Bam Bam Bhole ! Jammu’s National Movement for Hindusthan – movement for Sri Amarnath land.
A video on Shri Amarnathji movement.
Tandava in Jammu - Movement for Sri Amarnath Land
http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=Mom7hukrn8E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRXKOJ3XC3A Kadam kadam badhayega… Video on Hindu revolution in Jammu.
'Jammu is treated like a pariah, because we are patriots'
August 27, 2008
The agitation in Jammu over revocation of the allotment of land to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board has taken an unprecedented turn. The only similar mass upsurge was during the Praja Parishad movement in 1952 to end the two dual constitutional provisions (thanks to Article 370) in Jammu and Kashmir that allowed two flags, a separate head of the state and separate laws.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has been supporting the agitation and the Congress's local leaders too have expressed their support for fear of losing Hindu votes. The agitation has seen small children with their mothers and grandmothers coming out on the roads with the tricolour in their hands and demanding that the land be given back to the SASB.
Leela Karan Sharma, 68, a senior advocate of the Jammu and Kashmir high court for 41 years, has been active in every Hindu religious organisation including the Dogra Brahmin Pratinidhi Sabha as its vice-president. He emerged on the national stage as president of the Shri Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti, which is leading the mass movement in Jammu for the last two months. His day begins at 6 in the morning and ends past midnight.
The agitation, which took shape on a modest note on June 29, has taken an expanse none had imagined. Can he control the tiger he is riding? Has it contributed more to divide society on communal lines? He spoke exclusively to Tarun Vijay, director, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation.
Image: Shri Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti President Leela Karan Sharma
http://im.rediff.com/news/2008/aug/27sld1.jpg
'The agitation is an expression of accumulated anger'
August 27, 2008
What was the need to form this Samiti? Was it just the Amarnath land row?
Of course, taking back the land allocated to build facilities for Amarnath pilgrims was a great insult and was the spur for the movement. Now it has become an expression of accumulated anger against the (Kashmir) valley's discrimination for the last 60 years.
In every walk of life, Jammu is treated like a pariah, a discardable part just because we are patriots and lay our lives for the tricolour. As far as the land for Amarnath pilgrims is concerned, it has to be noted that we had not demanded it. It was the government which felt the need and passed the order to allocate land to another government body -- the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board.
Still under pressure from the separatists, the government took back its order, which was earlier signed by ministers belonging to Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's People's Democratic Party and the Congress. The state government was hesitant to give facilities to the yatris from the beginning.
Also this year, the governor, who is the ex-officio head of the shrine board, was changed midway through the yatra, resulting in confusion and mismanagement.
After the PDP and National Conference opposed the allotment of land, the new governor, N N Vohra, who is an old confidante of Sayeed, unilaterally took back the letter for land allotment to the SASB and handed over the organisation of the yatra back to the state tourism department on June 29.
The same day we decided enough is enough and took a vow to wage a battle till the land was given back to the SASB.
Did you anticipate this kind of response?
No, this has become the largest-ever mass movement I have ever seen. It's beyond my imagination. Children, old men, ladies and youngsters, all are on the road and it has become a self-propelled agitation growing every day. People are using novel ways and innovative methods to make it more effective.
'We have the support of various Muslim organisations'
August 27, 2008
It is alleged the movement has communal overtones.
It is all the propaganda of the valley's lie masters and Delhi's politicians who would have liked this movement to become a Hindu-Muslim issue. It hasn't so they are baffled and disappointed. No one believes the calumnious charges against us because we have the full support of various Muslim organisations like the Muslim Front, Jammu Kashmir Muslim Federation and Gujjar and Bakkarwal Muslim groups.
Apart from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the doctors association, bar association, engineers, other professionals active in various fields like IT, women's groups, Sikhs -- everyone has come out to support us unequivocally. The BJP and Congress, both are supporting us locally. Congress MLAs and MPs have publicly pledged their support to our demands.
Why did you block roads that take essential supplies to the valley?
We had only appealed for a Chakka Jam (blockade). Immediately, the army was deployed and supplies to the valley were restored. But no one speaks about the stoppage of supplies to Jammu. Why? We are still facing difficulties and essential daily needs are still not coming to Jammu.
In the valley, the separatists go on anti-India strikes every other day and life comes to a standstill. Nobody complains then, because the strike is against India.
When we agitate for securing national integrity and the honour of the tricolour, they complain. Secondly, people are not told that the separatists beat up truck drivers carrying supplies and burnt some trucks too.
'The separatists are blackmailing Delhi'
August 27, 2008
Have you seen the eruption in the valley? They say you are the reason behind revival of the anti-India agitation in the valley?
As if before the Amarnathji Yatra Sangharsh Samiti, they were great patriots and held the Indian tricolour high? Every now and then, for the last 60 years, these separatists have used their affinity to Pakistan to blackmail Delhi.
The central government must allow them to leave Kashmir if they are so keen to go to Pakistan. They will surely be treated worse than the Muhajirs were treated. Even US has changed policies toward them after 9/11. They can't get better opportunities outside India.
Don't you think if Jammu and Kashmir remains friendly to each other it helps the national interest?
Indian interests are served only when India lives in the valley. To safeguard Indian interests, the Centre will have to take Jammu's help. You have to strengthen Jammu to strengthen India in this region. After all, how long will we have to suffer because we are patriots?
Kashmir has become the gateway of terrorism in India. Someday this was going to happen and now is the time to take proper remedial measures without any fear.
Are you not being led by a political party? What's the role of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and BJP? Why did you stop BJP leaders from joining your rally?
We are a completely non-political movement supported by all parties, organisations and ideologies. We did not stop any leader of the BJP as none was coming, but have issued a clarification that for the August 23 rally we have not invited any BJP leader.
What's the next course of action? What will make Jammu return to normal?
We are beginning a complete non-cooperation movement on the Gandhian pattern and no Jammu citizen will pay taxes to the government.
As far as the solution is concerned, since day one we have just one demand -- give back the land to the SASB and we will take back the agitation.
Image: All Parties Hurriyat Conference leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, other leaders and supporters during a march towards the United Nations office in Srinagar on August 18 to demand that the UN recognise their right to self-determination. Photograph: Tauseef Mustafa/AFP/Getty Images.
http://im.rediff.com/news/2008/aug/27sld4.jpg
http://specials.rediff.com/news/2008/aug/27sld1.htm
~EIGHT LIES OF A MOTHER~
1.The story began when I was a child;
I was born as a son of a poor family.
Even for eating, we often got lack of food.
Whenever the time for eating, mother often gave me her portion of rice.
While she was removing her rice into my bowl,
she would say "Eat this rice, son. I'm not hungry".
That was Mother's First Lie
2.When I was getting to grow up,
the persevering mother gave her spare time for fishing in a river near our house,
she hoped that from the fishes she got,
she could gave me a little bit nutritious food for my growth.
After fishing, she would cook the fishes to be a fresh fish soup,
which raised my appetite. While I was eating the soup,
mother would sit beside me and eat the rest meat of fish,
which was still on the bone of the fish I ate.
My heart was touched when I saw it.
I then used my chopstick and gave the other fish to her.
But she immediately refused it and said "Eat this fish, son.
I don't really like fish."
That was Mother's Second Lie.
3.Then, when I was in Junior High School,
to fund my study,
mother went to an economic enterprise to bring some used-matches boxes that would be stuck in.
It gave her some money for covering our needs.
As the winter came,
I woke up from my sleep and looked at my mother who was still awoke,
supported by a little candlelight and within her perseverance she continued
the work of sticking some used-matches box.
I said, "Mother, go to sleep, it's late,
tomorrow morning you still have to go for work.
" Mother smiled and said "Go to sleep,
dear. I'm not tired."
That was Mother's Third Lie.
4.At the time of final term,
mother asked for a leave from her work in order to accompany me.
While the daytime was coming and the heat of the sun was starting to shine,
the strong and persevering mother
waited for me under the heat of the sun's shine for several hours.
As the bell rang, which indicated that the final exam had finished,
mother immediately welcomed me and poured me a glass of tea
that she had prepared before in a cold bottle.
The very thick tea was not as thick as my mother's love,
which was much thicker. Seeing my mother covering with perspiration,
I at once gave her my glass and asked her to drink too.
Mother said "Drink, son. I'm not thirsty!".
That was Mother's Fourth Lie.
5.After the death of my father because of illness,
my poor mother had to play her role as a single parent.
By held on her former job, she had to fund our needs alone.
Our family's life was more complicated. No days without sufferance.
Seeing our family's condition that was getting worse,
there was a nice uncle who lived near my house came to help us,
either in a big problem and a small problem.
Our other neighbors who lived next to us saw that our family's life was so unfortunate,
they often advised my mother to marry again. But mother,
who was stubborn, didn't care to their advice,
she said "I don't need love."
That was Mother's Fifth Lie.
6.After I had finished my study and then got a job,
it was the time for my old mother to retire.
But she didn't want to; she was sincere to go to the marketplace every morning,
just to sell some vegetable for fulfilling her needs.
I, who worked in the other city, often sent her some money to help her in fulfilling her needs,
but she was stubborn for not accepting the money.
She even sent the money back to me.
She said "I have enough money."
That was Mother's Sixth Lie.
7.After graduated from Bachelor Degree,
I then continued my study to Master Degree.
I took the degree, which was funded by a company through a scholarship program,
from a famous University in America .
I finally worked in the company. Within a quite high salary,
I intended to take my mother to enjoy her life in America .
But my lovely mother didn't want to bother her son,
she said to me "I'm not used to."
That was Mother's Seventh Lie.
8.After entering her old age,
mother got a flank cancer and had to be hospitalized.
I, who lived in miles away and across the ocean,
directly went home to visit my dearest mother.
She lied down in weakness on her bed after having an operation.
Mother, who looked so old, was staring at me in deep yearn.
She tried to spread her smile on her face;
even it looked so stiff because of the disease she held out.
It was clear enough to see how the disease broke my mother's body,
thus she looked so weak and thin.
I stared at my mother within tears flowing on my face.
My heart was hurt, so hurt, seeing my mother on that condition.
But mother, with her strength, said "Don't cry, my dear.
I'm not in pain."
That was Mother's Eight Lie.
After saying her eighth lie, She closed her eyes forever!
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/fun_and_fun_only/
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Bullet-for-Bullet Could Eliminate Terrorism from India
Bullet-for-Bullet Could Eliminate Terrorism from India
– Sardar Joginder Singh, Ex CBI Chief
From: Narain Kataria
FOURTEENTH HINDU SANGATHAN DIVAS
(HINDU UNITY DAY) REPORT
The Hindu Temple Society of North America, The Indian American Intellectuals Forum (“Forum”) and several other Hindu organizations joined hands to celebrate with pomp, pageantry and enthusiasm the Fourteenth Hindu Sangathan Divas (Hindu Unity Day) on August 10, 2008 at Hindu Temple Auditorium in Flushing, New York.
The upscale auditorium was packed to capacity, including the balcony. Inside, there were more than 1000 Hindus present. Putting aside their caste, creed, color, nationality, the Hindus from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Guyana, Trinidad and many other countries, participated in the most unique event of the times – the Hindu Unity Day – with a lot of energy, enthusiasm, zeal and gusto. The assertion of the newly born Hindu pride and confidence had to be seen to be believed.
The high-profile dignitaries, who addressed the huge audience were: Dr. Subramanian Swamy, the Chief Guest and President of Janata Party in India and the former Law Minister; Sardar Joginder Singh, the Keynote Speaker and former Chief of India’s Central Bureau of Intelligence; Rajeev Malhotra, the Founder of Infinity Foundation and a philanthropist; Sri Nithya Bhaktananda Swamy, the very successful business professional turned spiritual master, and Dr. Uma Mysorekar, the President of Hindu Temple Society of North America.
The fact that the event evoked so much of interest and involvement of so many Hindus from the tri-state area, and elsewhere, demolished the frequently propounded theory by the prophets of doom, and exploded their much-hyped myth that the Hindus simply cannot work in unison.
The Hindu public and the assembled leaders deliberated over the serious problems of the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh, the terrorist bomb blasts in mega Indian cities such as Bangaluru, Jaipur and Ahmedabad, the forcible conversion of Hindus to other religions, the acquisition of Hindu temple lands by governments in India, the return of 100 acre land back to the Amarnath Shrine, widespread terrorism and rampant corruption in governmental agencies. Numerous resolutions were proposed and were passed unanimously by voice vote, and are attached herewith.
In his hard-hitting speech supported by facts, Dr. Subramanian Swamy stated that the anti-Hindu focus of the present UPA government in India has become abundantly obvious, especially in the case of Sethusamudram Ship Channel Project that was supposedly needed to accomplish certain maritime objectives. Here, all along, the government was insisting to follow one particular route that required destroying the historical Rama Setu, the ancient bridge built by the army of Rama in order to reach the island of Lanka.
That was despite the fact that there are five other alternative routes available to accomplish what was needed. Yet, the government was hell-bent on breaking the Rama Setu and hurting the sentiments of nine hundred fifty million Hindus. “Why?” Dr. Swamy asked. “Is that because Karunanidhi (Tamil Nadu Chief Minister) and Sonia (Congress Party Chairperson) hate the Hinduism?”
For the first time since 1947, Hindus have won a court case for Hinduism, by having the Supreme Court direct the national government look for another route because, as the Judges observed, "Where the faith is hurt, development project has to give way." Now the government is exploring an alternative route, which was Dr. Swamy's demand in his Writ Petition, to begin with.
Dr. Swamy argued that the terrorists have political objectives that we can act to nullify. For example, he cited the fact that terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir have killed the Hindu Pandits and driven out 375,000 Hindus to create a Caliphate there. "Retaliate," he thundered, "by sending one million ex-servicemen to settle in the Valley for good. Give them the necessary weapons to defend themselves and also an amount of Rs. 5 lakh each to build their homes."
Furthermore, Dr. Swamy said, “If the terrorists bomb our temples, then send the army to take over the Mosque built on the Kashi-Vishwanath temple, and restore the entire area to Lord Shiva." “If the Bangladeshis infiltrate into India as they have,” Dr. Swamy pointed out, “then demand the territory from Bangladesh.” "Let us send a column of Indian army from Khulna to Sylhet in Bangladesh and annex the top one-third of that nation as the compensation," he said.
The jam-packed auditorium roared with approval at every punch line and gave Dr. Swamy a standing ovation for five minutes when he finally finished his talk.
Speaking on the menace of terrorism, former CBI chief Sardar Joginder Singh said, “Nowhere in the world was the problem of terrorism ever tackled through talks with the terrorists.” Quoting Gulam Nabi Azad, a Congress veteran leader and an ex-Chief Minister of the State of Jammu and Kashmir, Sardar Joginder Singh said, “He (Azad) had once said that ‘bullet-for-bullet’ was the only way to solve the problem of terrorism. You have to kill the terrorists or else they will kill you.”
“Thousands of innocent people have been killed in India due to terrorism,” lamented Joginder Singh, “We should follow the Israeli model to handle terrorism. In Israel, citizens have been trained to be vigilant about the suspicious activities of anti-national elements. Hence, it is the duty of government to encourage citizens to cooperate with it. At the same time, it is the responsibility of every citizen to cooperate with security agencies in capturing terrorists.
Rajeev Malhotra, a highly acclaimed intellectual and a philanthropist, was honored at the Unity event for his exceptional services to the Hindu society. Mr. Malhotra emphasized the importance of maintaining our Hindu identity.
Sri Nitya Bhaktananda Swamy said that Hinduism believes in giving, loving, sharing and caring. Temples play very important role in uniting the Hindu people. Scriptures, Guru-shishya tradition, temples and society are the four pillars of Hindu Dharma.
Dr. Uma Mysorekar said, “It was wrong to say that Hinduism is merely a way of life. Hinduism is a full-fledged religion and has its own scriptures, methodology and identity.”
Earlier in the event, Indira Narasimharajan welcomed the audience. Narain Kataria, the President of Intellectual Forum, while welcoming Sardar Joginder Singh, said that Hindus and Sikhs have suffered immensely at the hands of invaders while they have also rejoiced together. Hindus consider Sikhs as their blood brothers. The system of “Roti” and “Beti” is still prevalent between the Sikhs and Hindus in Punjab. Guru Arjun Dev, Guru Teg Bahadur and Guru Gobind Singh and his four sons sacrificed their lives for the protection of Hindu Dharma. Contributions of Sikhs in the struggle for India’s freedom are unparalleled in the annals of history.
Arish Sahani, the Vice President of the Forum proposed a vote of thanks and Rene Lobo, a distinguished journalist, Director of Community News at television channel ITV and a budding politician emceed the event.
