Updated: October 26, 2020 6:49:56 am
Lieutenant General BS Raju is in charge of operations throughout LoC. (File / PTI)
MORE THAN a year after the central government removed the special status granted to Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 and divided the state into two Union territories, the region has “passed that stage of disturbing calm,” according to Lieutenant General BS Raju, commander of the Chinar Army Corps (XV Corps), which is in charge of operations in the Line of Control and against militancy.
Raju spoke to reporters a day before the Center amended the Panchayati Raj Act of Jammu and Kashmir to include a third tier of governance, at the district level, to set the stage for the Panchayat and District Development Committee elections. .
“We have been able to substantially stop the infiltration” due to “a combination of many efforts being made by the ground force,” including “additional personnel, additional technology” throughout the LoC and “drones to monitor movement,” Raju said.
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However, he noted, “Pakistan has no desire to stop the infiltration” and cited interceptions of infiltrators who said they “cannot go” but are still being pushed to do so.
On the fight against militancy, Raju said: “We have been able to keep the level of violence at a threshold … where normal people can continue to do their work … (We) have been able to keep the number of terrorists also under control. considerable. “
Today, North and South Kashmir together, Raju said, has more than 200 militants at one point, “which was like 260 at the beginning of the year.” The Corps Commander attributed this fall to “the close synergy between all the security agencies.”
Army data shows that of the 207 active militants in the Valley, 117 are local recruits and 90 are from Pakistan. A regional breakdown of the data shows that the north of Kashmir has 22 local recruits and 65 Pakistani militants, while the south has 95 local recruits and 25 militants from across the border. The data shows that while 24 youths joined the militancy in the north of Kashmir, 107 did so in the south.
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Of the total number of militants present in Kashmir as of October, 89 are with Lashkar-e-Taiba, of whom 51 are Pakistanis, the data shows. Hizbul Mujahideen has a total of 56 militants, with 52 local recruits; Jaish-e-Mohammed is 52; and Al Badr, who had been inactive for many years, had recruited 16 local youth this year, 10 of whom are active.
Major General Hashim Bali, who heads the Awantipora-based Victor Force, responsible for all counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations in southern Kashmir, dismissed any concerns about the resurgence of Al Badr. “If it were powerful, its members would have had weapons and ammunition commensurate with a powerful group,” he said, adding that this has not been visible during the operations.
According to official data for 2020, more than a third of local recruits have a useful life of less than three months once they join the militancy. About 44 percent die in six months, and nearly two in three (62.6 percent) die in less than a year, the data shows.
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Army data shows that of the 131 local recruits in the Valley as of September 2020 (up from 117 in 2019), 102 were between the ages of 16 and 25: 62 were killed, 14 arrested, and two had surrendered. They show that the total number of militants killed at J&K as of October is 171, along with 50 arrested and three turned over.
“But while doing these operations, I have said it before, we are not happy to kill people, especially people who just took up arms a month ago,” said Corps Commander Raju.
He said the Army has been trying to encourage local recruits to surrender. “In every operation, we try to get people back. Not only in operations, but also a large number of families today are coming out and saying that they want their children back. Several people have returned, ”he said.
Raju said the Army will focus more on deliveries, “because for us, getting a man back is more important than neutralizing him.” He said that “the people who have already joined, we tell them they can come back”, and just because “they picked up a gun and took a photo” doesn’t mean they have to die.
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