WHAT MODI AND RAJNATH NEED TO ASK THEMSELVES IS WHAT PAKISTAN’S OBJECTIVES MIGHT BE AND TAKE THE ACTION THAT IS NEEDED TO CHECKMATE IT

The fidayeen attack on its base at Uri is easily the worst setback that the Indian army has suffered in Kashmir in the past 26 years.

An attack by home-grown terrorists is unlikely for, since August 1999, all such attacks have come from Pakistani territory. The chosen, and politically far more effective, weapon of Kashmiri separatists has been stones. So assuming that these were Pakistanis, nurtured by the Lashkar-eTaiba, and sent to Kashmir by the ISI, what should India’s response be?

What it absolutely must not be is a punitive counterattack on Pakistan. For that will free Islamabad’s hands to send huge numbers of terrorists into Kashmir. Pakistan knows that, given the conditions that prevail in Kashmir today, they would be welcomed as saviours, something that has not happened in the past.

What Modi and Rajnath Singh need to ask themselves is what Pakistan’s objectives, in launching this attack now, might be and take the action that is needed to checkmate it. The obvious one is a desire to continue fuelling the curfew and lockdown conditions that have prevailed in Kashmir since the death of Burhan Wani.

Delhi must stop letting Pakistan play upon its ignorance of Kashmiri aspirations. Unlike Modi, Islamabad knows that very few Kashmiris want Kashmir to go to Pakistan. This was confirmed by the meticulously constructed Chatham House (Royal Institute of International Affairs, London) survey of opinion in both parts of Kashmir in 2009, which found that even in the hotbeds of separatism in the Valley only 2 to 7 percent of the people wanted to go to Pakistan.

As a group of journalists and human rights activists, of whom I was one, found out during a visit to Kashmir last month, this proportion has not changed by much despite all that the people of the Valley have suffered. What has changed is the intensity with which the 75% to 95% who wanted independence then, want it now.

However, except for teenagers who have not yet begun to think of their future, and the fringe of unemployed youth in their twenties who lead the revolt, almost no one wants to sever all relations with India. To them ‘azadi’ means political freedom without the sacrifice of Kashmir’s huge and profitable economic integration with India.

In short, what Kashmiris want is what Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen has written so eloquently about: it is not the negative concept of freedom from India but the positive concept of freedom, as the capacity to do things with India to improve their lives.

This duality has existed since Sheikh Abdullah was imprisoned in 1953, but has only grown stronger with the passing of the years. It gives the government, even now, a powerful yet simple way to end the intifada in Kashmir.

Modi has urged the Kashmiri opposition parties, and the separatists, to ask for anything within the framework of the Indian Constitution, and Rajnath Singh has gone even further. But no one is taking up their invitations to talk because no one in the Valley trusts any Indian government any longer not to renege upon its word.

The only way to bridge this trust deficit is to make a declaration that the government of India is willing to grant Kashmir full autonomy within the framework of the Instrument of Accession and the Delhi framework agreement of 1952 (which addressed their core need for economic integration) and also allow the newly-elected state government to decide which of the later 67 amendments to Kashmir’s constitution that have deepened this integration, they wish to retain.

Jammu, September 18

After the Uri terror attack, the voices within the Army and the Ministry of Defence, who want accountability to be fixed for the security lapses, have gained strength. The Army and intelligence agencies reportedly had concrete inputs of a possible fidayeen attack in the state. A fidayeen attack in Poonch a few days ago confirmed the validity of these inputs. Despite this, fidayeens succeeded in carrying out their nefarious designs. “This is not going to be put under the carpet and hushed up like previous attacks where accountability was not fixed. Time has come to make people accountable, due to whose negligence soldiers lost their lives,” said a source in the Ministry of Defence. — TNS

Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 10

In an embarrassment to the Modi government, the armed forces have rejected the salary and emoluments recommended by the Seventh Central Pay Commission, pleading that its implementation be put on hold in view of the “unresolved anomalies” that lowered the status of the forces vis-à-vis their counterparts in the police and the civil administration.(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)The Ministry of Defence had issued the notification on September 6 after taking into account a letter by the three services chiefs on the issue of pay parity, among other things. This notification was exclusively for the forces.In the past 24 hours, the Army, the Navy and the Air Force have issued separate letters to inform senior commanders and the troops about the decision of the top brass.The Chiefs of Staff Committee had met on September 7 to discuss the issue. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar is expected to take a decision on the matter on Monday. Earlier, the notification for enhanced pay for the forces had been held up as the issues raised by the three services were being studied.The main “anomaly” is that the formula adopted for determining the basic pay for the armed forces is different from the one for other Central government employees. As a result, in each rank the service officers have been awarded lower pay scales.In March, the MoD had told an empowered panel that the status, pay and allowances of the armed forces be kept above the other “fighting” arms of the government.

