Pulwama, 1st anniversary, origins and challenges

In history, after India and Pakistan became nuclear powers there were 2 instances where both countries came to brink of full-scale war. First instance was when Indian parliament, attacked by Pakistan Jihadis. In this instance, the main target was massacre of Indian legislators. Thankfully with few fatal casualties, legislators were untouched. Still, furious India went with operation parakaram, mobilizing tens of thousands of soldiers towards Pakistan border, placing mines and other war equipment near border, simulating battle field scenarios. Six months later tensions deescalated & relations between two nations cooled.

 2^nd Instance was on Feb 14 2019.More than 40 Indian CRPF soldiers were killed in VBIED suicide attack near NH1 highway, worst terrorist attack in Kashmir militancy history. Suicide attack was so gory that some of soldier coffins contain few body parts than full body itself. In next few hours/days, pictures depicting gory of the attack went viral in twitter/facebook enraging Indian citizens. Opposition parties too questioned the attack whether its because of major intelligence failure. After nearly 15 days, Indian fighter planes went inside Pakistan and bombed one of jihadi training base in Pakistan. Pakistan retaliated back, bombing near LoC. In subsequent dog fight, India lost a fighter plane and pilot was captured. Thankfully due to intense diplomatic effects of Saudi Arabia and other world powers impending nuclear war was averted.

Since today marks 1^st anniversary of this Pulwama attack, this article explores origins of this attack and various conspiracy theories around the attack.

Arrival of Online radicalization in Kashmir

               

Kashmir militancy origin can be traced back to 1989. After several years of dreadful fighting, militancy graph in Kashmir reached record low in 2014.  Number of militants came down to 50 odd in 2014, when compared to several thousands fighting in 90’s. This phenomena can be attributed to several factors like strong anti infiltration grid built near LoC, slowly moved India-Pakistan peace process between 2004-2013, Pakistan’s precarious economic condition & its terrorism fight inside its own country.

When new government came in 2014, there were hopes the India-Pakistan peace process will proceed further ahead. But India Pakistan relations started to go backwards. This has its own effect in Kashmir valley. When beef lynching’s happened inside Indian main land, there were big protests, shutdowns in valley. Anger inside once less militancy prone area like south Kashmir(Pulwama,Kulgam,Shopian) started to rise from 2015. Militancy once waned in 2014, now resurged and evolved via new way called online radicalization. Militants who once masked their face and running, started to show their faces via videos with more fiery speech. In  social media driven (twitter/facebook/whatsapp) era, these videos eased communication gaps between local youths and spread in domino effect. Every militant funeral in south kashmir attracted thousands of villagers, became fertile recruit ground for future militants. Words like martyrdom, images of new militants holding guns, their lifeless bodies after death created new narrative of militancy inside valley. Few journalists called the places like Pulwama as Kandahar of kashmir, Tral as Torabora of kashmir, due to dangerous groundswell of militancy support. Number of local militants surged and encounters between militants/security forces increased.

This social media driven radicalization started in June 2015 with infamous Burhan wani gang. By July 2016, Burhan wani was killed. But seeds sown by him was successful in methodical progression of militancy. His videos created unprecedented number of followers. Death of Burhan wani sparked major unrest inside valley in 2016. It took nearly 10 months for Kashmir to return normal. Army camps which were removed previously as part of demilitarization, now revived in areas Pulwama, Anantnag, Kulgam, shopian.  

Jaish revival, Changed 2017 & Operation Allout

In Kashmir militancy, Jaish e Mohammed(Army of Mohammed) the most dreadful ever terrorist organization. Earlier major terror attacks like parliament attack, redfort attack, Akshardham temple attack were carried by Jaish. After 2004, main commanders of Jaish in Kashmir valley, were neutralized one by one and organization became defunct for nearly decade. In 2014, the number of jaish terrorists in Kashmir was almost zero, but never completely wiped out, made to lie low by ISI. Seeing the unprecedented radicalization in south kashmir, ISI put a blue print of jaish revival in south kashmir. Old militants who were once sentenced and now resuming normal life were recycled. One notable recycled commander among them was Noor Mohammad tantray. Through amplified radical indoctrinations, Noor Mohammed built factory of suicide bombers. Origins of 2017 Pulwama police lines attack, Srinagar airport attack can be attributed to Noor Mohammed.