14th HINDU SANGATHAN DIVAS
RESOLUTIONS PASSED
We believe that under the present conditions, the future of Hindus is in peril and the survival of India is in danger. To avert this calamity, we strongly urge the Government of India to initiate a process to implement the following resolutions:
1. Abrogate the Article 30 of Indian Constitution because it is discriminatory against majority community (Hindus). It allows state and federal funding to minority institutions, including Madrasas that have become the breeding ground for Islamic terrorism.
2. Implement Uniform Civil Code (Article 44).
3. Repeal Article 370 of India’s Constitution in order to fully integrate Jammu & Kashmir with the rest of India.
4. Expel all illegal infiltrators and set-up stringent conditions to prevent any further infiltration from Bangladesh, Pakistan etc.
5. Free all Hindu temples from the Government control.
6. Ban cow slaughter throughout India.
7. Build Ramjnmabhoomi Temple at Ayodhya (India) by passing a law in the Parliament.
8. Restore the land allotment to the Board of Amarnath Shrine in Jammu.
9. No reservations of any kind on the basis of religion.
10. All citizens must be treated equally; there must be no appeasement and no discrimination.
11. Hindus should establish one billion dollar strong “Hindu Support Fund” to take care of Hindus suffering from the terrorism.
12. In order to bring the Hindus of the world on one platform, Hindu leaders should agree to observe one day in a year, preferably the Guru Purnima Day, as the “International Hindu Unity Day.”
http://narainkataria.blogspot.com/2008/08/bullet-for-bullet-could-eliminate.html
Separatism is unacceptableClaude ArpiIn the past fortnight, several senior commentators have decided it is time to accept the separatists' demand for self-determination in the Kashmir Valley. One commentator has written, "As a liberal, I dislike ruling people against their will... Let Kashmiris decide the outcome, not the politicians and Armies of India and Pakistan... The parallels between British rule in India and Indian rule in Kashmir have become too close for my comfort."Such reasoning is fallacious. To "dislike ruling people against their will" is not reason enough to let parts of India secede. Don't you think that the people of Arunachal Pradesh often feel neglected by the rulers in Delhi who decide their future without consulting them and 'against their will'? Any 'liberal' (if he/she is honest) will apply the same reasoning to the entire North-East. Should these States also secede? In the 1980s, the Khalistanis in Punjab also felt that Delhi was ruling them 'against their will'. Should Punjab have become independent? As for the 'promised' plebiscite, which is being resurrected by 'liberal' commentators, the UN resolutions of August 1948 and January 1949 were clear and specific. The proposed plebiscite was for all the regions of Jammu & Kashmir. Further it was conditional to the Pakistani troops withdrawing from all the areas it had occupied in the State; and, second, Pakistan withdrawing its tribesmen and nationals not ordinarily resident in these areas from the entire State.For the UN, there was no question of first changing the demography of the occupied areas. To hold a plebiscite after the Kashmir Valley has been cleansed of its Hindu population will only encourage secessionists and terrorists to use similar tactics in other parts of India. Another eminent columnist has written, "If you believe in democracy, then giving Kashmiris the right to self-determination is the correct thing to do... This is India's century. We have the world to conquer -- and the means to do it. Kashmir is a 20th century problem. We cannot let it drag us down and bleed us as we assume our rightful place in the world." This merits only one comment: If India is further dismembered, it is doubtful that the 21st century will be India's century. Allowing Kashmiris to secede is certain to become a precedent for others in India to 'democratically' ask for their right to self-determination. Similar to the position taken by our 'liberals' has been that of the foreign media which has reacted to the recent troubles with its old prediction that 'Kashmir will soon be lost for India". Le Monde quotes Ahmed, a young Kashmiri, as saying, "I prefer to die in the streets shouting 'Long Live Free Kashmir' than in an isolated confinement after being tortured (by the Indian Army)." Ahmed's friends, says Le Monde, threw stones at security forces while screaming, "Indians are dogs." Then, referring to Abhinav Bindra's gold medal, Ahmed says, "But it is in Kashmir that Indians are the best shooters."Le Figaro, in an article headlined "Kashmir bye-bye?", its correspondent spoke of the "beauty of the Valley which nobody questions, though some in India have nonetheless begun to ask themselves if the future of their great democracy is to keep four million Kashmiris against their will. It is a new tune!" The correspondent, however, asked a relevant question: "Why has the Government in New Delhi kept silent and inactive for so long when the tension had already started mounting in July?"The problem is not only the poor leadership of the rulers in Delhi, though nobody can deny that the present crisis has been created by the inept handling of the situation, but also the wily leadership in the Kashmir Valley. If one looks at the history of Jammu & Kashmir, one realises that whenever the Valley has been stricken by famine, war or invasion, it was due to the poor leadership and despotism of its kings, sultans and maharajas. The Chinese pilgrim Hsuan-tsang has described Kashmiris thus: "They are volatile and timid; they are good-looking, but deceitful."The history of Kashmir is a succession of alternating periods when just and fair rulers made the Valley a 'Paradise on Earth' and times when "people were treated as grass", to quote the historian Srivara, one of the authors of Rajatarangini. He describes one of these periods during the 15th century when "accepting bribes was considered by the officers as virtue, oppressing the subjects was regarded as wisdom and the addiction to wine and women was reckoned as happiness".Take the more recent example of Sheikh Abdullah, described by historian S Gopal as "Nehru's old friend, colleague and blood-brother." Sheikh Abdullah was chosen by Jawaharlal Nehru in January 1948 to plead India's case in the UN. Though a member of the official Indian delegation to Lake Success, Abdullah had a secret meeting with US Ambassador Austin, who reported to the US Secretary of State, "It is possible that the principal purpose of Abdullah's visit was to make clear to US that there is a third alternative, namely independence... He made quite a long and impassioned statement on the subject. He said in effect that whether Kashmir went to Pakistan or India, the other dominion would always be against a solution... (Kashmir) is a rich country. He did not want his people torn by dissension between Pakistan and India. It would be much better if Kashmir were independent and could seek American and British aid for development of the country" Thus was the seed 'azadi' planted by Nehru's 'blood-brother'. Adlai Stevenson came to Srinagar to meet Abdullah in May 1953. The creation of an independent 'Sheikdom of Kashmir' was the purpose of the visit. This would perfectly suit American interests by checking the advances of the Chinese in Xinjiang and the Russians in Afghanistan. A 'non-aligned' Nehru could not be considered a reliable ally. At that time, The New York Times published a map hinting at an independent status for the Valley and a few days later, Abdullah asserted in a speech, "It is not necessary that our State should become an appendage of either India or Pakistan."This habit of saying something one day and doing the opposite the next has been characteristic of most of the leaders of Jammu & Kashmir for the past 60 years. Sheikh Abdullah's grandson, Mr Omar Abdullah, recently said in Parliament, "We fought for our land and will continue to fight for our land till our last breath." This same person shamelessly sides with those who say that Hindus are trying to change the demography of the Kashmir Valley by erecting some temporary structures for pilgrims.With a vacillating Centre, a weak Governor, a father-and-daughter duo always ready to pull the carpet from under their partner's feet and the secessionists back in the news after several years, the State of Jammu & Kashmir seems doomed. But not if India were to stand firm and resist those who wish to see the country disintegrate.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/indexn12.asp?main_variable=EDITS&file_name=edit3%2Etxt&counter_img=3
DIVERSITY-USA
(A National Democratic Think Tank on Minority Affairs)
3145 Gilbert Ave., Roseburg , OR ( USA ) 97471
Tel. & Fax 1-541-957-8414
August. 27, 2oo8
ISLAMIC JIHAD IN KASHMIR HAS A DIRECT BEARING ON SOUTH ASIA
Considering the various aspects of the ongoing agitations in Kashmir brought about by the Muslim generated Shri Amarnath Land dispute in which about a dozen lives have already been lost and hundreds of thousands of people, men, women and children, have courted arrest and filled jails, and complete bunds observed for months at a time, Diversity-USA, a Democratic Think Tank on Minority Issues, has issued the following assessment report. Among other things the report presents a few well thought out proposals for the consideration of the concerned authorities and the thinking public with a view to help resolve the internal crisis in Kashmir and at the same time fulfill the demands and aspirations of all segments of the Kashmiri society. The National Chairperson of the Diversity-USA, Dr. Jagan Kaul, cautioned that the Islamic insurgency and civilizational war in Kashmir aided and abated by Pakistan and the Pan Islamic movement and its outcome has a direct bearing upon the future of democracy and the prevention of fundamentalist advancement in South Asia .
SELF CONFESSED PAKISTANIS OF KASHMIR HAVE LOST THEIR RIGHT TO RULE J&K
No matter what the outcome of Shri Amarnath Yatra Land dispute, the complexion of J&K politics, administration, regional consciousness & trust, political alignments and the federal government’s disintegrative appeasement policy – all will have to under go a serious radical transformation. Thanks to the governing elite’s unprecedented communal attempts at out right talibanization and drift away from India and subsequently the massive retaliation and grassroots resurgence of the nationalist forces, the ‘politics as usual’ in J&K is soon likely to be a thing of the past. The nationalists are determined to put an end to the civilizational war unleashed by Islamists and their collaborators - the Al Qaeda operatives from Pakistan. Henceforth any government run by the Sunni Muslims of Kashmir, with out any regard to the guarantees it or its promoters from New Delhi may be willing to offer, will be fully, wholly and completely unacceptable to the rest of the J&K population. Any steps by the otherwise ineffective government compelling the populace for submission and compliance will have the potential of triggering off still stronger agitations even, “civil disobedience” and “satyagraha”.
SECULARISTS HAVE JOINED THE RANKS OF ISLAMISTS IN J&k
The oft repeated declarations made in presence of hundreds of thousands of people (by some estimates12 lakh Muslims) by the Sunni leaders of Kashmir valley during the past two months that “they were Pakistanis” and “Pakistan was theirs”, raising Pakistani flags and burning the Indian flags, shouting slogans like Ham Kya Chahte hein – Aazaadi – Aazaadi; Ragda Ragda – Tiranga Ragda; Bharat Teri Maut Aayi-Lashkar Aayi – Lashkar Aayi; and scores of similar anti-India – pro-Pakistan slogans, has made one thing crystal clear that Kashmiri Muslims in general and the Hurriyat, the conglomerate of anti-national organizations they follow, in particular are disloyal citizens having their allegiance with Pakistan and other outside anti-India entities. It has been a demonstration of naked and treasonous lethality of Saudi born Wahabbism in this volatile area. By not challenging, opposing, contradicting or condemning these treacherous activities of Pakistan supported Islamists and jihadists, all elements of Kashmir region’s political spectrum claiming to be patriotic, secular and nationalist by implication extended their silent yet firm support to these seditious declarations. They included the Abdullah and Mufti clans whose entire political careers have been nurtured and brought to blossom by various Indian establishments. And this patronage was extended at the cost of the political cultures of Jammu & Ladakh and the Pandits & Sikhs of the valley. No country in the world would have dealt with separatist and secessionist movements more gently or irresponsibly than the Indian Govt. has.
APPEASEMENT BY INDIA BOOSTED TALIBANIZATION IN KASHMIR
KASHMIR CONFLICT IS WAR BETWEEN THE NATIONALISTS & ISLAMISTS
Following an anti-India Islamist policy in Kashmir the Indian governments, one after the other, have heavily contributed in worsening the socio-political and administrative conditions in the state. However, now the State is at a point when the lines of regional, ethnic, religious and cultural boundaries for confrontation are drawn. When interpreted in an honest and non-prejudicial manner the ongoing agitations in various regions of the state at this point in time have become a well demarcated war between patriotic and anti-India pro-Pak separatist forces. In this struggle in view of the federal government’s erroneous policy the loyal and patriotic citizens of India residing in J&K State have been on the receiving end for the past six decades.
` KASHMIR HAS BECOME EPICENTER OF ISLAMIC TERRORISM
INDIA MUST SET AN EXAMPLE BY OUTLAWING JIHAD
Kashmir has already become the epicenter of Islamic terrorism which has spread its tentacles through out the length and breadth of India . Kashmiri Islamists have participated in most of the major terrorist bombings including the one meant to blow up the Indian parliament and kill parliamentarians. Now these terrorists can strike at will any time and any where. In reality leaving a state Govt., its resources and personnel and entire apparatus and the largest amount of federal aid drawn from Delhi at the disposal of the Islamic fundamentalists and followers of Osama bin Laden is clearly tantamount to aiding the Islamic plans to destroy India. Beginning with outlawing the Islamic jihad in India this irrational and dangerous policy must change. The violation of the ban on jihad must be punishable with death. Keeping India ’s own demographic compulsions and infiltration by the soldiers of jihad trained in the jihad factories of Pakistan and Bangladesh in mind enforcing such a law in the country is absolutely necessary.
India must also ban all contributions made by Saudi charities to religious and educational institutions in Kashmir as they are almost always politically motivated for preaching and spreading Wahabbism. The Sunnis of Kashmir by virtue of being Pakistanis are not entitled to any Haj subsidies from Indian or J&K and therefore, must be denied the same. Last year J&K sent the largest Muslim group for Haj pilgrimage.
CONSTITUTION BARS GOVT. FROM IMPOSING PAKISTANI RULE UPON LOYAL CITIZENS OF INDIA
The unchallenged public declarations by the Islamists that they are Pakistanis has landed the state at the top of a new judicial and constitutional volcano raising the fundamental question i.e., Can the self pronounced Pakistanis be allowed to rule over the loyal and patriotic citizens of India in their own country? Under the tenets of her own jurisprudence India has neither power nor rights to force the Buddhists of Ladakh, Pandits & Sikhs of Kashmir, Dogras, Gujjars and Bakarwaals of Jammu to submit to the rule of the Sunni Muslims of Kashmir valley who as Pakistanis have enmass declared their allegiance and loyalty with Pakistan . This leads the constitutional scholars to believe that even if the Shri Amarnath Sangarsh Samiti were to call off its agitation, for which obviously there is no possibility, the political situation in the state and mechanism of distribution of power has changed for ever. The above stated ethnic communities (Buddhists, Pandits, Sikhs, Dogras, Gujjars, Bakarwaals and others) will not allow themselves to be ruled ever again by the self confessed Pakistanis of Kashmir valley. On the other hand it is their right and responsibility to refuse accepting and/or recognizing a Govt. in J&K set up by Pakistanis. From their standpoint things cannot be allowed to be as usual any more. The Indian authorities will be acting outside the legal boundaries set forth by the Indian Constitution should they condemn the loyal Indian citizens to subjugation under the rule of Pakistanis within the territorial jurisdiction of the Indian Union. Thus the mockery of democracy in J&K perpetuated by New Delhi and Srinagar over the years is about to be buried under its own weight.
REORGANIZATION OF J&K ONLY VIABLE & DEMOCRATIC OPTION
Under these circumstances the two viable alternatives available to India for resolving this unrest are either deny the right of vote to all those who have openly and publicly declared themselves to be the citizens of India’s mortal enemy i.e., Pakistan – as Pakistanis cannot exercise franchise in India, or undertake the much awaited and demanded new political reorganization of J&K State. Such reorganization will divide the state in four politically equal and autonomous parts i.e., Ladakh, Panun Kashmir, Kashmir and Jammu . Given the traditional strategy of pampering of the Sunnis by GOI over the years they are expected to make hue and cry claiming that Indian Hindus were robbing them of their legitimate right of ruling the J&K state by breaking up the state. They have tasted blood and they are not going to give it up without fighting back and expressing their indignation – a usual tactic applied by Islamists. There is however, one more pragmatic option for reorganizing the state without breaking it up yet empowering all communities without discrimination.
CREATE A NEW STATE CALLED “ UNION OF LJPK”
Under this option a Union of LJPK (representing Ladakh, Jammu , Panun Kashmir and Kashmir ) be created, in which all newly created four autonomous regions will rule themselves democratically and independently of each other. However, the matters pertaining to the state as a whole will fall in the portfolio of the state and will be determined and deliberated upon by the state legislature composed of equal number of elected representatives from all regions. A system of rotation should be used for composing the cabinets and appointing Chief Ministers. However, the state will not interfere in the internal affairs of the regions without the express consent and permission of the regional authorities and the regions will be free to design their relationship with India and her Constitution. This formula will enfranchise and empower the entire population of the state without eroding the territorial integrity of the state. Those persons of the autonomous regions particularly of the region of Kashmir still expressing their allegiance with Pakistan should be free even encouraged to go to the land of their choosing.
Dr. Jagan N. Kaul drjagankaul@rosenet.net
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Where should the National Hindu revolution of Jammu arrive? Deletion of Art. 370.
Where should the National Hindu revolution of Jammu arrive? Deletion of Art. 370.
