Monthly Archives: August 2018

Manpreet Singh Badal and his wife Veenu arrive at Raj Bhawan on Thursday.

Jupinderjit Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 16

Newly appointed Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal today became the first in the new government to shun security cover and decline an official car, which he is entitled to as a Cabinet Minister and MLA.Other Congress ministers and MLAs have taken security.Manpreet reached Raj Bhawan for the swearing-in ceremony in his Toyota Fortuner without any police guard. In the SAD-BJP regime, ministers, some MLAs and halqa in-charges, who had not even won the elections, used to roam around with 10 or more gunmen.Even some Akali leaders in Delhi had up to 20 gunmen. To end the ‘VIP culture’ was one of the main issues in the Assembly elections. The Congress and AAP had promised in their manifestoes not to follow the ‘VIP culture’.Manpreet, who drafted the Congress manifesto, said he did not take police security and government vehicle during his tenure as the Finance Minister in the SAD-BJP government as well.As for AAP, its 20 MLAs will convene a meeting soon to decide whether or not take security. Dakha MLA HS Phoolka said that so far, none of the MLAs had taken security and official vehicle.“We are against the ‘VIP culture’ and show of power. Having said that, some MLAs may face difficulty as they don’t have a vehicle of their own. We will meet soon and take a call,” Phoolka told The Tribune.AAP chief whip Sukhpal Khaira said party MLAs would decide soon. “On a personal note, I feel government vehicle might be required. Moreover, an MLA can have gunmen, but it should not become a show of power,” he said.Some AAP MLAs said SHOs of their areas had attached a constable with them. They said the party used minimum police security in New Delhi, but the situation in Punjab was different. “Here, you have to travel a lot. In light of recent attacks and sacrilege incidents, security cover may become a necessity,” a legislator said.On government vehicles, AAP MLAs alleged the Transport Department offered them Maruti Gypsy, which was in poor condition. The government has Toyota Camry and Innova, besides Gypsy for MLAs. Congress MLAs have opted for the luxurious vehicles, leaving Gypsy for AAP and Akali MLAs.AAP MLAs have retuned Maruti Gypsy as their official vehicle. They may accept Innova.

Channi: No red beacon chandigarh: Keeping his word, newly appointed Technical Education Minister Charanjit Singh Channi ordered his staff to remove the red beacon atop his official car after the swearing-in ceremony at the Punjab Raj Bhawan here on Thursday. Channi said, “I have asked my driver not to keep any red beacon, because I will be travelling to the Secretariat as a common resident of the state. I have always told my voters that I am one among them.” Speaking to his supporters, Channi said, “I come from a middle-class family. I have seen the misuse of power associated with symbols such as red beacon and security guards. I will carry my office as simple and as open as I promised my voters during my campaigning.” Channi had avoided carrying a red beacon even when he was the CLP leader during the tenure of the SAD-BJP government in spite of being entitled to it. Sanjeev Singh Bariana