Security scenario in south kashmir completely changed and became worse in 2017. Once sun sets and dark arrive, local people living in vicinity of shopian, kulgam, Pulwama villages afraid to come out of their houses as there was high anticipation of violence, encounters. Daily encounters, killings increased manifold. Through social media & posters, Militants/OGW often intimate & warn local people not to move in close proximity with security forces. Local police officers, army jawans were abducted from their homes and killed in orchards, to instill fear among locals not to join security forces  When young local lad Lt Ummar Fayaz was abducted and killed by militants in shopian, central government signaled aggressive stance in dealing with militants.“Operation Allout”, an aggressive approach in dealing with militants was announced in spring of 2017. Cordon and Search Operations(CASO) & flush outs, which were once abandoned in 2003,  were reintroduced in rural hinterlands of south Kashmir.

Operation all out eliminated many militants ruthlessly initially. It created fear psyche among young youths who want to join militancy. Though Operation all out created dip in militant recruitment, but still it could not stop youths, students joining militancy. Doctorate student from Aligarh university joined militant rank & later killed. 32 year old Professor, who has doctorate in sociology & faculty in university, joined militant rank and was eliminated within 40 hours.

Crowds Disruption – a new tactics

By the time when operation allout was yielding some positive results for security forces, a new trend started to morph during encounters and CASO’s in late 2017 & 2018. Massive crowds which often show their presence during militant funerals, started to move dangerously close towards the encounter site. In this some were involved in stone pelting to disrupt the security operations. These crowd not only involve in disrupting security operations, but often help militants to escape. Hours after militants escape, videos showing dramatic escape of militants will appear in social media. Villagers who helped militants to escape often pride among themselves for the act. Security forces despite having advantage of aerial surveillance (using drones, choppers) & tight deployment, could not able to stop militants escaping with help of assault mobs. This worrying trend made many A+ grade militants, escape from security dragnet for quite long time.

Crowd mobilization on the encounter sites happens through whatsapp groups, announcements via mosques and through word of mouth. During CASO’s, security forces movement details were passed and shared among these whatsapp groups, effectively mobilizing big crowds, pelt stones and helping militants to escape. There were circumstances, where stone pelting youths travelled from multiple miles to encounter site, to save militants. Crowd disruption was major headache for security forces, it gave edge to the militant outfits. Security forces already in active combat mode, has new burden of controlling this law and order situation. To curb mob mobilization and stone pelting, government suspended the internet in the areas where encounters happens. Nearly 300 whatsapp groups which were used to mobilize stone pelters have been shutdown. Few group administrators of locally operated Whatsapp groups were identified, counselling has been by police. In encounter sites, CRPF were deployed to control law and order situation. These measures yielded positive results. Though these measures didn’t completely stop the crowd mobilizations and subsequent militants escape, it drastically reduced the militants escape success rate.

Sufferers of Operation Allout

when operation allout progressed through rural hinterlands, human toll due to deadly battles was heavy. 300 militants were killed, mostly locals including top commanders eliminated. Local civilians who tried to disrupt the encounter operations were killed in cross duel between militants and security forces. At least 140 civilians, mostly youth, have also been killed and hundreds of others either blinded or injured in protests near encounter sites. Nearly 250 security forces, including Army, paramilitary and police, have also been killed in the attacks and gun battles during the same period. Houses and other huge material property belonging to Kashmir’s working class and peasantry have also been destroyed in the encounters, as security forces used heavy mortar shells and explosives to neutralize defiant militants stuck in localities. In this period, significant number of political workers, alleged informers were tortured and killed by militants

Operation All Out also enhanced military concentration in south kashmir. Many new Army camps, paramilitary and the SOG have been established at various locations roughly a distance of five kilometers separating each. Residents privacy has been routinely breached, people of all ages has been frisked during CASO’s.