In a restored Sun temple of Martand in Jammu and Kashmir.
The bases for the National Hindu revolution triggered in Jammu have to be discovered in the perceptions of deprivation felt by the Hindu majority in Jammu and Kashmir state of Hindusthan. As will be clear from the following indicators, there is discrimination against Jammu in terms of political representation, even though Jammu accounts for 75% of the States’ revenue. Discrimination against Jammu is most pronounced in the fact that unemployment is almost 70% in Jammu while only 29% of Kashmir labour-force are unemployed.
The real solution to the perceived discrimination against residents of Jammu goes beyond the humiliation piled upon them by denying a simple request for civic amenities to the pilgrims of Amarnath. It is natural to compare this inequity with the extraordinarily luxurious arrangements made all over Hindusthan for the Haj pilgrims and heavy subsidies given from the Central and state exchequers for the Haj pilgrimages.
The basic issues are thus economic and little to do with only ‘emotions’ as the Hon’ble Union Minister seems to indicate. Amarnath is for all humanity and should be the guiding paramaatman for all people of Hindusthan and should not be reduced to a mere ‘religious’ issue.
The question to ask is: Has the temporary provision of Art. 370 in the Constitution served its purpose? Yes, indeed. It has been on the statute for nearly 57 years now and it is time that this temporary provision is rescinded by a Presidential proclamation as provided for in the very same Article, thus absorbing Jammu and Kashmir (including the regions under Pakistani occupation) into the Union of India, that is Bharat.
The civilizational history of Jammu and Kashmir marks the region clearly as a crown-jewel of Hindu civilization, exemplified by the presence of Adi S’ankara in a hill near Srinagar.
Appended are selected verses from Nilamata Purana which indicate how Vasudeva (possibly Son of Devaki, Sri Krishna) made the unborn child of a queen as the King of Kas’mira. Vasudeva referred to in Nilamata Purana had anointed the unborn child (later named Gonanda) as King of Kas'mira.
King Lalitaditya had built the Sun temple at Martand. Avantivarman (9th cent.) built Srinagar as the capital city.
Kashmir Shaivism, exemplified by Abhinavagupta and Kshemaraja (10th -11th century ) presented S’iva as consciousness, s’akti its energy, and anN as the material world. “The mind is viewed as a hierarchical (krama) collection of agents ( kula ) that perceives its true self spontaneously ( pratyabhijna ) with a creative power that may be viewed as being pulsating (spanda) .” Prtyabhijna was recognition of Is’vara or S’iva by Utpala (c 900-950).
Hindu queen Kota Rani ruled from 1323 to 1338 after the death of King Rinchana. It was during the reign of Sikandar (1389-1413) that conversions to Islamism intensified. The tolerant regime of Sikandar's son Zain-ul-Abidin (1420-1470) helped many Hindus to return to the Kashmir valley. Akbar incorporated the region into his empire in 1587. In 1752, Afghans took control of the region; they were later defeated by Ranjit Singh in 1819. Gulab Singh, the Dogra ruler of Jammu purchased the Kashmir valley from the British in 1846; he also annexed Ladakh into the kingdom. When, in October 1947, some tribes of Pakistan tried to invade the valley, Maharaja of the region acceded to the Indian portion of partitioned Hindusthan. In a UN-supervised cease-fire declared on 1 Jan. 1949, Pakistan had been allowed to occupy 33,000 square miles of the 86,500 square miles of Jammu and Kashmir State.
Sheikh Abdullah (1905-1982) rejected the sectarian policies of M.A. Jinnah and the Muslim League. In 1939 the name of Muslim Conference headed by Sheikh Abdullah was changed to National Conference to emphasize its secular character.
http://kashmir-information.com/Poplar.html
This historical outline should form the basis for a peaceful resolution of the National Hindu revolution unleashed by the people of Jammu region. The solution lies in the deletion of temporary Constitutional provision Art. 370 by a Presidential Proclamation recognizing that all the people of Jammu and Kashmir state of the Union of Hindusthan were all Hindu before the onrush of Islamism in the 15th century. This move will be consistent with the directive principle of state polity which enjoins the State to institute a Uniform Civil Code applicable to the entire nation, just as the Criminal Procedure Code is a nationally-applicable criminal code.
Kalyanaraman
Some key indicators of inequity in Jammu vis-Ã -vis Kashmir region of J&K State:
1 Area-26293 sq kms (Jammu) 15948 sq kms (Kashmir)
2 Total revenue generated-75 % (Jammu) 20% (Kashmir)
3 Total voters-3059986 (Jammu); 2883950 (Kashmir)
4 Assembly seats allotted-37 (Jammu); 46 (Kashmir)
5 Loksabha seats-2 (Jammu); 3 (Kashmir)
6 Cabinet ministers(till 7th July,08) –5 (Jammu); 14 (Kashmir)
7 Unemployment status-69.70 % (Jammu); 29.30% (Kashmir)
8 Representation in state govt. jobs-1.2 lakhs (Jammu); 3lakhs (Kashmir)
9 Percentage of employees from local area-less than 25% (Jammu); 99% (Kashmir)
10 Power generation -22 Mega Watt (Jammu); 304 Mega Watt (Kashmir)
11 Rural electrification-less than 70% (Jammu); 100% (Kashmir)
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-3396388,flstry-1.cms
Translation of Nilamata Purana by Dr. Ved Kumari Jammu and Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages, Srinagar
Om auspiciousness. Salutation to the auspicious Ganes'a.
Salutation to the venerable Vasudeva Om.
Verses 1-100
1-2. Having paid homage to the god Hari - the abode of Sri, the giver of boons, the highest lord, the master of three worlds, the finder of cow (earth), the imperishable and the unchangeable - the honourable king Janamejaya, the supporter of the family of Pariksita, asked Vyasa's pupil Vaisampayana.
3. Janamejaya (said): "Kings of various countries - the great heroes - came to the great Bharata war of my forefathers.
4-5. Say, why did not the king of Kas'mira come there ? Why was that king not chosen by the sons of Pandu and Dhrtarastra? The region of Kas'mira, of course, occupies an important place in the world.
6. Vaisampayana (said): "Accompanied by his four-fold armies (the king of Kas'mira) went to the Svayamvara to fight with Madhava, the son of Vasudeva.
7. A fight between him and the wise Vasudeva took place there as had taken place between Naraka and Vasudeva.
8-9. Consequently he was thrown down by Vasudeva in that good combat. Out of respect for that country, Vasudeva coronated his pregnant queen, so that the posthumous son might rule.
10. Afterwards, she gave birth to a male child who was named Gonanda. Being a child, he was brought neither by the Pandavas nor by the Kauravas."
11. Janamejaya (spoke): "O best among the twice-born, why did the high-minded Vasudeva honour (so much) the country that he himself coronated a woman ?"
12- 13. Vaisampayana (said): "O best amongst the kings, the goddess Uma is the same as Kas'mira. What was formerly, an enjoyable, heart-enrapturing lake for six Manvantaras since the beginning of the Kalpa, became a beautiful territory in this Manvantara.
14-16. Filled with rows of rice-fields, fully thriving and endowed with good fruits etc., inhabited by the people who perform sacrifices and are engaged in self-study and contemplation - virtuous ascetics well-versed in the Vedas and the Vedangas - by highly prosperous Ksatriyas adept in (the use of) all the arms and weapons, by Vaisyas engaged in (earning) the means of livelihood, and by sudras serving the twice-born, it is bedecked with the temples of the gods and all the holy places, and is auspicious.
17. 0 protector of men ! all the sacred places, which are on the earth, are there. Thronged with the hermitages of the sages ( it is ) pleasant in heat and cold and is auspicious.
18. Unconquerable by the enemy-kingdoms, ignorant of the fears born of them, rich in cows, horses. elephants etc. it is devoid of the fear of famines.
19. Not dependent on rains, enjoyable, holy, beneficial for living beings, endowed with the qualities (of producing) all grains, it is devoid of dangers and is thickly populated.
20. Possessed of the grace like that of a temple due to the (presence of) tender ladies, it is devoid of evil serpents, tigers, buffaloes and bears.
21. Always full of festivals, twangings of the bows and the sounds of the Vedic recitals, it is crowded with ever- sportive men and is surrounded by ever happy persons.
22. Full of gardens and pleasure-groves and resounding with the sounds of drums and lutes, it is always crowded with people fond of drinks and is dear to the hearts of good men.
23. Laden with various types of flowers, fruits, trees, creepers and medicinal herbs, it is full of hosts of wild beasts and is enjoyed by the Siddhas and the Caranas.
24-25. O controller of the enemies, the holy region of Kas'mira is possessed of all the sacred places. There are sacred lakes of the Nagas and the holy mountains; there are holy rivers and also the holy lakes; there are highly sacred temples and also the hermitages attached to them. .
26. In the center flows, making as it were the parting of the hair, the Vitasta - the highest goddess visibly born of the Himalaya."
http://www.koausa.org/Purana/Verses1-100.html
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Geopolitics of Kashmir valley and Hindu identity
Geopolitics of Kashmir valley and Hindu identity
Read also: http://www.scribd.com/doc/3963268/ahimsa-and-dharma-Kalyan-Viswanathan
A brilliant article by Kalyan Viswanathan, "Bhagavad Gita and Mahatma Gandhi -- dharma and ahimsa; the relevance of ahimsa in resolving political conflicts today; responding to islamic terrorism." (July 2008).
This note includes three reports:
1. George Bush’s undertaking to investigate Paki role in the attack on Indian mission in Kabul
2. Pioneer edit on Islamist in valley with particular reference to Saudi-Paki money fomenting islamist jehadi activity in the valley
3. Summary of Vohra Committee Report on Internal Security (of topical importance because Vohra now happened to be Governor of Jammu and Kashmir and has just visited and prayed at the sacred Amarnath temple).
4. Note on the importance of the valley for Hindu identity (Dr. Swamy’s lecture).
These have to read with A. Surya Prakash’s article on the denial of land to Hindus in Kashmir (Pioneer, July 15, 2008). http://dailypioneer.com/indexn12.asp?main_variable=EDITS&file_name=edit3%2Etxt&counter_img=3
This is the most serious challenge to Hindu identity and national sovereignty. The next Government should resolve to delete Art. 370 from the Constitution by a Presidential proclamation (this is all it takes to absorb Jammu and Kashmir into the mainstream of national interests). Given the background of Paki and Saudi involvement, India should resolve to send Antonia back to Luciana and engage the foreign forces at work in the Valley, if necessary in coordination with the NATO forces fighting the war against the islamist jehadis in Afghanistan. Surely, the war will spill over into the Paki occupied portion of the valley; it is the bounden duty of the Government of India, the Indian State to get rid of this occupation.
The pace of development of Jammu and Kashmir will gain rapidity once Jammu, Kashmir and Leh are declared as separate states and Indians allowed to invest in developmental projects in all these three states.
Kalyanaraman
Press Trust Of India Washington, July 16, 2008 First Published: 11:47 IST(16/7/2008)
Last Updated: 14:52 IST(16/7/2008)
US to probe Afghan charge on Pak role in Indian mission attack
The US will "investigate" Afghan President Hamid Karzai's allegation of involvement of Pakistan's ISI in the recent terrorist attack in his country, including the bombing of Indian embassy, President George W Bush has said.
"First of all, we'll investigate his charge and we'll work with his service...To get to the bottom of his allegation," Bush told reporters when asked in Washington about Karzai statement.
The US President's statement came days after US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said there was no evidence available of Pakistan's involvement in the attack on Indian embassy in Kabul last week that killed its Brigadier-rank defence attache, an IFS officer and 58 others.
Bush said extremists were coming out of parts of Pakistan into Afghanistan which "should be troubling to Pakistan" as it was to Washington.
"No question, however, that some extremists are coming out of parts of Pakistan into Afghanistan. And that's troubling to us, it's troubling Afghanistan, and it should be troubling to Pakistan.
"We share a common enemy; that would be extremists who use violence to either disrupt democracy or prevent democracy from taking hold. Al-Qaeda is -- they're there. We have hurt Al-Qaeda hard -- hit them hard and hurt them around the world, including in Pakistan," he added.
Bush said that the United States would jointly with Pakistan continue to apply pressure on Al Qaida.
"I certainly hope that the government understands the dangers of extremists moving in their country. I think they do," Bush said.
In a strongly worded statement on Monday, Karzai had said the attacks in Afghanistan were "carried out by the intelligence administration of Pakistan, its military intelligence institutions."
http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx?Id=bd617faf-0539-4ab2-9881-1b5fd40785f8
Islamism in Valley
The Pioneer Edit Desk (July 16, 2008)
Protest prelude to greater jihad?
While the Congress itself has downplayed it, the statement by the former Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad, whose actions while in office have set him apart from his self-seeking and Islam-pandering predecessors, that the violent agitation against the transfer of land -- for temporary shelters and facilities to be used by Hindu pilgrims visiting the Amaranth shrine -- was funded by Pakistani and Saudi Arabian sources, is actually fairly noteworthy. It amounts to the first serious admission, by a politician who has been in Government in Srinagar, that the so-called 'Kashmir cause' is actually camouflage for a global Islamist network that transcends borders and barriers. That the Saudis have got into the game is particularly disturbing as it would indicate a return to the early-1990s when petro-dollars funded the surge in radical Islam in this part of the world. The parallels are eerie. In 1990, after the defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and after American retreat from the region, the internationalist jihadi armies turned their attention to new battlegrounds. The Kashmir Valley was one such. Jammu & Kashmir saw extensive blood-letting at the hands of not just Kashmiri and Pakistani terrorists, but Afghans and Yemenis, too. Indeed, in that turbulent period, Osama bin Laden and the nascent Al Qaeda trained terrorists at camps in Afghanistan for deployment in Jammu & Kashmir. The logistical patrons were Pakistani Generals at the Inter-Services Intelligence and rogue elements in the teeming establishment in Riyadh. Today, history may be repeating itself. The American-led forces are facing a resurgent, Pakistan-backed Taliban offensive. The jihadis smell success, perhaps even triumph. The fact that a new, untested American President will be in charge in 2009, gives them even more hope. India cannot escape the spill-over. Perhaps, as the recent Amarnath episode suggests, the pan-Islamic coalition is already training its guns in this direction. That the All-Party Hurriyat Conference and the PDP have been at the forefront of the chilling protests against the allotment of land for Hindu pilgrims only adds to suspicions. These groups have been closely linked to radical Islamist organisations, tacitly or otherwise. The Hurriyat is openly Islamist, comparing the recent Amarnath episode to the Israeli attempt to settle Jews on territories Palestinians claim as their own.
Sometimes a simple sentence anticipates a larger truth. Mr Azad's attack on his political opponents the other day may have been just such an example. If the Pakistani meddling in Jammu & Kashmir is being re-intensified in an election year -- admittedly, it had never gone away in the first place -- and if the Saudis are entering the fray, India can brace for a long-drawn terrorist war. With vast tracts of Pakistani territory under the control of radical forces and the private armies of mullahs, India can no longer pretend that the notional regime in Islamabad offers it a buffer. The hard reality is that the frontline has shifted in these past seven years -- since 9/11 -- and India, not Pakistan, is now the frontline state; Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is the war zone. The resurgence of radical Islamist groups, after three or four quiet years, in the Valley indicates a greater design. In a nutshell, that is what Mr Azad is trying to warn New Delhi about.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/indexn12.asp?main_variable=EDITS&file_name=edit1%2Etxt&counter_img=1
Vohra Committee Report
[Scanned and compared from the publicly available, i.e., abridged, document,
with no guarantee of authenticity. Please obtain the original from Home Ministry.]
VOHRA COMMITTEE REPORT
MINISTRY OF HOME AFFAIRS
l. l Government had (through its Order No.S/7937/SS(ISP)/93 dated 9th July ‘93) established a Committee, comprised as below, to take stock of all available information about the activities of crime Syndicates/Mafia organisations which had developed links with and were being protected by Government functionaries and political personalities. Based on the recommendations of the Committee, Government shall determine the need, if any, to establish a special organisation/agency to regularly collect information and pursue cases against such elements:
(i) Home Secretary Chairman
(ii) Secretary (R) Member
(iii) DIB Member
(iv) Director CBI Member
(v) JS(PP) MHA Member Secy.
1.2 The Committee was authorised to invite senior officers of various concerned Departments to gather the required information.
1.3 Special Secretary (Internal Security & Police), MHA, was subsequently added as a Member of the Committee. The Committee was desired to submit its Report within 3 months.