Army personnel near the encounter site in Tral. Tribune File photo

Azhar Qadri

Tribune News Service

Hayuna (Tral), March 10

The voice notes were sent and shared over phone messengers. The anonymous speakers called for mobilisation of demonstrators to rescue the militants.As the gunfight ensued for the next 16 hours before ending on Sunday afternoon, the site of the encounter was surrounded by angry crowds which came in waves to throw stones at the security personnel manning the outer rings of the cordon. The village of Haffo, where the gunfight took place this week, was surrounded by layers of security personnel and then by another layer of belligerent protesters.It is for the first time in south Kashmir’s Tral sub-district, where the village is located, that such a clash has taken place amid a gunfight. The police called it a “minor” incident. Locals, however, said it was previously unseen here.The new trend where civilians clash with security forces, engaged in battling militants, has swept the districts of south Kashmir and drawn warnings from the top echelons of security forces. It is almost a reversal of what used to happen during the first two decades of militancy in the region when civilians would flee to safety.At Haffo, the protesters made desperate attempts to rescue Aqib Ahmad Bhat, a young man from neighbouring Hayuna village, and Usama, a foreigner — the militant duo which was fighting off repeated assaults on a house which they had barricaded.On an early spring morning on Monday, a day after the gunfight ended at Haffo, Bhat’s body lay motionless on a makeshift stage under the shade of a leafless walnut trees. His face was partly bandaged to hide a bullet wound in his left eye. Next to the dead militant, a bearded speaker raised slogans in support of ‘gun solution’ and eulogising the militant cause. Finally, the speaker read out the names of dead militants to which women responded, “They are alive.” Their colourful scarves, which veiled the faces of many, sparkled in the barren ground at Hayuna, where Bhat’s body was kept for funeral.Some women wore a traditional black veil, including a mother, who moved between rows to find a spot from where she could make her two daughters, aged nine and twelve, have a look at Bhat’s face. For her, it was an act of reverence.The funerals of militants are drawing unprecedented participation in recent years, and, as the crowds of protesters swarm the battle zones, it is also reshaping the region’s political narratives.The last militant funeral in Tral was the largest in recent decade. It was of Burhan Wani, whose killing in a gunfight in July last year had sparked a wave of protests and a long phase of unrest.To reach Hayuna for Bhat’s funeral, men and women walked long distances. A middle-aged woman from Tral’s Amirabad village had walked 5 km. “I am married in Amirabad but I am from this village,” she said. “I have rarely seen him as he had gone to memorise the Koran for three years and then he went in Allah’s ‘path’,” she said.Inside the ground where Bhat’s body was placed before a crowd of mourners, the women raised slogans as men jostled to touch the militant’s body and held mobile phones to shoot pictures and videos. On the road outside the ground, some men gathered in groups, discussing facts, rumours and legends.Bashir Ahmad Mir, a local, recalled the protest that erupted around the site of the gunfight at Haffo village, located almost a kilometre from Hayuna. “Some people had even come from Kulgam to throw stones,” Mir said, referring to a district which is almost 60 km from Tral.Mir, in his fifties, was surprised at the way the new generation had clashed with security forces. “Earlier, everyone would run away, this time, everyone was rushing towards this place,” he said.One of the protesters who clashed with security forces outside Haffo had come from Shopian, nearly 40 km from Tral. “My two brothers have died, they were militants. So, I had to come,” he said as if it was an obligation for this father of two young girls. “Our blood is the same,” he said.

Civilians clashwith forces

• The new trend where civilians clash with security forces, engaged in battling militants, has swept the districts of south Kashmir and drawn warnings from the top echelons of security forces
• The funerals of militants are drawing unprecedented participationin recent years, and,as the crowds ofprotesters swarm the battle zone, it is also reshaping the region’s political narratives

26/11 carried out by group based in Pak is a classic trans-border terrorist event. Mahmud Ali Durrani, Ex-NSA

Simran Sodhi & Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 6

Pakistan’s former National Security Adviser (NSA) Mahmud Ali Durrani today said the 26/11 Mumbai attacks were carried out by a terror group based in Pakistan.Speaking at an event here, Durrani, however, denied the Pakistan government or the Inter-Services Intelligence played any role, calling it a “classic” example of cross-border terrorism. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)His admission of Pakistan’s involvement comes as no surprise as he had said the same thing in 2009 too. He was sacked from the NSA’s post for confirming to the media that Ajmal Kasab, the lone terrorist captured after the Mumbai attacks, was indeed a Pakistani national. Asked for his response to Durrani’s statement, Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju said, “India’s position is well known and consistent… There is nothing new for us.”Speaking at the same event, Mohammad Hanif Atmar, Afghanistan’s NSA, condemned Pakistan’s policy of “using one terrorist against another”. He said there was no good or bad terrorist. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar called for coordinated global action against terrorism. “Even though there is a broad consensus on what constitutes an act of terror, a formal agreement is missing,” he said.Since the Mumbai attacks in 2008, India and Pakistan have gone back and forth on the probe into the case. While Delhi has been demanding action against Lashkar chief Hafeez Saeed, Pakistan’s contention is that the proof provided against him was “inadequate”.Durrani’s statement, therefore, will be an added thread to the ongoing India-Pakistan narrative. After more than a year of chill in ties, India and Pakistan will meet for the Permanent Indus Commission talks in Lahore on March 20-21.