Beijing: China’s second space lab Tiangong-2 will be put into space between September 15 and 20, the office of China’s manned space programme said on Friday.

The space lab was transferred with its carrier rocket to the launch pad at Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre on Friday, Xinhua news agency said, quoting a statement from the office.

It took 90 minutes to complete the transfer from the assembling centre to the launch pad.

“The completion of the transfer signals that the space lab Tiangong-2 mission has entered its launching stage,” it said.

Technicians completed testing on the assembling of the lab and the rocket after they had been separately delivered to the launch centre in July. The centre will continue testing the rocket and inject the required propellent before the launch.

Tiangong-2 — which can enable two astronauts to live in space for 30 days, nearly double the national record for space stay — is capable of receiving manned and cargo spaceships and will be used for testing systems and processes for mid-term space stays and refuelling.

It will also be involved in experiments on aerospace medicine, space sciences, on-orbit maintenance and space station technologies.

China’s first space lab Tiangong-1, which was launched in September 2011, ended its data service earlier this year. It had docked with Shenzhou-8, Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10 spacecraft and undertaken a series of experiments.

Neither France nor India knew about the sub data leak till Monday afternoon. Reuters file photo

New Delhi, August 26

The ‘whistleblower’ behind the Scorpene document leak will hand over the disk containing thousands of pages of data detailing the Indian submarine’s stealth and warfare capabilities to the Australian government on Monday, The Australian newspaper on Saturday said.

It said that the identity of the unnamed whistleblower is already known to the Australian authorities.

The weekend edition of the newspaper said that neither France nor India knew about the leak till Monday afternoon when it sought a comment from French firm DCNS.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

The paper said whistleblower wants Australia to know that its future submarine partner, France, has already lost control over secret data on India’s new submarines.

His hope is that this will spur the Turnbull government and DCNS to step up security to ensure Australia’s 50 billion dollar submarine project does not suffer the same fate, it said.

“He has not broken any law and the authorities know who he is. He plans to surrender the disk to the government on Monday,” the newspaper said.

The newspaper said the story behind this leak may be more of incompetence than espionage, more Austin Powers than James Bond.

The Weekend Australian has been told by sources that the data was removed from DCNS in Paris in 2011 by a former French Navy officer who quit the service in the early 1970s and worked for French defence companies for more than 30 years before becoming a subcontractor to DCNS.

Sources say they believe this subcontractor somehow copied the sensitive data from DCNS in France and, along with a French colleague, took it to a Southeast Asian country.

If so, he broke the law and may face prosecution, the paper said.

The two men worked in that Southeast Asian country carrying out unclassified naval defence work.

The speculation is that the data on Scorpene was removed to serve as a reference guide for the former naval officer’s new job, but it is unclear why anyone would risk breaking the law by taking classified data for such a purpose.

The two men are then said to have the fallen out with their employer, a private company run by a Western businessman.

They were sacked and refused re-entry to their building.

At least one of the men asked to retrieve the data on Scorpene but they were refused and the company — possibly not knowing the significance of the data — held on to it, the newspaper said.

The secret data was then sent to the company’s head office in Singapore, where the company’s IT chief — again probably not knowing its significance — tried to load it on an Internet server for the person in Sydney who was slated to replace the two sacked French workers.

The data was placed on a server on April 18, 2013, and it was then that it was dangerously vulnerable to hacking or interception by a foreign intelligence service.

It is not known whether the data stayed on this server for a few days or for a year. It is not known if any foreign intelligence service obtained it during this time, the paper said.

Unable to send such a large file over the net and not knowing the significance of the data, the Singapore company sent it on a data disk by regular post to Sydney.

When the recipient, who was experienced in defence issues, opened the file on his home computer he was stunned.

He was expecting to read notes on a low-level naval programme, but before him lay the secret capabilities of the new Indian submarine fleet, the report said.

The data was not encrypted so he transferred it to an encrypted disk. That evening the man wiped the old disk with special software, grabbed a hammer and smashed it to pieces in his backyard.