2.1 In the first meeting of the Committee (held on l5th July ‘93), I had explained to the Members that Government had established the Committee after seeing the reports of our Intelligence and Investigation agencies on the activities/linkages of the Dawood Ibrahim gang, consequent to the bomb blasts in Bombay in March 1993. From these various reports, it was apparent that the activities of Memon Brothers and Dawood Ibrahim had progressed over the years, leading to the establishment of a powerful network. This could not have happened without these elements having been protected by the functionaries of the concerned Government departments, specially Customs, Income Tax, Police and others. It was, therefore, necessary to identify the linkages and to also determine how such information could be timely collected and acted upon in the future.
2.2 In the course of the discussions, I perceived that some of the Members appeared to have some hesitation in openly expressing their views and also seemed unconvinced that Government actually intended to pursue such matters. Accordingly, I addressed separate personal letters to each of the Mernbers of the Committee seeking their well considered suggestions and recommendations. Their responses are briefly brought out below.
Secretary (R&AW)
2.3 The various offices abroad of this Agency have limited strength and are largely geared to the collection of military, economic, scientific and political intelligence. R&AW monitor the activities of certain organisations abroad only insofar as they relate to their involvement with narco-rerrorist elements and smuggling arms, ammunition, explosives, etc. into the country. It does not monitor the activities of criminal elements abroad, which are mainly confined to "normal smuggling without any links to terrorist elements". The present strength of the Agency’s offices abroad would not permit it to enlarge its field of activities. If, however, there is evidence to suggest that these organisations have links with Intelligence agencies of other countries, particularly Pakistan, and that they are being used or are likely to be used by such countries for destabilising our economy, it would become R&AW’s responsibility to monitor their activities, as is being done by this Agency to collect vital information in regard to the investigations in the Bombay bomb blasts case.
2.4 The creation of a nodal agency to collect information regarding the activities of Mafia organisations is very essential. All the existing information/data available with R&AW, IB and CBI could be made available to this nodal agency. R&AW will nominate an officer of suitable rank to Iiaise with the nodal agency on a
regular basis to enable expeditious follow-up action.
Director CBI
3. l A Report on the nexus between the Bombay City Police and the Bombay under-world was prepared by CBI in 1986. It would be useful to institute a fresh study by CBI, on the basis of which appropriate administrative/ legal measures could be initiated.
]
3.2 An organised crime Syndicate/Mafia generally commences its activities by indulging in petty crime at the local level, mostly relating to illicit distillation/gambling/organised satta and prostitution in the larger towns. In port towns, their activities involve smuggling and sale of imported goods and progressively graduate
to narcotics and drug trafficking. In the bigger cities, the main source of income relates to real estate - forcibly occupying lands/buildings, procuring such properties at cheap rates by forcing out the existing occupants/tenants etc. Over time, the money power thus acquired is used for building up contacts with bureaucrats and politicians and expansion of activities with impunity. The money power is used to develop a network of muscle-power which is also used by the politicians during elections.
3.3 CBI has reported that all over India crime Syndicates have become a law unto themselves. Even in the smaller towns and rural areas, muscle-men have become the order of the day. Hired assassins have become a part of these organisations. The nexus between the criminal gangs, police, bureaucracy and politicians has come out clearly in various parts of the country. The existing criminal justice system, which was essentially designed to deal with the individual offences/crimes, is unable to deal with the activities of the Mafia; the provisions of law in regard economic offences are weak; there are insurmountable legal difficulties in attaching/confiscation of the property acquired through Mafia activities.
3.4 It has been suggested that the menace has first to be tackled at the local level where the agencies of the State and the concerned Central Enforcement Agencies like Customs and Excise, Income Tax etc. would be required to take effective action. In cases where a crime Syndicate has graduated to big business, it would be necessary to conduct detailed investigations into its assets, both movable and immovable. It has been stressed that when such action is not timely and effectively taken, the lower functionaries of the concerned State and Central Departments/organisations start over-looking the activities of the crime Syndicates. To elucidate this point, the Director CBI has given the example of IQBAL MIRCHI of Bombay who, till the late 80’s, was
merely a visitor to passenger and carrier ships to obtain liquor and cigarettes for selling the same at a profit. In the last 3-4 years, MIRCHI acquired real estate valuing crores of rupees; he has many bank accounts and has been paying lakhs of rupees to his carriers. The growth of MIRCHI is due to the fact that the concerned Enforcement agencies did not timely take action against him and, later, this perhaps became difficult on account of the enormous patronage that he had developed. If MIRCHI is investigated, the entire patronage enjoyed by him and his linkages will come to light. Director CBI has observed that there are many such cases, as that of MIRCHI where the initial failure has led to the emergence of Mafia giants who have become too big to be tackled.
3.5 Director CBI has stated that the main mode of communications/contacts of the Mafias operating at the international level is through telephonic communications. Referring to the useful leads emerging from the investigations into the activities of Dawood Ibrahim, a Mafia leader, the director CBI has stated that the effective monitoring of the telephone calls made from India/received from abroad would yield useful information and, for this being done, Government may grant sanction to monitor certain telephone connections.
3.6 The assistance of Banks is an essential input. The Bank Managers can be placed under obligation to render reports on all heavy transactions and suspicious accounts to the Enforcement agencies. Such a practice obtains in UK.
3.7 Concluding his analysis, Director CBI has made the following suggestions to bring under control the activities of the criminal Syndicates:
(i) Identification of offences and award of deterrent punishments, including preventive detention.
(ii) Trial procedures should be simplified and hastened.
(iii) Surveillance should be carried out through finger printing, photographs and dossiers.
(iv) Monitoring mechanisms should be established at the State and Central levels.
(v) Establishment of Special Cells in the States CIDs and CBI.
(vi) Suitable amendments should be introduced in the existing laws to more effectively deal with the activities of Maixa organisations, etc.; this would also include review of the existing laws.
(vii) A detailed case study of l0-15 cases would provide useful information regarding the administrative/legal measures, which would be required to be taken to effectively tackle the functioning of Mafia organizations. The CBI can do this within a short period.
Director, IB
6.1 DIB has reported that due to the progressive decline in the values of public life in the country "warning signals of sinister linkage between thc underworld politicians and the bureaucracy have been evident with disturbing regularity, as exemplified by the exposures of the networks of the Bombay blast case". He has
recommended itnmediate attention to:-
(i) Identification of the nexus between the criminals/Mafias and anti-national elements on the one hand and bureaucrats, politicians and other sensitively located individuals on the other.
(ii) Identification of the nature and dimensions of these linkages and the modus operandi of their operations.
(iii) Assessment of the impact of these linkages on the various institutions, viz., the electoral, political, economic, law and order and the administrative apparatus.
(iv) Nexus, if any, between the domestic linkages with foreign intelligence.
(v) Necessary action to show effective action to counteract/ neutralise the Mafia activities.
(vi) Political and legal constraints in dealing with the covert/illegal functioning of the linkages.
6.2 Like the Director CBI, the DIB has also stated that there has been a rapid spread and growth of criminal gangs, armed senas, drug Mafias, smuggling gangs, drug peddlers and economic lobbies in the country which have, over the years, developed an extensive network of contacts with the bureaucrats/Government functionaries at the local levels, politicians, media persons and strategically located individuals in the non-State sector. Some of these Syndicates also have international linkages, including the foreign intelligence agencies. In this context, the DIB has given the following examples
(i) In certain States, like Bihar, Haryana and UP, these gangs enjoy the patronage of local level politicians, cutting across party lines and the protection of governmental functionaries. Some political leaders become the leaders of these gangs/armed senas and, over the years, get themselves elected to local bodies, State Assemblies and the national Parliament. Resultantly, such elements have acquired considerable political clout seriously jeopardizing the smooth functioning of the administration and the safety of life and property of the common man, causing a sense of despair and alienation among the people.
(ii) The big smuggling Syndicates, having international linkages, have spread into and infected the various economic and financial activities, including havala transactions, circulation of black money and operations of a vicious parallel economy causing serious damage to the economic fibre of the country. These Syndicates have acquired substantial financial and muscle power and social respectability and have successfully corrupted the government machinery at all levels and wield enough influence to make the task of Investigating and Prosecuting agencies extremely difficult; even the members of the Judicial system have not escaped the embrace of the Mafia.
(iii) Certain elements of the Mafia have shifted to narcotics, drugs and weapon smuggling and established narco-terrorism networks, specially in the States of J&K, Punjab, Gujarat and Maharashtra. The cost of contesting elections has thrown the politician into the lap of these elements and led to a grave compromise by officials of the preventive/detective systems. The virus has spread to almost all the centres in the country; the coastal and the border States have been particularly affected.
(iv) The Bombay bomb blast case and the communal, riots in Surat and Ahmedabad have demonstrated how the Indian underworld has been exploited by the Pak ISI and the latter’s network in UAE to cause sabotage, subversion and communal tension in various parts of the country. The investigations into the Bombay bomb blast cases have revealed extensive linkages of the underworld in the various governmental agencies, political circles, business sector and the film world.
6.3 DIB has stated that the network of the Mafia is virtually running a parallel Government, pushing the State apparatus into irrelevance. It is thus most immediately necessary that an institution is established to effectively deal with the menace. In this connection, the DIB has stated:
(i) Presently, there. is no system/ mechanism which is specifically designated to collect and collate intelligence pertaining to the linkages developed by crime Syndicates/Mafias with the governmental set up. Nonetheless, the various intelligence/investigation/enforcement agencies collect, in the normal course of their functioning, information about the nexus between the bureaucracy and politicians with the Mafia gangs, smugglers and the underworld. These agencies use such available inputs "only within the narrow confines of their work charter and choose not to take undue cognisance and follow-up action, leave alone sharing with any other agencies". Thus, all these agencies "function within their own cocoons, with the result that a plethora of information fails to get specific and purposeful attention needed for the exposure of the Linkages". It is, therefore, necessary to immediately have an institutionalized system which "while giving total freedom to the various agencies to pursue their charter of work, would simultaneously cast on them the onus of sharing such inputs to a nodal outfit whose job will be to process this information for attention of a single designated authority". This will enable the nodal Group to provide useful leads to the various agencies and, over time, a progressive database will get generated "to facilitate periodic reviews and analysis which could then be passed to a designated body".
7.1 As would be seen from the afore-stated brief discussion, specially the views expressed by Director CBI and DIB, it is evident that the muscle power of the crime Syndicates is sustained by their enormous financial power which, in turn, is, secured by the Mafia elements by committing economic offences with impunity. In this context, I held detailed personal discussions with Secretary (Revenue) under whose control operate the various economic intelligence/investigative/enforcement agencies.
7.2 The Department of Revenue functions through the following major agencies:
(i) Central Board of Excise & Customs (CBEC)
Inter alia, CBSE is responsible for the prevention of smuggling, In this and other tasks, it is assisted by the by the Director General of Revenue Intelligence (DGRI) and the Directorate General of Anti-Evasion (DGAE). The DGRI deals with the evasion of customs duties; the DGAE with Excise duty evasion.
(ii) Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT)
Income Tax Department administers the Income Tax Act, Wealth Tax Act, etc.
(iii) Central Economic Intelligence Bureau (CEIB)
The CEIB is responsible for coordinating and strengthening the intelligence gathering activities and the investigative and enforcement actions of the various agencies responsible for investigation into economic offences and the enforcement of economic laws. The CEIB is responsible for maintaining liaison with the concemed Departments Directorates both at the Centre and at the State levels and is expected to provide overall direction to the investigative agencies under the Department of Revenue.
The CEIB is expected, inter alia, to attend to the following tasks:
(a) Identification of major sources generating black money; directing and developing intelligence about such sources; planning and coordinating action and operations against such sources.
(b) Assisting the various enforcement agencies in strengthening the intelligence gathering infrastructure and building up their capability for storage and retrieval of intelligence.
(c) Conducting investigative and analytical studies in difficult areas of black money operations and monitoring indicators thereof.
(iv) Enforcement Directorate
This Directorate is concerned with the enforcement of the investigation and penal provision of the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act; collection of intelligence relating to foreign exchange offences; enquiries into suspected violations of the provisions of FERA, etc.
(v) Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB)
The NCB is responsible for the administration of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act. It is responsible for coordination with different Central and State Government Departments/Ministries and the various Central and State law enforcement agencies for the implementation of the NDPS Act. I explained to Secretary (Revenue) the broad considerations on account of which the government had set up a Committee to look into the linkages developed by the Mafia elements. He informed me that he had recently held a meeting with senior representatives of the RBI, the Chairman CBEC, Chairman CBDT and the Economic Intelligence Council in the Department of Revenue, and readily agreed with my request to attend a meeting of the Committee along with his concerned officers for a full discussion on the issues before the Committee. Accordingly, I arranged a meeting of the Committee (30th Aug ‘93) to hear the views of Seeretary (Revenue), who was accompanied by chairman CBDT, DGRI, Member (Customs) and Director (Enforcement). During the course of the discussions with Secretary (Revenue) and his aforesaid principal officers, the following significant observations were made:
(i) In the normal course of his work, to detect violations of Customs & Excise laws, the DGRI comes across information on linkages crime Syndicates and governmental functionaries etc. As following of such information is not within the charter of duties of DGRI, his officers focus primarily on the information relating to the violation of laws relating to their charter.
(ii) As in the case of DGRT, indirect information also becomes available the CBDT about linkages. Here again, not being directly relating to their charter of responsibilities, the CBDT do not follow up such leads.
(iii) While the NCB is specifically responsible for booking drug traffickers, with the increasing importance being given to Narco-terrorism, the NCB has been asked to gather further information so that the real king-pins in the narcotics trade can be apprehended.
(iv) The Directorate of’ Enforcement comes across information on linkages and passes it on to the CBI and IB.
(v) Of late, currency amounting to crores of rupees is being seized, invariably packed in suitcases and gunny bags. The Banks are reluctant to pass on informaton about account holders to CBDT and do not allow their officers to hold exploratory enquiries.
(vi) While a certain arnount of information is shared between the various organisations under the Department of Revenue, and those under the MHA and Cabinet Secretariat, the exchanges are sporadic and limited. This is perhaps due to the fact that each concerned organisation/agency is anxious to protect its sources and is apprehensive that a full sharing of all information might jeopardise its operations, on account of premature leakage of information.
(vii) While DGRI, Director (Enforcement) and DG NCB are authorised to undertake phone tapping of suspected offenders, the DGRI has not been allowed to enforce surveillance on the telephonic communications of political personalities.
(viii) Senior Police officers, even in the border States, are not trained or adequately informed of the work done by the Directorate of Enforcement, specially in regard to money laundering operations.
(ix) Information about the activities of drug traffickers is passed on by DG NCB to the concerned State Governments and their agencies. However, niggardly responses by the latter and prolonged delays in the disposal of cases before the Courts seriously hampers. the effective functioning of the NCB. While the NDPS Act prescribes the award of deterrent punishments to offenders, the results are to the contrary. It is necessary that the Directorates of Prosecution in the State Governments are urgently brought under the control of the State Police.
7.5 Secretary (Revenue) stated that the field officers of his various Departments were faced with various problems, amongst which are:
(i) The utter inadequacy of the criminal justice system; cases are not heard timely; functioning of the Government lawyers is grossly inadequate; all this results in a low percentage of convictions and mild punishments. Unless the criminal justice system is geared up, the work of the enforcement agencies cannot be effective.
(ii) The field officers of the various agencies of the Revenue Department are often pressurized by senior government functionaries/political leaders, apparently at the behest of crime Syndicates/Mafia elements. Unless the field level officers are offered effective protection, they cannot be expected to maintain interest in vigorously pursuing action against the activities of such elements.
7.6 Chairman CBDT stated that insofar as the functioning of his officers is concerned, whenever they come into possession of any information regarding the violation of any other law, they pass it on to the concerned agency. He suggested that if the information available with other agencies is passed on to him, his officers could pursue the sane.
8.l As a result of the discussions held by the Committee with Secretary (Reveriue) and his principal officers, it is evident that:
(i) While, in the course of their normal activities, information on the linkages of the crime Syndicates sometimes becomes available, such information is not pursued on the score that it is not directly related to offences falling within the laws administered by these agencies;
(ii) such information is occasionally passed on by these agencies to the CBI and or IB;
(iii) the various agencies under the Department of Revenue do not specifically search out information on the linkages of crime Syndicates.
9. 1 Consequent to the Committee’s discussions with the Secretary (Revenue) and his principal officers, I held a series of further personal discussions with the Secretary (Revenue). At my request, Secretary (Revenue) gave me a personal note indicating his views, which are briefly as below:
(i) The information gathered by the various agencies under the Revenue Department, while gathering intelligence on offences relating to the laws administered by them, is generally not put to any use unless it is required to be passed on to other intelligence agencies outside the Department of Revenue.
