued eminence of its venerable
Twin Towers whose acts of omission and commission hang around its neck like
an albatross, has wet its ammunition. One of the terrorists involved in the
infamous Kandahar hijack was previously released in lieu of the daughter of
the then Union Home Minister. Though supporting Mr. V.P. Singh's government
from outside, the BJP did not demand Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's resignation or
at least change of portfolio, even after it became known that Rubaiya Sayeed
was friendly with her so-called kidnappers.
Kandahar, of course, is an eternal shame for
the Vajpayee government, even if Mr. Advani distances himself from the scandal.
Yet it was Mr. Advani who assured Portugal that India would not award the
death penalty to Abu Salem, in return for his deportation. He did this without
taking the nation into confidence, and without caring for the manner in which
he compromised the dignity of the Indian judiciary.
Of course, the primary responsibility for
raising the Afzal issue vests with the Congress party. It is inconceivable
that chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad could have demanded clemency without
permission from Ms. Sonia Gandhi, who has maintained another irritating and
duplicitous silence, though the issue is tearing the nation apart. The perception
of public revulsion forced Congress to nudge senior leader Digvijay Singh
to oppose the mercy petition, but the party spokesperson and some of its media
friends are trying to make a case regarding the morality of the death penalty.
Interestingly, given Mr. Azad's concerns, should we assume there will be no
action against those who attacked the J&K Assembly, as the culprits are
certain to be Muslims and denizens of the hallowed Valley?
The Congress is playing with fire. Many bleeding
hearts in the post-Godhra Gujarat riots have since been unnerved by Mumbai's
second serial blasts of 2006, which killed 285 and injured a thousand. By
coincidence, the trial is ending in the 1993 serial blasts which killed 300
persons, and citizens will want stiff punishments meted out to the guilty.
Some liberals now see merit in a strong State.
Communal polarization is an Indian reality,
aggravated by the politics of minority appeasement and vote banks. Lobbying
for clemency for an act of high treason against the State on the ground that
the accused is a Muslim from the indisciplined Kashmir valley is a new low,
and derives from Ms. Sonia Gandhi's political ascent and her desire to accentuate
Muslim separatism in all walks of life. Even the agony of the families of
the martyred policemen has failed to impress her of the need to stand for
justice and rule of law. Instead, politicians across the spectrum are being
encouraged to demand subversion of the judicial process.
On the issue of terrorist attacks, former
Chief Justice of India Mr. R.C. Lahoti opined: "Which penalty is required
other than death for this dastardly act? ….. We forget the family of
those killed, injured and totally uprooted…" He emphasized that
the first duty of Government is to enforce the law. "There is no other
way to maintain an ordered and moral society. Nothing can destroy a Government
more quickly than its failure to observe its own laws or worse, its own disregard
of the charter of its existence." To this I would only add that the Prophet
himself breached the sanctity of the holy Ramzan for tactical advantage; we
would do well to emulate his example. Afzal should hang on the scheduled date.