Pulwama attack

In subsequent encounters, Jaish chief masood azhar’s nephews Usman and Talha were killed in 2018. There was high anticipation among the security circles for spectacular terror attack in 2019, avenging the jaish chief nephew killings. Reports were circulating in national media that afghan war veteran has successfully infiltrated the Kashmir. He is expert in IED making and going to avenge the killings.

By 3:00PM Feb 14 2019, local suicide bomber rammed the security convey with VBIED. Attack was worst in history of Kashmir militancy, as neither of any single attack yielded these many fatalities. Jaish released video of suicide bomber confining to the crime. Indian public enraged, balakot strike happened, followed by Abinandan capture and release. In the first year anniversary, it was found NIA Pulwama probe has reached virtual deadend. Militants & OGW who coordinated this attack was either killed or captured. NIA could not able to conclude the mastermind of the attack, as there was no solid information

Conspiracy theories & Intelligence failure 

After Pulwama attack, government was heavily criticized for intelligence failure. JK police explains the suicide bomber was grade c militant. In Kashmir militant/terrorist classifications, Grade A,A+ militants are higher priority, CT operations are planned on them. Intelligence networks heavily tracks these militants to neutralize. Intelligence networks are more concerned about decapitating the leadership  which these grade A,A+ militants own. Grade c militants are generally fresh recruits, many are few days/months old.  To escape from the intelligence radar, jaish targeted these grade c militants for heavily radicalization and preparations for suicide bombing operations. One among them is adil ahmed dar  who completed his mission on Feb 14 2019.

One of the mystery is how such large amount of RDX could have been smuggled into valley from Pakistan through border, keeping the military, CRPF, BSF, police, and intelligence agencies entirely in the dark. There are reports that some explosives might have been moved in bits and pieces from sand quarry via locals.

Conclusion:

Pulwama suicide attack was not first suicide attack in Kashmir. In 2001,16 year old Srinagar boy belonging to jaish drove a car, full of explosives into Kashmir legislative assembly complex. Bombing killed 38 people including civilians and security forces. After 18 years, suicide bombing returned to Kashmir in Pulwama. Depth analysis needed to understand what made the suicide bombing to vanish and reappear in gruesome way after 18 years.

There was peace process between India & Pakistan. Once it started to dried up, Militant violence and disturbance across LoC started to increase in incremental way. Ceasefire violations, fidayeen attacks, momin mujahideen(guest fighters from Pakistan) in villages, IED attacks,finally suicide bombing returned gradually one by one.

Suicide attack site in 2020, the patch in the road show extensive damage occurred in Feb 2019

Pic Courtesy: Ieshan wani

Mainstream political parties like NC, PDP, once acted as bridge between India & pro independent/Pakistan separatists. After online radicalization and trust deficit of these parties with locals, these parties too lost their traditional support base. Generations changed and current generation believe more in militant voices than to leaders of these political parties. In Aug 2019, when central government annexed JK state, removing article 370, the situation maintained fluid with no improvement till now. Political vacuum in valley widened after article 370 abrogation. Currently both separatists and mainstream politicians are discredited, this vacuum will swing locals more towards militant voices across border. Though ground level intelligence gathering was good in valley, challenges posed in cyber domain were not tackled with counter narratives. Internet shutdowns in last few months might have brought the militant recruitment pulse to decline. This is bandgap measure, cannot be sustained in long time. Once the government decides to bring back high speed internet, online propaganda videos will surf again, radicalization of youths & street protests will return.

Militancy in Kashmir cannot be eliminated with kinetic security operations alone. Both soft and hard approach can be applied to manage the situations. In coming days, Peace in valley depends on how locals convinced with current situation.