(ii) The linkages developed by crime Syndicates get generally confirmed when pressure is mounted on the concerned agencies not to take action against the offenders or to go slow in the cases against them. Such pressures are mounted either immediately after a raid is conducted or at the time when prosecution is about to be initiated. Pressures are also exerted whenever corrupt and undesirable officers are shifted from sensitive assignments (Preventive Customs Divisions at the Airports, sensitive Collectorates in the Central Excise etc.).
(iii) In the narcotics arena, which includes cultivation of opium, manufacture of alkaloids, prevention of narcotics, smuggling etc. the financial stakes are astronomically high. Consequently, the level of corruption is of a very high order in this area of functioning and enormous pressures are brought to bear even when subordinate officials are posted away specially when the shift of an officer adversely affects the interests of those who are making easy money.
(iv) Narcotics trade has a world-wide network of smugglers who also have close links with terrorists. Terrorists indulge in narcotics trade to amass huge funds, in various foreign currencies, from which they source their procurement of weapons etc.
9.2 While the Department of Revenue has initiated a number of steps to deal with the activities of smugglers and to plug loop-holes in the system, Secretary (Revenue) has stated that a possible approach to effectively liquidating the linkages developed by the crime Syndicates would be to mercilessly prosecute the offenders without succumbing to any pressure whatsoever. He is of the view that once the offenders are deterrently punished under the law, their influence and strength will start declining, as also of all those who support them, wherever located. He has emphasised that for this objective being achieved it will be extremely necessary that: the entire governmental machinery involved in taking action against the crime Syndicates is allowed to perform its duties with total freedom; officers with impeccable integrity should be posted to head the various organisations which are responsible for taking action against tax offenders, smugglers etc; such officers should be selected with utmost care and provided sufficiently long tenures, giving them the clear mandate to ruthlessly punish the offenders; action must be taken to ensure the objective functioning of Courts which deal with the trial of economic offences; all cases before the Courts should be speedily concluded without the judicial officers coming under any pressure or succumbing to temptations; inefficient and corrupt elements in the various organisations venue must be weeded out and Government should take stringent action against officers who seek to exert political pressure for securing postings and appointments of their choice.
10.1 From the above narrated analysis, the following conclusions can be drawn:-
(i) On the basis of the extensive experience gained by our various concerned intelligence, investigative and enforcement agencies, it is apparent that crime Syndicates and Mafia organisations have established themselves in various parts of the country.
(ii) The various crime Syndicates /Mafia organisations have developed significant muscle and money power and established linkages with governmental functionaries, political leaders and others to be able to operate with impunity (as recently exemplified by the activities of the Memon Brothers and Dawood Ibrahim).
(iii) While the CBI and IB and the various agencies under the Department of Revenue, in their normal course of functioning, come across information relating to the linkages of crime Syndicates/Mafia organisations, there is presently no system under which they are expected to pass on such information to an indentified nodal agency. Sharing of such information is presently of an occasional nature and no evidence is available of the same having been put to any operational use (the only mentionable exception perhaps relates to the recent investigations into the activities of Memon Brothers and the Dawood gang on which several of our agencies were put to work collectively).
11.1 Even where an agency comes across certam information about the linkages of crime Syndicates, it has no mandate to immediately pass it on to one or more agencies. An agency which comes across information regarding linkages is also apprehensive that the sharing of such information may jeopardize its own functioning through premature leakage. In sum, the various agencies presently in the field take care to essentially focus on their respective charter of duties, dealing with the infringement of laws relating to their organisations and consciously putting aside any information on linkages which they may come across.
12. 1 In the discussions in lhe Committee, I asked each of the Members as well as the Secretary (Revenue) and his principal officers about their views regarding the establishment of a Nodal Agency for the collection, collation and operationalisation of all information relating to the activities of crime Syndicates. Broadly, the following approaches have been mooted:
(i) The DIB has stated that while considering the establishment of any nodal mechanism, "It must be appreciated that the problems has enormous impact on national security and is indeed highly political in nature". In this context, he has suggested that the nodal set up should be under the IB, which is even otherwise engaged in monitoring various political activities having a bearing on national security. He has recommended that "an exclusive Top Secret Cell be established in the IB to function as the Nodal Group for receipt of inputs from various security/revenue agencies which reveal a politician-bureaucrat-underworld nexus. Such sharing will be through personal communications in writing, while operating difficulties could be sorted out through periodic meetings among the heads of these organisations to be chaired by the Home Secretary". The Top Secret Cel1 will share all tactical and operational information with other concerned agencies on "need to know and act basis".
(ii) The other approach recommended is to set up a system under which the Heads of the various Intelligence and Revenue agencies shall meet on a regular basis and exchange vital information, without there being any leakage.
13.1 In the background of the discussions so far, there does not appear to be need for any further debate on the vital importance of setting up a nodal point to which all existing intelligence and Enforcement agencies (irrespective of the Department under which they are located ) shall promptly pass on any information which they may come across, which relates to the activities of crime Syndicates.
13.2 If the preposition in the preceding para is sustained, a decision will need to be taken regarding the Department/Ministry under which the nodal set-up should be located.
14.1 Under the existing arrangements for the transaction of Government business, the Ministry of Home Affairs is responsible for all matters relating to internal security. It is for this reason that the Intelligence Bureau is a part and parcel of this Ministry (It is only by tradition that the DIB reports directly to authorities
outside MHA). R&AW functions under the Cabinet Secretariat and deals with external intelligence. The various Intelligence, Investigation and Enforcement agencies dealing with the implementation of economic laws report to the Revenue Department under the Ministry of Finance. The CBI, which is the principal criminal investigation agency of the Centre, is under the Department of Personnel.
14.2 In my view, considerable care would have to be taken to ensure that the information which becomes available to the Nodal Cell is handled by a very senior and trust-worthy officer. Any leakage of such information would not only jeopardize potential action against the powerful criminal Syndicates, but may also be susceptible to political exploitation. Under all circumstances, it will have to be ensured that the information available with the nodal set-up is used strictly and entirely for stringent action against the crime Syndicates, without allowing any scope whatever of its being exploited for political gain.
14.3 In the preceding context, it would be logical if the nodal set-up is under the MHA, directly handled by the Home Secretary who can be assisted by one or more selected officers of the Ministry for the collation and compilation of all information received from IB, CBI, R&AW and the various agencies under the Department of Revenue The manner in which such information is operationalised would need to be confidentially discussed with the concerned Heads of Organisation and, as necessary, with Secretary (Revenue). It will also need to be ensured that the nodal set-up functions with extreme secrecy. Needless to say, any leakage whatever about the linkages of crime Syndicate senior Government functionaries or political leaders in the states or at the centre could have a destabilizing effect on the functioning of Government. As such, it would not appear prudent to entrust the functioning of the Nodal Cell to any level below that of the Home Secretary. Further, the government would also have to carefully consider and prescribe the authorities to whom the Home Secretary will report in regard to the sensitive information received by the nodal set-up as well as regarding the operations to be launched by one or more of the concerned agencies to apprehend, investigate and prosecute the offenders.
15.1 In the normal course this report would have been drafted by the Mernber Secretary and finalized by the Committee. Considering the nature of the issues involved, I did not consider it desirable to burden the Members of the Committee with any further involvement beyond the views expressed by them. Accordingly, I decided to personally dictate this Report.
15.2 I have prepared only three copies of this Report. One copy each is being submitted to MOS(IS) and HM, the third copy being retained by rne. After HM has perused this Report, I request him to consider discussing further action with finance Minister, MOS(IS) and myself. The emerging approach could thereafter be got approved from Prime Minister before being implemented. At that stage other concerned senior officers would be taken into confidence.
15.3 After an initial discussion at the level of MOS(IS) and HM I could send a copy of this Report to FM, before the issues are discussed with him.
Sd/-
(N. N. VOHRA )
HOME SCRETARY
5.10.93
HM [Copy No.1/3]
MOS [Copy No.2/3]
http://mahendra-agarwalonline.20m.com/PR_VohraCommitteeReport.htm
Kashmir is the Defining Issue of Indian Identity
by Dr. Subramanian Swamy
[Lecture on July 9, 2008 to Indian students and Americans scholars at MIT, USA]
I believe that the Kashmir "issue" can no more be solved by dialogue either with the Pakistanis or the Hurriyat. This is because the Pakistan army has now a majority of captains and colonels owing allegiance to the Taliban. In another five years, they will reach, by promotions, the corp commander level. We know that the government in Pakistan is controlled by the seven corp commanders of the army. Therefore a Taliban government in Pakistan is inevitable and a jehad against India the logical consequence of the same. In turn the Hurriyat is an organization that cannot go against Pakistan.
Hence India has about five years to prepare for a decisive and defining war with Pakistan and we must prepare to win it. We therefore have to throw out of office in the coming elections all those Indian politicians who crave or preen themselves on being popular in Pakistan by sounding reasonable and secular as also equivocating on every issue. For the survival of the ancient civilization of India we have to win that inevitable war and recover the whole of Kashmir.
I will not blame the jehadis for the coming war. They are after all programmed that way by Islamic theology. I will blame ourselves for not understanding the fundamentals of Islam as propounded in the Sira and the Hadith. It teaches that if Muslims are in a majority, they must rule [Darul Islam], and then everyone else is a dhimmi and a kafir who do not have equal rights of worship. Thus in Saudi Arabia, you cannot even display a picture of a Hindu god inside your own home ! When Muslims are in a hopeless minority, then Sira and Hadith urges Muslims to make a deal with the majority and make no demands[Darul Ahad]. In US and Australia for example, Muslims will therefore never ask for separate shariat personal law. If Muslims are not hopelessly in a minority, then Islam directs that true Muslims conduct subversions and act against all human values to leverage their position[Darul Harab] to become of defining influence in the polity and ultimately rulers. We saw this in Kashmir recently when the government was made to cave in on the most humane gesture of allotting land to make Hindu pilgrims feel comfortable while on arduous journey to Amarnath caves.And we have it on the authority of the Chief Minister of the state that the agitation against the allotment was financed by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
It is foolish therefore in the face of this reality to expound the banal sentiment that "all Muslims are not terrorists or fanatics". Of course that is true. Or that Koran is a message of peace. May be it is. However, the Islam of the cutting edge of Muslim thought propounded by leaders such as Osama Bin Laden is in Sira and Hadith, which calls on the faithful to wage war against the infidels who cannot strike back effectively and crush them.
The struggle for Kashmir by the jehadis thus is not just for independence. They instead want a Darul Islam there and for the state to become a part of the Caliphate. Hindus are a special target because despite Iran, Iraq, Egypt and other countries becoming 100 percent Muslims after less than two decades of conquest and brutalization, India after a thousand years of massacres, mayhem and rape remained dominantly Hindu. This is a living affront for the fundamentalist Muslim, and in their seminaries and madrassas in Iran and Saudi Arabia, they even today debate and agonize over it.
Contrary to the British imperialist propaganda, Hindus did not just lie down and be conquered by foreign invaders. Hindu fighting spirit had never dimmed even if weakened by traitors within. Periodically Hindus rose in revolt symbolized by the Vijayanagaram empire[which lasted 300 years] or in Shivaji's bravery, or Guru Gobind Singh's campaigns or the Mahratta national onslaught.
Most of us thus remained Hindus, defiant, even if in poverty and misery singing Vande Mataram. This the true history of India which the fundamentalist Muslim and the British imperialist historians cannot bear to acknowledge.
Accommodation and compromise with Islamic terrorists is self-defeating and suicide. We have instead to fight back, for which Kashmir is the starting point. Hindu renaissance, long overdue, will be nurtured if we look for an opportunity to seize back the occupied areas of Kashmir, and make the jehadis feel that in India there can only be Darul Ahad for Muslims. We had opportunities earlier to demonstrate that: e.g.,in 1948, 1971, 1999, and 2001. But we let it go.
Hence, let there be no more intellectual confusion about the identity of India as a Hindu Rashtra, which means a land of Hindus and those others who acknowledge proudly that their ancestors are Hindus. If Muslims acknowledge this truth, then they are welcome as a part of our family. And those who do not so acknowledge cannot be equal citizens in India. Hence, we shall not agree to any more truncation of Indian territory
We have to therefore disown UN Resolutions and India-Pakistan treaties such as signed in Simla]1972] as unauthorized Nehruvian policy blunders. The legality of the Instrument of Accession signed in favour of India by the then Maharaja of J&K on October 26, 1947 has to prevail. Otherwise it will create a plethora of legal issues including what will become the status of the Maharaja if we abrogate this Instrument. Will Dr. Karan Singh, the son of Maharaja Hari Singh, have then a claim to be regarded again as an independent and sovereign King of J&K ? In the Junagadh issue, Pakistan had held the Instrument once signed is "final, irrevocable, and not requiring the wishes of the people to be ascertained". That is the correct position. But the Junagadh Nawab after signing the Instrument in favour of Pakistan, invaded the neighbouring princely states, states which had acceded to India. So when the Indian Army was moved by Patel to defend these areas, the Nawab ran away to Pakistan. His subjects were mostly Hindu who then welcomed the Indian army.
Furthermore, on what legal basis can we de novo seek to ascertain the wishes of the people of J&K when the Indian Independence Act[1947] passed by the British Parliament makes no provision for the same ? After all it was this same Act which created a legal entity called Pakistan, carved out from the united India. India under the Act was a settled and continuing entity out which the British Parliament made a new entity called Pakistan. Never in previous history there was ever a country called Pakistan. The concept itself was formulated only in 1947.
By what mechanism can then Pakistan today seek to amend or even de-recognise the Act without unwittingly undermining the legal status of Pakistan itself? That is, if the Instrument of Accession is called into question, will not Partition itself be subject to challenge as without legal basis on the same consideration? I raise this question also because in the case of Beruberi in Eastern India, the transfer of that area to Bangla Desh although agreed to, has been enmeshed in prolonged litigation in the Indian Supreme Court because of Article 1 of the Indian Constitution which bars de-merger of any Indian territory after 1950.
Indian army jawans created Bangla Desh out of Pakistan. But despite that, and drunk with their Darul Islam status, the Bengali Muslims have not only driven out the Hindus or butchered them or forcibly converted them but millions of Bengali Muslims have sneaked into India and are happily working with Hindus in India. Partition was agreed to by Hindus only for those Muslims who could not bear to live under Hindu hegemony. And now after getting their territory, they cannot now say that they are happy to live in India with Hindus.
Hence, a virat Hindu Rashtra should tell Bangla Desh to take back their Muslims or hand over one-third of Bangla Desh territory as compensation. If they do not agree, then we must send two divisions of Indian army from Sylhet to Khulna and annex one third of north Bangla Desh as our due for bearing the economic and political burden of Bangla Deshis in our country. This will make our access to Assam and Northeast much easier too.But most of all it will send a powerful and salutary signal to Pakistani terrorists: that Hindus will no more be passive.
These actions are possible if we gear up diplomatically for it. Today the world is sick of the terrorism and the greed of Muslims nations to make money out the sale of oil which they have got by sheer accident of geology. Hence, we must make strong allies. Israel is one such country. We must find ways to make China see our interests. It can be done if we know how to come to an understanding with them. This is essential for isolating Pakistan. At present China has begun to see the tinder box that Pakistan has become. Uighurs from Xinjiang have been to madrassas of Pakistan for training in subversion in Urumuchi and to sabotage the Beijing Olympics This worries China. It should concern us too.
Hence to lay the foundation for the liberation of Kashmir, we must have President's Rule for some time. India should refuse to engage in any dialogue on Kashmir in which the other side does not accept the whole of Kashmir as an integral and inalienable part of India. The people of Kashmir should be left in no doubt in their minds where the citizens of Hindu Rashtra stand on the future of the state: that it lies with us. Every Hindu has a claim on Kashmir. I for one claim it because my gotra is Kashyapa. It was rshi Kashyapa who invented Kashmir out the Dal lake. Hence my claim.
We should undo the "cleansing" of the state of Kashmiri Hindu Pandits by sending 1 million ex-servicemen and families into the Kashmir valley for re-settlement. Article 370 of the Constitution will have to be removed for that purpose, but according to the Constitution itself, it is supposed to be a "temporary provision" not requiring a Parliamentary two-thirds majority for amendment. It can be erased by a Presidential Notification on the recommendation of the Union Cabinet.
Then we await a war. We do not have to go to war with Pakistan on Kashmir because a Talibanised Pakistan will provide us with the opportunity. What I am advocating here is that we prepare mentally and militarily for that eventuality, and having been provided that opportunity, go for the jackpot-- to use an American slang.
Read also: http://www.scribd.com/doc/3963268/ahimsa-and-dharma-Kalyan-Viswanathan
A brilliant article by Kalyan Viswanathan, "Bhagavad Gita and Mahatma Gandhi -- dharma and ahimsa; the relevance of ahimsa in resolving political conflicts today; responding to islamic terrorism." (July 2008).