He placed the new encrypted disk in a locked filing cabinet in his office and there it remained for more than two years, before he decided to show it to the The Australian, the report said. — PTI

Army officers pay tributes to Lance Havildar Davinder Singh at Dakoha village in Jalandhar Cantt on Saturday. Tribune photo

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, August 20

Lance Havildar Davinder Singh (38) of 17 Sikh, who got injured in a fierce gunfight in the Machhil sector of Jammu and Kashmir on August 8, succumbed to his injuries yesterday.The Non-Commissioned Officer had received three gunshot wounds and was under treatment at the Army’s Referral and Research Hospital, New Delhi.Davinder Singh’s last rites were performed with full military and state honours here today. Major General Deepak Dhanda, Chief of Staff, Vajra Corps, KK Yadav, Deputy Commissioner, Jalandhar, other senior military, civil dignitaries and leaders from various political parties paid tributes to the martyr.He was part of the operation launched near the Line of Control following information about presence of militants in the area in which three Border Security Force (BSF) personnel and one militant were killed and two Army personnel were injured. Davinder is survived by his wife Satwinder Kaur and 13-year-old son Jobanpreet. He was a native of Gurdaspur.

Jammu, August 14

The Army’s Northern Command chief Lt Gen DS Hooda today reviewed the security situation in Kashmir during his visit to the Awantipur-based Victor Force.Lt General Hooda was briefed by Chinar Corps Commander Lt Gen Satish Dua and all General Officers Commanding of the LC formations and the Rashtriya Rifles on the security situation prevailing in the Valley.He also reviewed the measures taken for restoring calm and normalcy in coordination with all security and other government agencies.Expressing satisfaction over the synergised functioning of the entire security apparatus, Lt Gen Hooda stressed on the need to take necessary steps to ensure adequate domination and security of the lines of communication so as to keep them open for the public.He further stressed that free movement was necessary for providing essential services to the people. — TNS

ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਫੌਜੀਆਂ ਦੀ ਜਾਨ ਨੂੰ ਖ਼ਤਰਾ ਬਣੀ ਤਪਸ਼

ਸਿਆਚਿਨ, 14 ਅਗਸਤ

ਵਾਤਾਵਰਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਆ ਰਹੀ ਤਬਦੀਲੀ ਨਾਲ ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਗਲੇਸ਼ੀਅਰ ਵਿੱਚ ਤਾਇਨਾਤ ਜਵਾਨਾਂ ਲਈ ਜਿਥੇ ਹਾਲਾਤ ਦਿਨ-ਬ-ਦਿਨ ਔਖੇ ਤੋਂ ਔਖੇ ਹੁੰਦੇ ਜਾ ਰਹੇ ਹਨ ਉਥੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੀ ਜ਼ਿੰਦਗੀ ਵੀ ਖਤਰੇ ਵਿੱਚ ਹੈ। ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਬੈਟਲ ਸਕੂਲ ਦੇ ਕਮਾਂਡੈਂਟ ਲੈਫਟੀਨੈਟ ਕਰਨਲ ਐਸ. ਸੇਨਗੁਪਤਾ ਨੇ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਕਿ ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਮੌਸਮ ਦੀ ਖ਼ਰਾਬੀ ਕਾਰਨ ਜਿੰਨੇ ਜਵਾਨਾਂ ਦੀ ਮੌਤ ਹੋਈ ਹੈ ਓਨੀ ਦੁਸ਼ਮਣ ਦੀਆਂ ਗੋਲੀਆਂ ਨਾਲ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੋਈ।
ਇਸ ਬਾਰੇ ਇਸਰੋ, ਵਾਡੀਆ ਇੰਸਟੀਚਿਊਟ ਆਫ ਹਿਮਾਲੀਅਨ ਜਿਓਲੋਜੀ ਅਤੇ ਹੋਰ ਸੰਸਥਾਵਾਂ ਵੱਲੋਂ ਕੀਤੇ ਅਧਿਐਨ ਮੁਤਾਬਕ ਗਲੋਬਲ ਵਾਰਮਿੰਗ ਕਾਰਨ ਗਲੇਸ਼ੀਅਰ ਹਰ ਸਾਲ 5-20 ਮੀਟਰ ਪਿਘਲ ਰਿਹਾ ਹੈ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਕਿ ਇਥੇ ਬਰਫ ਦੇ ਤੋਦੇ ਡਿੱਗਣਾ ਵਾਤਾਵਰਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਆ ਰਹੀ ਤਬਦੀਲੀ ਦਾ ਹੀ ਨਤੀਜਾ ਹਨ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਕਿ ਵਾਤਾਵਰਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਵੱਧ ਰਹੀ ਗਰਮੀ ਕਾਰਨ ਗਲੇਸ਼ੀਅਰ ਵਿੱਚ ਤਰੇੜਾਂ ਪੈ ਜਾਂਦੀਆਂ ਹਨ ਜਿਸ ਕਾਰਨ ਬਰਫ਼ ਖਿਸਕਣੀ ਸ਼ੁਰੂ ਹੋ ਜਾਂਦੀ ਹੈ ਤੇ ਬਰਫ਼ ਦੇ ਤੋਦੇ ਡਿੱਗਣ ਲੱਗਦੇ ਹਨ। ਇਸ ਖਤਰੇ ਦੇ ਮੱਦੇਨਜ਼ਰ ਥਲ ਸੈਨਾ ਨੇ ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਪਣੀ ਰਣਨੀਤੀ ਬਣਾਈ ਹੈ ਤੇ ਕਈ ਚੌਕੀਆਂ ਨੂੰ ਹਟਾ ਕੇ ਨਵੀਂ ਥਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਬਣਾ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਹੈ। ਇਸ ਦੇ ਨਾਲ ਬਰਫ਼ ਦੇ ਤੋਦਿਆਂ ਬਾਰੇ ਜਾਣਕਾਰੀ ਹਾਸਲ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ ਵਿਸ਼ੇਸ਼ ਰਾਡਾਰ ਪ੍ਰਣਾਲੀ ਵੀ ਸਥਾਪਤ ਕੀਤੀ ਗਈ ਹੈ। ਸਿਆਚਿਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਸਾਲ 2013 ਤੋਂ ਹੁਣ ਤੱਕ ਬਰਫ਼ ਦੇ ਤੋਦਿਆਂ ਕਾਰਨ ਭਾਰਤ ਦੇ 41 ਜਵਾਨਾਂ ਦੀ ਜਾਨ ਜਾ ਚੁੱਕੀ ਹੈ ਜਦ ਕਿ ਸਾਲ 2003 ਤੋਂ ਭਾਰਤ ਤੇ ਪਾਕਿਸਤਾਨ ਦਰਮਿਆਨ ਹੋਈ ਗੋਲੀਬੰਦੀ ਤੋਂ ਬਾਅਦ ਇਥੇ ਇਕ ਵੀ ਗੋਲੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਚੱਲੀ। 1984 ਤੋਂ ਇਥੇ ਭਾਰਤ ਦੇ 1013 ਜਵਾਨ ਮਾਰੇ ਜਾ ਚੁੱਕੇ ਹਨ।

