One after another three terror attacks in Jammu region’s hilly and plain areas in three days, beginning with a terror assault on a pilgrim’s bus in Reasi on the last Sunday evening when the nation was glued to their TVs watching the historic oath ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the third consecutive term, have brought out a series of deficiencies and complacencies in the system. These attacks have dented if not shattered completely the make-believe rhetoric that everything is hunky-dory and terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir is on death bed.
Within 48 hours of Reasi attack, two terrorist attacks in Hiranagar area of Kathua district bordering Pakistan on Tuesday evening, and the other in hilly area of Bhaderwah in Doda district hours later demonstrated the reach of the terrorists in the region, which hitherto was declared and established as terror-free zone in J&K. These three incidents – nine killed in Reasi, one terrorist killed in Hiranagar, and five soldiers injured in Bhaderwah – cover almost entire geography of Jammu region.
The system has a tendency to wake up with a lot of pledges to eliminate terrorism and punish terrorists after each attack. That is necessary to assure the public and the families of victims that the government is alive to the situation and would not allow it to go out of hand, that is precisely the meaning of the statements promising fight to finish against terrorism. If this is realization of the fact that the terrorism exists and it needs to be neutralized in full, it also is demonstrative of deficiencies that exist in the system flourishing under a sense of absolute complacency.
Two kinds of misunderstanding about terrorism have plagued Jammu and Kashmir; one there is a tendency to claim never-before–seen peace in Jammu and Kashmir because of the strike at terrorists and the ecosystem that kept them kicking and alive , second that Pakistan has been decimated so much that it cannot dare to repeat anything destructive like the Pulwama terror attack in which a terrorist Adil Dar, working at the behest of terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad , rammed his explosive laden van into CRPF convoy , killing 40 personnel on the spot on February 14, 2019 as the aerial strikes in Pakistan demolished the terror training camps . This has been the case for the past five years, but the deadly attack on a pilgrims’ bus in Reasi district that also houses one of the most revered Hindu shrines of Shri Mata Vaishno Devi may not have thrown ugly spectacle of bus going into flames with big bang sounds, yet its impact was no less. The two situations cannot be compared, but the objective of the terrorists was to kill the people.
In a way it is more shocking, this Sunday evening attack in Reasi took place when nation was watching Prime Minister Modi taking oath for the third time. It was to split the headlines , and at the same time a challenge to the theory that terrorism has been vanquished in J&K. Since the bus carried pilgrims from Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, terrorists must have known this and consequences of the attack. The attack sent shockwaves across the Hindi heartland in the country, making country aware that J&K was still faces with a challenge of terrorism.
There is absolutely no doubt that many of the dark phases of militancy from Kashmir have been rolled back and sent packing. The life in the Valley is quite smooth than it has been ever in the past over three decades. This success in tearing apart fear and threat of terrorism disrupting normal life has given a new confidence to the people to live life on their terms- one of the best example can be seen in the high voter turnout in Kashmir during Lok Sabha polls 2024, a remarkable transformation from poll boycott to line up before polling booths. This phenomenon should not only be celebrated in terms of the high voting percentage but the enthusiasm that voters demonstrated by showing election ink on their fingers before cameras.
This transformation excited the government so much that it promised to hold the long-awaited Assembly elections in J&K soon. The point it missed was that there was a hostile country Pakistan watching the whole turn of events. Its game was slipping out of its hands. It had kept its plans ready to cause troubles, which it did. This is the demonstration of its lethal intentions that J&K is witnessing terror acts again. It calls for a fair assessment of the situation and response. That is mandatory. Alongside the Government must increase its people-to people contact, currently restricted to bureaucratic way of thinking and articulation.
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