This note includes three reports:
1. George Bush’s undertaking to investigate Paki role in the attack on Indian mission in Kabul
2. Pioneer edit on Islamist in valley with particular reference to Saudi-Paki money fomenting islamist jehadi activity in the valley
3. Summary of Vohra Committee Report on Internal Security (of topical importance because Vohra now happened to be Governor of Jammu and Kashmir and has just visited and prayed at the sacred Amarnath temple).
4. Note on the importance of the valley for Hindu identity (Dr. Swamy’s lecture).
These have to read with A. Surya Prakash’s article on the denial of land to Hindus in Kashmir (Pioneer, July 15, 2008). http://dailypioneer.com/indexn12.asp?main_variable=EDITS&file_name=edit3%2Etxt&counter_img=3
This is the most serious challenge to Hindu identity and national sovereignty. The next Government should resolve to delete Art. 370 from the Constitution by a Presidential proclamation (this is all it takes to absorb Jammu and Kashmir into the mainstream of national interests). Given the background of Paki and Saudi involvement, India should resolve to send Antonia back to Luciana and engage the foreign forces at work in the Valley, if necessary in coordination with the NATO forces fighting the war against the islamist jehadis in Afghanistan. Surely, the war will spill over into the Paki occupied portion of the valley; it is the bounden duty of the Government of India, the Indian State to get rid of this occupation.
The pace of development of Jammu and Kashmir will gain rapidity once Jammu, Kashmir and Leh are declared as separate states and Indians allowed to invest in developmental projects in all these three states.
Kalyanaraman
Press Trust Of India Washington, July 16, 2008 First Published: 11:47 IST(16/7/2008)
Last Updated: 14:52 IST(16/7/2008)
US to probe Afghan charge on Pak role in Indian mission attack
The US will "investigate" Afghan President Hamid Karzai's allegation of involvement of Pakistan's ISI in the recent terrorist attack in his country, including the bombing of Indian embassy, President George W Bush has said.
"First of all, we'll investigate his charge and we'll work with his service...To get to the bottom of his allegation," Bush told reporters when asked in Washington about Karzai statement.
The US President's statement came days after US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said there was no evidence available of Pakistan's involvement in the attack on Indian embassy in Kabul last week that killed its Brigadier-rank defence attache, an IFS officer and 58 others.
Bush said extremists were coming out of parts of Pakistan into Afghanistan which "should be troubling to Pakistan" as it was to Washington.
"No question, however, that some extremists are coming out of parts of Pakistan into Afghanistan. And that's troubling to us, it's troubling Afghanistan, and it should be troubling to Pakistan.
"We share a common enemy; that would be extremists who use violence to either disrupt democracy or prevent democracy from taking hold. Al-Qaeda is -- they're there. We have hurt Al-Qaeda hard -- hit them hard and hurt them around the world, including in Pakistan," he added.
Bush said that the United States would jointly with Pakistan continue to apply pressure on Al Qaida.
"I certainly hope that the government understands the dangers of extremists moving in their country. I think they do," Bush said.
In a strongly worded statement on Monday, Karzai had said the attacks in Afghanistan were "carried out by the intelligence administration of Pakistan, its military intelligence institutions."
http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx?Id=bd617faf-0539-4ab2-9881-1b5fd40785f8
Islamism in Valley
The Pioneer Edit Desk (July 16, 2008)
Protest prelude to greater jihad?
While the Congress itself has downplayed it, the statement by the former Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad, whose actions while in office have set him apart from his self-seeking and Islam-pandering predecessors, that the violent agitation against the transfer of land -- for temporary shelters and facilities to be used by Hindu pilgrims visiting the Amaranth shrine -- was funded by Pakistani and Saudi Arabian sources, is actually fairly noteworthy. It amounts to the first serious admission, by a politician who has been in Government in Srinagar, that the so-called 'Kashmir cause' is actually camouflage for a global Islamist network that transcends borders and barriers. That the Saudis have got into the game is particularly disturbing as it would indicate a return to the early-1990s when petro-dollars funded the surge in radical Islam in this part of the world. The parallels are eerie. In 1990, after the defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and after American retreat from the region, the internationalist jihadi armies turned their attention to new battlegrounds. The Kashmir Valley was one such. Jammu & Kashmir saw extensive blood-letting at the hands of not just Kashmiri and Pakistani terrorists, but Afghans and Yemenis, too. Indeed, in that turbulent period, Osama bin Laden and the nascent Al Qaeda trained terrorists at camps in Afghanistan for deployment in Jammu & Kashmir. The logistical patrons were Pakistani Generals at the Inter-Services Intelligence and rogue elements in the teeming establishment in Riyadh. Today, history may be repeating itself. The American-led forces are facing a resurgent, Pakistan-backed Taliban offensive. The jihadis smell success, perhaps even triumph. The fact that a new, untested American President will be in charge in 2009, gives them even more hope. India cannot escape the spill-over. Perhaps, as the recent Amarnath episode suggests, the pan-Islamic coalition is already training its guns in this direction. That the All-Party Hurriyat Conference and the PDP have been at the forefront of the chilling protests against the allotment of land for Hindu pilgrims only adds to suspicions. These groups have been closely linked to radical Islamist organisations, tacitly or otherwise. The Hurriyat is openly Islamist, comparing the recent Amarnath episode to the Israeli attempt to settle Jews on territories Palestinians claim as their own.
Sometimes a simple sentence anticipates a larger truth. Mr Azad's attack on his political opponents the other day may have been just such an example. If the Pakistani meddling in Jammu & Kashmir is being re-intensified in an election year -- admittedly, it had never gone away in the first place -- and if the Saudis are entering the fray, India can brace for a long-drawn terrorist war. With vast tracts of Pakistani territory under the control of radical forces and the private armies of mullahs, India can no longer pretend that the notional regime in Islamabad offers it a buffer. The hard reality is that the frontline has shifted in these past seven years -- since 9/11 -- and India, not Pakistan, is now the frontline state; Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is the war zone. The resurgence of radical Islamist groups, after three or four quiet years, in the Valley indicates a greater design. In a nutshell, that is what Mr Azad is trying to warn New Delhi about.
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Vohra Committee Report
[Scanned and compared from the publicly available, i.e., abridged, document,
with no guarantee of authenticity. Please obtain the original from Home Ministry.]
VOHRA COMMITTEE REPORT
MINISTRY OF HOME AFFAIRS
l. l Government had (through its Order No.S/7937/SS(ISP)/93 dated 9th July ‘93) established a Committee, comprised as below, to take stock of all available information about the activities of crime Syndicates/Mafia organisations which had developed links with and were being protected by Government functionaries and political personalities. Based on the recommendations of the Committee, Government shall determine the need, if any, to establish a special organisation/agency to regularly collect information and pursue cases against such elements:
(i) Home Secretary Chairman
(ii) Secretary (R) Member
(iii) DIB Member
(iv) Director CBI Member
(v) JS(PP) MHA Member Secy.
1.2 The Committee was authorised to invite senior officers of various concerned Departments to gather the required information.
1.3 Special Secretary (Internal Security & Police), MHA, was subsequently added as a Member of the Committee. The Committee was desired to submit its Report within 3 months.
2.1 In the first meeting of the Committee (held on l5th July ‘93), I had explained to the Members that Government had established the Committee after seeing the reports of our Intelligence and Investigation agencies on the activities/linkages of the Dawood Ibrahim gang, consequent to the bomb blasts in Bombay in March 1993. From these various reports, it was apparent that the activities of Memon Brothers and Dawood Ibrahim had progressed over the years, leading to the establishment of a powerful network. This could not have happened without these elements having been protected by the functionaries of the concerned Government departments, specially Customs, Income Tax, Police and others. It was, therefore, necessary to identify the linkages and to also determine how such information could be timely collected and acted upon in the future.
2.2 In the course of the discussions, I perceived that some of the Members appeared to have some hesitation in openly expressing their views and also seemed unconvinced that Government actually intended to pursue such matters. Accordingly, I addressed separate personal letters to each of the Mernbers of the Committee seeking their well considered suggestions and recommendations. Their responses are briefly brought out below.
Secretary (R&AW)
2.3 The various offices abroad of this Agency have limited strength and are largely geared to the collection of military, economic, scientific and political intelligence. R&AW monitor the activities of certain organisations abroad only insofar as they relate to their involvement with narco-rerrorist elements and smuggling arms, ammunition, explosives, etc. into the country. It does not monitor the activities of criminal elements abroad, which are mainly confined to "normal smuggling without any links to terrorist elements". The present strength of the Agency’s offices abroad would not permit it to enlarge its field of activities. If, however, there is evidence to suggest that these organisations have links with Intelligence agencies of other countries, particularly Pakistan, and that they are being used or are likely to be used by such countries for destabilising our economy, it would become R&AW’s responsibility to monitor their activities, as is being done by this Agency to collect vital information in regard to the investigations in the Bombay bomb blasts case.
2.4 The creation of a nodal agency to collect information regarding the activities of Mafia organisations is very essential. All the existing information/data available with R&AW, IB and CBI could be made available to this nodal agency. R&AW will nominate an officer of suitable rank to Iiaise with the nodal agency on a
regular basis to enable expeditious follow-up action.
Director CBI
3. l A Report on the nexus between the Bombay City Police and the Bombay under-world was prepared by CBI in 1986. It would be useful to institute a fresh study by CBI, on the basis of which appropriate administrative/ legal measures could be initiated.
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3.2 An organised crime Syndicate/Mafia generally commences its activities by indulging in petty crime at the local level, mostly relating to illicit distillation/gambling/organised satta and prostitution in the larger towns. In port towns, their activities involve smuggling and sale of imported goods and progressively graduate
to narcotics and drug trafficking. In the bigger cities, the main source of income relates to real estate - forcibly occupying lands/buildings, procuring such properties at cheap rates by forcing out the existing occupants/tenants etc. Over time, the money power thus acquired is used for building up contacts with bureaucrats and politicians and expansion of activities with impunity. The money power is used to develop a network of muscle-power which is also used by the politicians during elections.
3.3 CBI has reported that all over India crime Syndicates have become a law unto themselves. Even in the smaller towns and rural areas, muscle-men have become the order of the day. Hired assassins have become a part of these organisations. The nexus between the criminal gangs, police, bureaucracy and politicians has come out clearly in various parts of the country. The existing criminal justice system, which was essentially designed to deal with the individual offences/crimes, is unable to deal with the activities of the Mafia; the provisions of law in regard economic offences are weak; there are insurmountable legal difficulties in attaching/confiscation of the property acquired through Mafia activities.
3.4 It has been suggested that the menace has first to be tackled at the local level where the agencies of the State and the concerned Central Enforcement Agencies like Customs and Excise, Income Tax etc. would be required to take effective action. In cases where a crime Syndicate has graduated to big business, it would be necessary to conduct detailed investigations into its assets, both movable and immovable. It has been stressed that when such action is not timely and effectively taken, the lower functionaries of the concerned State and Central Departments/organisations start over-looking the activities of the crime Syndicates. To elucidate this point, the Director CBI has given the example of IQBAL MIRCHI of Bombay who, till the late 80’s, was
merely a visitor to passenger and carrier ships to obtain liquor and cigarettes for selling the same at a profit. In the last 3-4 years, MIRCHI acquired real estate valuing crores of rupees; he has many bank accounts and has been paying lakhs of rupees to his carriers. The growth of MIRCHI is due to the fact that the concerned Enforcement agencies did not timely take action against him and, later, this perhaps became difficult on account of the enormous patronage that he had developed. If MIRCHI is investigated, the entire patronage enjoyed by him and his linkages will come to light. Director CBI has observed that there are many such cases, as that of MIRCHI where the initial failure has led to the emergence of Mafia giants who have become too big to be tackled.
3.5 Director CBI has stated that the main mode of communications/contacts of the Mafias operating at the international level is through telephonic communications. Referring to the useful leads emerging from the investigations into the activities of Dawood Ibrahim, a Mafia leader, the director CBI has stated that the effective monitoring of the telephone calls made from India/received from abroad would yield useful information and, for this being done, Government may grant sanction to monitor certain telephone connections.
3.6 The assistance of Banks is an essential input. The Bank Managers can be placed under obligation to render reports on all heavy transactions and suspicious accounts to the Enforcement agencies. Such a practice obtains in UK.
3.7 Concluding his analysis, Director CBI has made the following suggestions to bring under control the activities of the criminal Syndicates:
(i) Identification of offences and award of deterrent punishments, including preventive detention.
(ii) Trial procedures should be simplified and hastened.
(iii) Surveillance should be carried out through finger printing, photographs and dossiers.
(iv) Monitoring mechanisms should be established at the State and Central levels.
(v) Establishment of Special Cells in the States CIDs and CBI.
(vi) Suitable amendments should be introduced in the existing laws to more effectively deal with the activities of Maixa organisations, etc.; this would also include review of the existing laws.
(vii) A detailed case study of l0-15 cases would provide useful information regarding the administrative/legal measures, which would be required to be taken to effectively tackle the functioning of Mafia organizations. The CBI can do this within a short period.
Director, IB
6.1 DIB has reported that due to the progressive decline in the values of public life in the country "warning signals of sinister linkage between thc underworld politicians and the bureaucracy have been evident with disturbing regularity, as exemplified by the exposures of the networks of the Bombay blast case". He has
recommended itnmediate attention to:-
(i) Identification of the nexus between the criminals/Mafias and anti-national elements on the one hand and bureaucrats, politicians and other sensitively located individuals on the other.
(ii) Identification of the nature and dimensions of these linkages and the modus operandi of their operations.
(iii) Assessment of the impact of these linkages on the various institutions, viz., the electoral, political, economic, law and order and the administrative apparatus.
(iv) Nexus, if any, between the domestic linkages with foreign intelligence.
(v) Necessary action to show effective action to counteract/ neutralise the Mafia activities.
(vi) Political and legal constraints in dealing with the covert/illegal functioning of the linkages.
6.2 Like the Director CBI, the DIB has also stated that there has been a rapid spread and growth of criminal gangs, armed senas, drug Mafias, smuggling gangs, drug peddlers and economic lobbies in the country which have, over the years, developed an extensive network of contacts with the bureaucrats/Government functionaries at the local levels, politicians, media persons and strategically located individuals in the non-State sector. Some of these Syndicates also have international linkages, including the foreign intelligence agencies. In this context, the DIB has given the following examples
(i) In certain States, like Bihar, Haryana and UP, these gangs enjoy the patronage of local level politicians, cutting across party lines and the protection of governmental functionaries. Some political leaders become the leaders of these gangs/armed senas and, over the years, get themselves elected to local bodies, State Assemblies and the national Parliament. Resultantly, such elements have acquired considerable political clout seriously jeopardizing the smooth functioning of the administration and the safety of life and property of the common man, causing a sense of despair and alienation among the people.
(ii) The big smuggling Syndicates, having international linkages, have spread into and infected the various economic and financial activities, including havala transactions, circulation of black money and operations of a vicious parallel economy causing serious damage to the economic fibre of the country. These Syndicates have acquired substantial financial and muscle power and social respectability and have successfully corrupted the government machinery at all levels and wield enough influence to make the task of Investigating and Prosecuting agencies extremely difficult; even the members of the Judicial system have not escaped the embrace of the Mafia.
(iii) Certain elements of the Mafia have shifted to narcotics, drugs and weapon smuggling and established narco-terrorism networks, specially in the States of J&K, Punjab, Gujarat and Maharashtra. The cost of contesting elections has thrown the politician into the lap of these elements and led to a grave compromise by officials of the preventive/detective systems. The virus has spread to almost all the centres in the country; the coastal and the border States have been particularly affected.
(iv) The Bombay bomb blast case and the communal, riots in Surat and Ahmedabad have demonstrated how the Indian underworld has been exploited by the Pak ISI and the latter’s network in UAE to cause sabotage, subversion and communal tension in various parts of the country. The investigations into the Bombay bomb blast cases have revealed extensive linkages of the underworld in the various governmental agencies, political circles, business sector and the film world.
6.3 DIB has stated that the network of the Mafia is virtually running a parallel Government, pushing the State apparatus into irrelevance. It is thus most immediately necessary that an institution is established to effectively deal with the menace. In this connection, the DIB has stated:
(i) Presently, there. is no system/ mechanism which is specifically designated to collect and collate intelligence pertaining to the linkages developed by crime Syndicates/Mafias with the governmental set up. Nonetheless, the various intelligence/investigation/enforcement agencies collect, in the normal course of their functioning, information about the nexus between the bureaucracy and politicians with the Mafia gangs, smugglers and the underworld. These agencies use such available inputs "only within the narrow confines of their work charter and choose not to take undue cognisance and follow-up action, leave alone sharing with any other agencies". Thus, all these agencies "function within their own cocoons, with the result that a plethora of information fails to get specific and purposeful attention needed for the exposure of the Linkages". It is, therefore, necessary to immediately have an institutionalized system which "while giving total freedom to the various agencies to pursue their charter of work, would simultaneously cast on them the onus of sharing such inputs to a nodal outfit whose job will be to process this information for attention of a single designated authority". This will enable the nodal Group to provide useful leads to the various agencies and, over time, a progressive database will get generated "to facilitate periodic reviews and analysis which could then be passed to a designated body".