Parrikar being briefed by the Navy. ANI file

New Delhi, August 12There are “unlikely” to be any survivors on board the AN-32 aircraft that went missing over the Bay of Bengal on July 22, the government said in the Lok Sabha on Friday.This is perhaps the first categorical statement by the government on the fate of the 29 people on board the IAF plane.Minister of State for Defence Subhash Ramrao Bhamre said during Question Hour that it is “unlikely” that there are any survivors after so many days of the incident.(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)He was responding to a question by Deputy Speaker M Thambi Durai, also an AIADMK member, who insisted that the search for the missing transport aircraft would not stop till its wreckage was found.The Minister said a variety of aircraft, including helicopters of the Air Force and Coast Guard, had been pressed into service to locate the plane. Merchant vessels and the fishermen community have also been requested to look for debris.As many as 30 floating objects were located but no “concrete” evidence has yet been found.The complete wreckage of the Malaysian Airlines flight MH 370, which had disappeared on March 8, 2014, had not been found so far, while the wreckage of a French airliner was found over a year after it had gone missing, Bhambre said, explaining the difficulties in finding the missing planes.He said the wreckage and remains of the crew of a Coast Guard Dornier aircraft were also found after several days.He said on the fateful day, the radars tracking the aircraft had found a “thunder cloud bad patch” but the plane was equipped with the device to avoid such a disturbance.The AN-32 had taken off on a routine courier flight to Port Blair from Tambaram air base near Chennai on July 22 at 8.30 am with six crew and 23 personnel, but never arrived at the destination. It was last seen on the radars at 9 am.Responding to a supplementary, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar said that in the past 24 months, no life had been lost in an air crash involving Air Force planes, barring the case of the AN-32 incident.He clarified that the Dornier aircraft which went down last year belonged to the Coast Guard.In his written reply, Parrikar said the Air Force had lost seven aircraft in crashes in 2013-14 and 10 in 2014-15. In 2015-16, the number was six and up to August 9, four planes had crashed.“Upgradation, modernisation and replacement of military aircraft depend on the national security/threat perception, strategic objectives and operational requirements of the defence forces and are reviewed by the government from time to time. This is a continuous process,” he said.Former Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi (TMC) wanted to ask a supplementary on the issue, but was apparently not allowed by Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. “You never allow me to ask…what is the point sitting in the House,” he complained. PTI