7.1 As would be seen from the afore-stated brief discussion, specially the views expressed by Director CBI and DIB, it is evident that the muscle power of the crime Syndicates is sustained by their enormous financial power which, in turn, is, secured by the Mafia elements by committing economic offences with impunity. In this context, I held detailed personal discussions with Secretary (Revenue) under whose control operate the various economic intelligence/investigative/enforcement agencies.
7.2 The Department of Revenue functions through the following major agencies:
(i) Central Board of Excise & Customs (CBEC)
Inter alia, CBSE is responsible for the prevention of smuggling, In this and other tasks, it is assisted by the by the Director General of Revenue Intelligence (DGRI) and the Directorate General of Anti-Evasion (DGAE). The DGRI deals with the evasion of customs duties; the DGAE with Excise duty evasion.
(ii) Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT)
Income Tax Department administers the Income Tax Act, Wealth Tax Act, etc.
(iii) Central Economic Intelligence Bureau (CEIB)
The CEIB is responsible for coordinating and strengthening the intelligence gathering activities and the investigative and enforcement actions of the various agencies responsible for investigation into economic offences and the enforcement of economic laws. The CEIB is responsible for maintaining liaison with the concemed Departments Directorates both at the Centre and at the State levels and is expected to provide overall direction to the investigative agencies under the Department of Revenue.
The CEIB is expected, inter alia, to attend to the following tasks:
(a) Identification of major sources generating black money; directing and developing intelligence about such sources; planning and coordinating action and operations against such sources.
(b) Assisting the various enforcement agencies in strengthening the intelligence gathering infrastructure and building up their capability for storage and retrieval of intelligence.
(c) Conducting investigative and analytical studies in difficult areas of black money operations and monitoring indicators thereof.
(iv) Enforcement Directorate
This Directorate is concerned with the enforcement of the investigation and penal provision of the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act; collection of intelligence relating to foreign exchange offences; enquiries into suspected violations of the provisions of FERA, etc.
(v) Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB)
The NCB is responsible for the administration of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act. It is responsible for coordination with different Central and State Government Departments/Ministries and the various Central and State law enforcement agencies for the implementation of the NDPS Act. I explained to Secretary (Revenue) the broad considerations on account of which the government had set up a Committee to look into the linkages developed by the Mafia elements. He informed me that he had recently held a meeting with senior representatives of the RBI, the Chairman CBEC, Chairman CBDT and the Economic Intelligence Council in the Department of Revenue, and readily agreed with my request to attend a meeting of the Committee along with his concerned officers for a full discussion on the issues before the Committee. Accordingly, I arranged a meeting of the Committee (30th Aug ‘93) to hear the views of Seeretary (Revenue), who was accompanied by chairman CBDT, DGRI, Member (Customs) and Director (Enforcement). During the course of the discussions with Secretary (Revenue) and his aforesaid principal officers, the following significant observations were made:
(i) In the normal course of his work, to detect violations of Customs & Excise laws, the DGRI comes across information on linkages crime Syndicates and governmental functionaries etc. As following of such information is not within the charter of duties of DGRI, his officers focus primarily on the information relating to the violation of laws relating to their charter.
(ii) As in the case of DGRT, indirect information also becomes available the CBDT about linkages. Here again, not being directly relating to their charter of responsibilities, the CBDT do not follow up such leads.
(iii) While the NCB is specifically responsible for booking drug traffickers, with the increasing importance being given to Narco-terrorism, the NCB has been asked to gather further information so that the real king-pins in the narcotics trade can be apprehended.
(iv) The Directorate of’ Enforcement comes across information on linkages and passes it on to the CBI and IB.
(v) Of late, currency amounting to crores of rupees is being seized, invariably packed in suitcases and gunny bags. The Banks are reluctant to pass on informaton about account holders to CBDT and do not allow their officers to hold exploratory enquiries.
(vi) While a certain arnount of information is shared between the various organisations under the Department of Revenue, and those under the MHA and Cabinet Secretariat, the exchanges are sporadic and limited. This is perhaps due to the fact that each concerned organisation/agency is anxious to protect its sources and is apprehensive that a full sharing of all information might jeopardise its operations, on account of premature leakage of information.
(vii) While DGRI, Director (Enforcement) and DG NCB are authorised to undertake phone tapping of suspected offenders, the DGRI has not been allowed to enforce surveillance on the telephonic communications of political personalities.
(viii) Senior Police officers, even in the border States, are not trained or adequately informed of the work done by the Directorate of Enforcement, specially in regard to money laundering operations.
(ix) Information about the activities of drug traffickers is passed on by DG NCB to the concerned State Governments and their agencies. However, niggardly responses by the latter and prolonged delays in the disposal of cases before the Courts seriously hampers. the effective functioning of the NCB. While the NDPS Act prescribes the award of deterrent punishments to offenders, the results are to the contrary. It is necessary that the Directorates of Prosecution in the State Governments are urgently brought under the control of the State Police.
7.5 Secretary (Revenue) stated that the field officers of his various Departments were faced with various problems, amongst which are:
(i) The utter inadequacy of the criminal justice system; cases are not heard timely; functioning of the Government lawyers is grossly inadequate; all this results in a low percentage of convictions and mild punishments. Unless the criminal justice system is geared up, the work of the enforcement agencies cannot be effective.
(ii) The field officers of the various agencies of the Revenue Department are often pressurized by senior government functionaries/political leaders, apparently at the behest of crime Syndicates/Mafia elements. Unless the field level officers are offered effective protection, they cannot be expected to maintain interest in vigorously pursuing action against the activities of such elements.
7.6 Chairman CBDT stated that insofar as the functioning of his officers is concerned, whenever they come into possession of any information regarding the violation of any other law, they pass it on to the concerned agency. He suggested that if the information available with other agencies is passed on to him, his officers could pursue the sane.
8.l As a result of the discussions held by the Committee with Secretary (Reveriue) and his principal officers, it is evident that:
(i) While, in the course of their normal activities, information on the linkages of the crime Syndicates sometimes becomes available, such information is not pursued on the score that it is not directly related to offences falling within the laws administered by these agencies;
(ii) such information is occasionally passed on by these agencies to the CBI and or IB;
(iii) the various agencies under the Department of Revenue do not specifically search out information on the linkages of crime Syndicates.
9. 1 Consequent to the Committee’s discussions with the Secretary (Revenue) and his principal officers, I held a series of further personal discussions with the Secretary (Revenue). At my request, Secretary (Revenue) gave me a personal note indicating his views, which are briefly as below:
(i) The information gathered by the various agencies under the Revenue Department, while gathering intelligence on offences relating to the laws administered by them, is generally not put to any use unless it is required to be passed on to other intelligence agencies outside the Department of Revenue.
(ii) The linkages developed by crime Syndicates get generally confirmed when pressure is mounted on the concerned agencies not to take action against the offenders or to go slow in the cases against them. Such pressures are mounted either immediately after a raid is conducted or at the time when prosecution is about to be initiated. Pressures are also exerted whenever corrupt and undesirable officers are shifted from sensitive assignments (Preventive Customs Divisions at the Airports, sensitive Collectorates in the Central Excise etc.).
(iii) In the narcotics arena, which includes cultivation of opium, manufacture of alkaloids, prevention of narcotics, smuggling etc. the financial stakes are astronomically high. Consequently, the level of corruption is of a very high order in this area of functioning and enormous pressures are brought to bear even when subordinate officials are posted away specially when the shift of an officer adversely affects the interests of those who are making easy money.
(iv) Narcotics trade has a world-wide network of smugglers who also have close links with terrorists. Terrorists indulge in narcotics trade to amass huge funds, in various foreign currencies, from which they source their procurement of weapons etc.
9.2 While the Department of Revenue has initiated a number of steps to deal with the activities of smugglers and to plug loop-holes in the system, Secretary (Revenue) has stated that a possible approach to effectively liquidating the linkages developed by the crime Syndicates would be to mercilessly prosecute the offenders without succumbing to any pressure whatsoever. He is of the view that once the offenders are deterrently punished under the law, their influence and strength will start declining, as also of all those who support them, wherever located. He has emphasised that for this objective being achieved it will be extremely necessary that: the entire governmental machinery involved in taking action against the crime Syndicates is allowed to perform its duties with total freedom; officers with impeccable integrity should be posted to head the various organisations which are responsible for taking action against tax offenders, smugglers etc; such officers should be selected with utmost care and provided sufficiently long tenures, giving them the clear mandate to ruthlessly punish the offenders; action must be taken to ensure the objective functioning of Courts which deal with the trial of economic offences; all cases before the Courts should be speedily concluded without the judicial officers coming under any pressure or succumbing to temptations; inefficient and corrupt elements in the various organisations venue must be weeded out and Government should take stringent action against officers who seek to exert political pressure for securing postings and appointments of their choice.
10.1 From the above narrated analysis, the following conclusions can be drawn:-
(i) On the basis of the extensive experience gained by our various concerned intelligence, investigative and enforcement agencies, it is apparent that crime Syndicates and Mafia organisations have established themselves in various parts of the country.
(ii) The various crime Syndicates /Mafia organisations have developed significant muscle and money power and established linkages with governmental functionaries, political leaders and others to be able to operate with impunity (as recently exemplified by the activities of the Memon Brothers and Dawood Ibrahim).
(iii) While the CBI and IB and the various agencies under the Department of Revenue, in their normal course of functioning, come across information relating to the linkages of crime Syndicates/Mafia organisations, there is presently no system under which they are expected to pass on such information to an indentified nodal agency. Sharing of such information is presently of an occasional nature and no evidence is available of the same having been put to any operational use (the only mentionable exception perhaps relates to the recent investigations into the activities of Memon Brothers and the Dawood gang on which several of our agencies were put to work collectively).
11.1 Even where an agency comes across certam information about the linkages of crime Syndicates, it has no mandate to immediately pass it on to one or more agencies. An agency which comes across information regarding linkages is also apprehensive that the sharing of such information may jeopardize its own functioning through premature leakage. In sum, the various agencies presently in the field take care to essentially focus on their respective charter of duties, dealing with the infringement of laws relating to their organisations and consciously putting aside any information on linkages which they may come across.
12. 1 In the discussions in lhe Committee, I asked each of the Members as well as the Secretary (Revenue) and his principal officers about their views regarding the establishment of a Nodal Agency for the collection, collation and operationalisation of all information relating to the activities of crime Syndicates. Broadly, the following approaches have been mooted:
(i) The DIB has stated that while considering the establishment of any nodal mechanism, "It must be appreciated that the problems has enormous impact on national security and is indeed highly political in nature". In this context, he has suggested that the nodal set up should be under the IB, which is even otherwise engaged in monitoring various political activities having a bearing on national security. He has recommended that "an exclusive Top Secret Cell be established in the IB to function as the Nodal Group for receipt of inputs from various security/revenue agencies which reveal a politician-bureaucrat-underworld nexus. Such sharing will be through personal communications in writing, while operating difficulties could be sorted out through periodic meetings among the heads of these organisations to be chaired by the Home Secretary". The Top Secret Cel1 will share all tactical and operational information with other concerned agencies on "need to know and act basis".
(ii) The other approach recommended is to set up a system under which the Heads of the various Intelligence and Revenue agencies shall meet on a regular basis and exchange vital information, without there being any leakage.
13.1 In the background of the discussions so far, there does not appear to be need for any further debate on the vital importance of setting up a nodal point to which all existing intelligence and Enforcement agencies (irrespective of the Department under which they are located ) shall promptly pass on any information which they may come across, which relates to the activities of crime Syndicates.
13.2 If the preposition in the preceding para is sustained, a decision will need to be taken regarding the Department/Ministry under which the nodal set-up should be located.
14.1 Under the existing arrangements for the transaction of Government business, the Ministry of Home Affairs is responsible for all matters relating to internal security. It is for this reason that the Intelligence Bureau is a part and parcel of this Ministry (It is only by tradition that the DIB reports directly to authorities
outside MHA). R&AW functions under the Cabinet Secretariat and deals with external intelligence. The various Intelligence, Investigation and Enforcement agencies dealing with the implementation of economic laws report to the Revenue Department under the Ministry of Finance. The CBI, which is the principal criminal investigation agency of the Centre, is under the Department of Personnel.
14.2 In my view, considerable care would have to be taken to ensure that the information which becomes available to the Nodal Cell is handled by a very senior and trust-worthy officer. Any leakage of such information would not only jeopardize potential action against the powerful criminal Syndicates, but may also be susceptible to political exploitation. Under all circumstances, it will have to be ensured that the information available with the nodal set-up is used strictly and entirely for stringent action against the crime Syndicates, without allowing any scope whatever of its being exploited for political gain.
14.3 In the preceding context, it would be logical if the nodal set-up is under the MHA, directly handled by the Home Secretary who can be assisted by one or more selected officers of the Ministry for the collation and compilation of all information received from IB, CBI, R&AW and the various agencies under the Department of Revenue The manner in which such information is operationalised would need to be confidentially discussed with the concerned Heads of Organisation and, as necessary, with Secretary (Revenue). It will also need to be ensured that the nodal set-up functions with extreme secrecy. Needless to say, any leakage whatever about the linkages of crime Syndicate senior Government functionaries or political leaders in the states or at the centre could have a destabilizing effect on the functioning of Government. As such, it would not appear prudent to entrust the functioning of the Nodal Cell to any level below that of the Home Secretary. Further, the government would also have to carefully consider and prescribe the authorities to whom the Home Secretary will report in regard to the sensitive information received by the nodal set-up as well as regarding the operations to be launched by one or more of the concerned agencies to apprehend, investigate and prosecute the offenders.
15.1 In the normal course this report would have been drafted by the Mernber Secretary and finalized by the Committee. Considering the nature of the issues involved, I did not consider it desirable to burden the Members of the Committee with any further involvement beyond the views expressed by them. Accordingly, I decided to personally dictate this Report.
15.2 I have prepared only three copies of this Report. One copy each is being submitted to MOS(IS) and HM, the third copy being retained by rne. After HM has perused this Report, I request him to consider discussing further action with finance Minister, MOS(IS) and myself. The emerging approach could thereafter be got approved from Prime Minister before being implemented. At that stage other concerned senior officers would be taken into confidence.
15.3 After an initial discussion at the level of MOS(IS) and HM I could send a copy of this Report to FM, before the issues are discussed with him.
Sd/-
(N. N. VOHRA )
HOME SCRETARY
5.10.93
HM [Copy No.1/3]
MOS [Copy No.2/3]
http://mahendra-agarwalonline.20m.com/PR_VohraCommitteeReport.htm
Kashmir is the Defining Issue of Indian Identity
by Dr. Subramanian Swamy
[Lecture on July 9, 2008 to Indian students and Americans scholars at MIT, USA]
I believe that the Kashmir "issue" can no more be solved by dialogue either with the Pakistanis or the Hurriyat. This is because the Pakistan army has now a majority of captains and colonels owing allegiance to the Taliban. In another five years, they will reach, by promotions, the corp commander level. We know that the government in Pakistan is controlled by the seven corp commanders of the army. Therefore a Taliban government in Pakistan is inevitable and a jehad against India the logical consequence of the same. In turn the Hurriyat is an organization that cannot go against Pakistan.
Hence India has about five years to prepare for a decisive and defining war with Pakistan and we must prepare to win it. We therefore have to throw out of office in the coming elections all those Indian politicians who crave or preen themselves on being popular in Pakistan by sounding reasonable and secular as also equivocating on every issue. For the survival of the ancient civilization of India we have to win that inevitable war and recover the whole of Kashmir.
I will not blame the jehadis for the coming war. They are after all programmed that way by Islamic theology. I will blame ourselves for not understanding the fundamentals of Islam as propounded in the Sira and the Hadith. It teaches that if Muslims are in a majority, they must rule [Darul Islam], and then everyone else is a dhimmi and a kafir who do not have equal rights of worship. Thus in Saudi Arabia, you cannot even display a picture of a Hindu god inside your own home ! When Muslims are in a hopeless minority, then Sira and Hadith urges Muslims to make a deal with the majority and make no demands[Darul Ahad]. In US and Australia for example, Muslims will therefore never ask for separate shariat personal law. If Muslims are not hopelessly in a minority, then Islam directs that true Muslims conduct subversions and act against all human values to leverage their position[Darul Harab] to become of defining influence in the polity and ultimately rulers. We saw this in Kashmir recently when the government was made to cave in on the most humane gesture of allotting land to make Hindu pilgrims feel comfortable while on arduous journey to Amarnath caves.And we have it on the authority of the Chief Minister of the state that the agitation against the allotment was financed by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
It is foolish therefore in the face of this reality to expound the banal sentiment that "all Muslims are not terrorists or fanatics". Of course that is true. Or that Koran is a message of peace. May be it is. However, the Islam of the cutting edge of Muslim thought propounded by leaders such as Osama Bin Laden is in Sira and Hadith, which calls on the faithful to wage war against the infidels who cannot strike back effectively and crush them.
The struggle for Kashmir by the jehadis thus is not just for independence. They instead want a Darul Islam there and for the state to become a part of the Caliphate. Hindus are a special target because despite Iran, Iraq, Egypt and other countries becoming 100 percent Muslims after less than two decades of conquest and brutalization, India after a thousand years of massacres, mayhem and rape remained dominantly Hindu. This is a living affront for the fundamentalist Muslim, and in their seminaries and madrassas in Iran and Saudi Arabia, they even today debate and agonize over it.
Contrary to the British imperialist propaganda, Hindus did not just lie down and be conquered by foreign invaders. Hindu fighting spirit had never dimmed even if weakened by traitors within. Periodically Hindus rose in revolt symbolized by the Vijayanagaram empire[which lasted 300 years] or in Shivaji's bravery, or Guru Gobind Singh's campaigns or the Mahratta national onslaught.
Most of us thus remained Hindus, defiant, even if in poverty and misery singing Vande Mataram. This the true history of India which the fundamentalist Muslim and the British imperialist historians cannot bear to acknowledge.
Accommodation and compromise with Islamic terrorists is self-defeating and suicide. We have instead to fight back, for which Kashmir is the starting point. Hindu renaissance, long overdue, will be nurtured if we look for an opportunity to seize back the occupied areas of Kashmir, and make the jehadis feel that in India there can only be Darul Ahad for Muslims. We had opportunities earlier to demonstrate that: e.g.,in 1948, 1971, 1999, and 2001. But we let it go.
Hence, let there be no more intellectual confusion about the identity of India as a Hindu Rashtra, which means a land of Hindus and those others who acknowledge proudly that their ancestors are Hindus. If Muslims acknowledge this truth, then they are welcome as a part of our family. And those who do not so acknowledge cannot be equal citizens in India. Hence, we shall not agree to any more truncation of Indian territory
We have to therefore disown UN Resolutions and India-Pakistan treaties such as signed in Simla]1972] as unauthorized Nehruvian policy blunders. The legality of the Instrument of Accession signed in favour of India by the then Maharaja of J&K on October 26, 1947 has to prevail. Otherwise it will create a plethora of legal issues including what will become the status of the Maharaja if we abrogate this Instrument. Will Dr. Karan Singh, the son of Maharaja Hari Singh, have then a claim to be regarded again as an independent and sovereign King of J&K ? In the Junagadh issue, Pakistan had held the Instrument once signed is "final, irrevocable, and not requiring the wishes of the people to be ascertained". That is the correct position. But the Junagadh Nawab after signing the Instrument in favour of Pakistan, invaded the neighbouring princely states, states which had acceded to India. So when the Indian Army was moved by Patel to defend these areas, the Nawab ran away to Pakistan. His subjects were mostly Hindu who then welcomed the Indian army.
Furthermore, on what legal basis can we de novo seek to ascertain the wishes of the people of J&K when the Indian Independence Act[1947] passed by the British Parliament makes no provision for the same ? After all it was this same Act which created a legal entity called Pakistan, carved out from the united India. India under the Act was a settled and continuing entity out which the British Parliament made a new entity called Pakistan. Never in previous history there was ever a country called Pakistan. The concept itself was formulated only in 1947.
By what mechanism can then Pakistan today seek to amend or even de-recognise the Act without unwittingly undermining the legal status of Pakistan itself? That is, if the Instrument of Accession is called into question, will not Partition itself be subject to challenge as without legal basis on the same consideration? I raise this question also because in the case of Beruberi in Eastern India, the transfer of that area to Bangla Desh although agreed to, has been enmeshed in prolonged litigation in the Indian Supreme Court because of Article 1 of the Indian Constitution which bars de-merger of any Indian territory after 1950.
Indian army jawans created Bangla Desh out of Pakistan. But despite that, and drunk with their Darul Islam status, the Bengali Muslims have not only driven out the Hindus or butchered them or forcibly converted them but millions of Bengali Muslims have sneaked into India and are happily working with Hindus in India. Partition was agreed to by Hindus only for those Muslims who could not bear to live under Hindu hegemony. And now after getting their territory, they cannot now say that they are happy to live in India with Hindus.
Hence, a virat Hindu Rashtra should tell Bangla Desh to take back their Muslims or hand over one-third of Bangla Desh territory as compensation. If they do not agree, then we must send two divisions of Indian army from Sylhet to Khulna and annex one third of north Bangla Desh as our due for bearing the economic and political burden of Bangla Deshis in our country. This will make our access to Assam and Northeast much easier too.But most of all it will send a powerful and salutary signal to Pakistani terrorists: that Hindus will no more be passive.
These actions are possible if we gear up diplomatically for it. Today the world is sick of the terrorism and the greed of Muslims nations to make money out the sale of oil which they have got by sheer accident of geology. Hence, we must make strong allies. Israel is one such country. We must find ways to make China see our interests. It can be done if we know how to come to an understanding with them. This is essential for isolating Pakistan. At present China has begun to see the tinder box that Pakistan has become. Uighurs from Xinjiang have been to madrassas of Pakistan for training in subversion in Urumuchi and to sabotage the Beijing Olympics This worries China. It should concern us too.
Hence to lay the foundation for the liberation of Kashmir, we must have President's Rule for some time. India should refuse to engage in any dialogue on Kashmir in which the other side does not accept the whole of Kashmir as an integral and inalienable part of India. The people of Kashmir should be left in no doubt in their minds where the citizens of Hindu Rashtra stand on the future of the state: that it lies with us. Every Hindu has a claim on Kashmir. I for one claim it because my gotra is Kashyapa. It was rshi Kashyapa who invented Kashmir out the Dal lake. Hence my claim.
We should undo the "cleansing" of the state of Kashmiri Hindu Pandits by sending 1 million ex-servicemen and families into the Kashmir valley for re-settlement. Article 370 of the Constitution will have to be removed for that purpose, but according to the Constitution itself, it is supposed to be a "temporary provision" not requiring a Parliamentary two-thirds majority for amendment. It can be erased by a Presidential Notification on the recommendation of the Union Cabinet.
Then we await a war. We do not have to go to war with Pakistan on Kashmir because a Talibanised Pakistan will provide us with the opportunity. What I am advocating here is that we prepare mentally and militarily for that eventuality, and having been provided that opportunity, go for the jackpot-- to use an American slang.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Honouring a Hindu fighter, Dr. Subramanian Swamy at Stroudsburg Sharada devi mandiram
Honouring a Hindu fighter, Dr. Subramanian Swamy at Stroudsburg Sharada devi mandiram
Press Release (July 15, 2008)
At a special function held today in the newly consecrated Sharada Devi temple in hills of Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania in US, with the blessings of the Jagadguru Shankaracharya of the Sringeri Mutt the representative of the Mutt Mr. Gauri Shankar and Dr. Yegna Subramanian honoured Dr. Subramanian Swamy, Janata Party President before a gathering of 3000 NRIs. In the citation, the Sringeri Pontiff lauded the efforts of Dr. Swamy for articulating the interests of the Hindu community and his unforgettable service in defending the Rama Setu in the Supreme Court. Dr. Swamy is currently teaching economics at Harvard University and is expected to return to India mid August to resume his political activities.
Issued by the TN Janata Party Office.
Press Release (July 15, 2008)
At a special function held today in the newly consecrated Sharada Devi temple in hills of Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania in US, with the blessings of the Jagadguru Shankaracharya of the Sringeri Mutt the representative of the Mutt Mr. Gauri Shankar and Dr. Yegna Subramanian honoured Dr. Subramanian Swamy, Janata Party President before a gathering of 3000 NRIs. In the citation, the Sringeri Pontiff lauded the efforts of Dr. Swamy for articulating the interests of the Hindu community and his unforgettable service in defending the Rama Setu in the Supreme Court. Dr. Swamy is currently teaching economics at Harvard University and is expected to return to India mid August to resume his political activities.
Issued by the TN Janata Party Office.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
St. Thomas, the myth
St Thomas, the myth
http://hindutva97.blogspot.com/2008/07/st-thomas-myth.html
St. Thomas’ two skeletons (Mylapore, India; Ortona, Italy)
Can you name the only Saint who left behind his two skeletions?: One was the skeleton as a youth (Found in Mylapore, Chennai), and the second skeleton as an old man (Found in Ortona, Italy). St. Thomas deserves a Bollywood movie to celebrate creationism.
Kalyanaraman
Read more… http://www.scribd.com/doc/3826832/St-Thomas
http://hindutva97.blogspot.com/2008/07/st-thomas-myth.html
St. Thomas’ two skeletons (Mylapore, India; Ortona, Italy)
Can you name the only Saint who left behind his two skeletions?: One was the skeleton as a youth (Found in Mylapore, Chennai), and the second skeleton as an old man (Found in Ortona, Italy). St. Thomas deserves a Bollywood movie to celebrate creationism.
Kalyanaraman
Read more… http://www.scribd.com/doc/3826832/St-Thomas
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Mt. kailas, abode of Shiva; Manasarovar, world's greatest water tower
Mt. kailas, abode of Shiva; Manasarovar, world's greatest water tower
Thanks to Tarun Vijay ji for this exquisite article. The abode of Shiva is Mt. Kailas. At the foothills of this stunner is Manasarovar glacier, which is the world's greater tower in the Himalayas yielding glacier melts which service 10 of the greatest perennial rivers of the world. This water tower, if managed well, can make every river in Bharatam a jeevanadi, and in the process help create a National Water Grid which will be a revolution for abhyudayam of Bharatam -- adding 9 crore acres of additional wet land with assured irrigation and over 60,000 kms. of national waterway, complementing the highway-railway networks. So, a form of Shiva is a S’ivalingam as the metaphor for the summit of Mt. Kailas, the water-giving divinity, devatatmaa himalaya; hence, the perpetual abhishekam in the jyotirlinga sthalams in Bharatam venerating the water-giving, life-giving Mahes’wara, paramaatman.
Kalyanaraman
Abode of the gods
June 20, 2008
As devotees prepare for the arduous annual trek to Kailas Manasarovar, Tarun Vijay reflects on that most sublime of spiritual experiences -- a pilgrimage to Shiva's home.
A group of atheists had accompanied us during an earlier pilgrimage to Kailas Manasarovar. I still recall them standing, frozen in place by their first glimpse of Mount Kailas; I saw tears of pure joy running down their faces -- and I was not surprised.
If there is one place on this planet where God can be touched and felt, it has to be the Kailas Manasarovar region -- it is indescribable, beyond the power of words to capture; it is perhaps the one experience that defines the state of being.
The trek is often called a pilgrimage, but it is so much more -- the fulfillment of a dream, a realisation of life's highest aspirations. People let themselves in for uncertainty, for incredible hardship, year after year because they know that what is in store for them is not simple anand, joy, but sachidanand, sublime joy.
It is for this experience that people wait a lifetime, offering up prayers to god to grant them an opportunity to go on this journey of self-realisation. That is one of the unique aspects of this trek -- unlike routine pilgrimages to even venerated sites, which you make when you want to, the trek to Kailas is not about your schedule. Trite though it seems to say this, the 'call' has to come; for some, it never does during their lifetimes; for others, who dream of this for years, suddenly it all falls into place and often in completely unexpected fashion, they find themselves readying for an experience they have dreamt about. I had the good fortune to get such a 'call', to go on a pilgrimage that brought me such bliss at the time, and that now feels like a dream.
Image: For pilgrims, this first frontal view of the legendary abode of Lord Shiva is the culmination of a lifetime's hopes and dreams.
The MEA has made this year's yatra possible
June 20, 2008
When news appeared earlier this year that China has cancelled this year's yatra, thus, it cast a pall of gloom not merely on those who had planned to make the trek this year, but on the community at large -- for even those who cannot go derive a measure of satisfaction from the knowledge that the experience is there, that others are savoring it, and that sooner or later, their turn will come.
Thanks largely to the efforts of our Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon, the Chinese government has agreed to allow the yatra to proceed in batches, on a revised schedule -- irrespective of the nature of government in New Delhi, our external affairs ministry boasts dedicated officers like Menon, who leave no stone unturned to ensure that the yatra is always on schedule. It needs pointing out that though the Chinese have cancelled all batches originating in Kathmandu, for fear of Tibetan infiltration into the group, they have allowed Indian pilgrims to make the journey.
I guess we need to thank the Chinese for allowing us to continue with our most revered pilgrimage -- though Shiva is a Hindu god, Tibet falls in their territory. Then army chief in Kashmir General Zoravar Singh had tried in 1841 to bring Kailas back to India; he in fact won the first phase of the battle and annexed the Kailas Manasarovar region into Maharaja Ranjit Singh's territory - but then winter intervened, and the enemy got the better of him in the treacherous climate.
Such was his bravery, however, such the heroism he displayed before dying in battle, that the Tibetans were moved to build a monument for him at Toya village near the Kailas route, adjoining Taklakot. The flag that General Zoravar Singh's soldiers brought back from Tibet is called the flag of Mantalai (Manasarovar), and forms part of the glorious heritage of the Jammu Kashmir Rifles. A military fort near Leh has also been named after General Singh.
Image: Clouds that shround the north face of Mount Kailas shift, in answer to pilgrims' prayers, to afford a clear view.
The quest for salvation
June 20, 2008
It takes two days to complete the 54-kilometre long parikrama (circumambulation) of Kailas -- 24 hours of immersing yourself in the spirituality that envelops this abode of Shiva, God of Gods. To the south of Kailas is Lake Manasarovar, whose circumference of 90 kilometres can be circumambulated in two days. The Tibetans call the lake Tso Mapham or Tso Mawang.
To the south of Manas is the Gurla Mandhata mountain named after Mandhata, a great king of yore who reportedly did penance here. The region finds numerous mentions in Indian scriptures, in the Ramayan and Mahabharat. The great poet Kalidasa beautifully described Kailas and Manasarovar in his masterpiece Kumarsambhavam: 'In the northern part there is a mighty mountain by name Himalaya -- the abode of perpetual snow -- fittingly called the Lord of mountains, animated by Divinity as its soul and internal spirit; spanning the wide land from the eastern to the western sea, it stands, as it were, like the measuring rod of the earth. At the direction of King Prithu, the selfsame mountain was used as a calf by all other mountains, while Mount Meru (Kailas) stood as an expert milker of cows and milched from Mother Earth the milk of shining gems and medicinal herbs of wonderful virtue and supreme efficacy.'
Image: Pilgrims on yaks make the two-day parikrama of Mount Kailas.
None to equal that transcendent moment when you stand at the threshold of Shiva's abode
June 20, 2008
Of all the many memories pilgrims carry away, and nurse for a lifetime, there is none to equal that transcendent moment when you stand at the threshold of Shiva's abode. I remember my own experience as if it were yesterday: The sun shone bright and high in the clearest blue sky I had ever seen. The peak of the holy mountain, alone, was shrouded in clouds, like a white silken curtain.
We were a group of 30 pilgrims, who came out of our base camp rooms to offer obeisance to the mountain. With folded hands and prayers on our lips, we waited for the clouds to move away -- and in that icy cold silence, pierced only by the prayers of the pilgrims, magic happened. The clouds suddenly moved away, and Mount Kailas appeared in full majestic effulgence, even as our voices rose in the chant of the Mahamrityunjay, the supreme mantra of victory over death.
You felt the tears roll down your faces; you looked around, and realized that everyone was crying in sheer bliss. There were some who said they had waited through several lifetimes for this chance to stand, head bowed in veneration, before the 22,028 feet high Mount Kailas, abode of Lord Shiva and the 'Navel of the Earth'.
Tarun Vijay, director, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation, is the author of books on Kailas Manasarovar, available in English, Hindi, Gujarati and Marathi.
Image: On the Chinese side of the pilgrimage, the signs of Indian culture are everywhere.
http://specials.rediff.com/news/2008/jun/20sld4.htm
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