http://

Lethpora (Pulwama), Feb 14

The local militant, Adil Dar (21), who rammed his car into the CRPF convoy had joined the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) in April last year, police sources said.

Dar is the second Kashmiri militant to have been involved in a suicide bomb attack on troops. In 2000, a JeM militant from Srinagar, Aafaq Shah, had blown up an explosive-laden vehicle outside the Army’s 15 Corps headquarters.

A JeM spokesperson later claimed responsibility for Thursday’s attack and identifed the suicide bomber as Adil Ahmad, alias Waqas Commando, of Pulwama. Before the attack, the militant recorded a video statement, which was later released on the social media.

Police sources said Dar, a Class X passout, was listed as a ‘category C’ militant. “He used to work as a band saw machine operator before joining militancy,” a police officer said. Dar’s family claimed he had left home last year.

“We have had no contact with him ever since,” said Aarif, his younger brother.

Jaish has been declared a terrorist organisation by the UN Security Council.

However, the India-led proposal to put a ban on Jaish supremo Masood Azhar continues to be blocked by veto-wielding China.  Sources say a fresh attempt at moving the proposal is unlikely. — TNS

Explosion was heard 10 km away

The explosive used in the attack was so strong that the blast was heard 10-12 km away, locals said. Some of the bodies were so badly blown up that officials feel it may take some time to identity them. This was the first suicide car bomb strike in Kashmir since the 2001 attack on the Assembly that left 41 persons, including three suicide attackers, dead.

Vishav Bharti
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, February 10

The 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar was not an isolated incident or the outcome of a brutal mindset, but a “calculated move to strike terror” among the masses, says a new book by a British historian.

To be released on Tuesday, Jallianwala Bagh: An Empire of Fear and The Making of A Massacre by Kim A Wagner argues that demonstrations of violence were intrinsic to the colonial encounter not just in British India, but also Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

The book is based on a range of material from diaries and letters to court testimonies. Wagner observes that the story of Jallianwala Bagh is also the story of a particular colonial mindset haunted by the spectre of the ‘Mutiny’ or the First War of Independence.

“After 1857, the British in India did not respond to local unrest as much as to what they imagined that unrest was or could become — hence the consistent disproportionality of violence on the part of the colonial regime. The Amritsar massacre was accordingly both retributive and pre-emptive: Dyer took revenge for the attacks on Europeans, including Miss Sherwood [a missionary teacher attacked in Amritsar], during the riots three days earlier, but he also acted to prevent a much bigger outbreak that he believed to be imminent.”

He writes that at Amritsar, Dyer had simply followed the example of so many colonial officials before him, including Frederick Henry Cooper, Amritsar DC during the 1857 rebellion, or L Cowan, who ordered Kukas to be blown from guns in 1872.

Both had resorted to “exemplary and indiscriminate violence when faced with rebellion and anti-colonial unrest”. Wagner says that rather than an exceptional episode, “in singular and sinister isolation”, the Amritsar massacre revealed the inner workings, and the imagined vulnerability, of the British colonial rule in India.

Colonial punishment, Wagner observes, had little to do with justice, and that the suppression of the unrest in Punjab in 1919 exposes the fundamental lie about the pre-eminence of the rule of law in British India in the most glaring fashion.

“A week after the massacre at Jallianwala Bagh, on 21 April 1919, Lieutenant Governor Michael O’Dwyer made a remarkable statement when defending Dyer’s actions to Viceroy Chelmsford: ‘The Amritsar business cleared the air, and if there was to be a holocaust anywhere, and one regrets that there should be, it was best at Amritsar. O’Dwyer was here using the word ‘holocaust’ in its literal sense of a ‘burnt offering’ – as a sacrifice. The crowd at Jallianwala Bagh, in other words, had to be sacrificed to produce the necessary effect, ‘clearing the air’, and preventing a second ‘Mutiny’.”

The book finds that Amritsar massacre was just in continuity of what the British were doing to the local populations, variously described as ‘tribal’, ‘savage’ or ‘fanatic’, on the North-West Frontier in Afghanistan, in Sudan or throughout parts of Africa and elsewhere.

They routinely massacred locals with machine guns, drove off cattle and burned villages in demonstrative displays of power. “What became known as ‘savage warfare’ was not simply shaped by the tactical necessities of asymmetric fighting against irregular enemies, but was based on deeply encoded assumptions concerning the inherent difference of local opponents.”

The Indian Air Force is all set to deploy ASRAAM heat seeking close combat air-to-air missile in its Sukhoi Su-30 MKI Fighters, Livefist has reported. The IAF is currently in the final stages of the programme to mate the British missile system with Russian-origin Sukhoi fighter jets.

A pair of HAL-built Su-30 MKI jets have gone through required modifications in software to deploy the MBDA ASRAAM missile, top IAF sources were cited in the report as saying.

The move comes after IAF successfully integrated the missile system with its Jaguar deep penetration strike jets. The ASRAAM integrated Jaguars are part of IAF’s £250 million contract with United Kingdom’s MBDA in July 2014. The modified Jaguars are to be declared operation ready this year.

According to the report, the IAF is intending to fully replace the Su-30 MKI’s current close combat missile, Russian Vympel R-73, with the ASRAAM in a phased manner.

The ASRAAM-armed Su-30 would be reportedly declared ready around the same time as the Jaguars, and will make use of the same test cycle.

National Aerospace Laboratory (NAL) was tasked with the checking the stability of the ASRAAM on the Su-30 airframe at its Bengaluru wind-tunnel.

NEW DELHI: The defence ministry is set to invite private sector companies to participate in the Rs 21,000 crore deal for new naval utility helicopters, which will be the first project to kick off under the strategic partnership (SP) policy under the ‘Make in India’ initiative.

Sources said that the first ‘expression of interest’ (EoI) to the private sector under the policy will be issued for the helicopter deal in the coming days while others like a mega plan to manufacture submarines,  ..

Tribune News Service

Jammu, December 5

Tributes were paid to the heroes of the Chhamb battle of 1971 at a solemn ceremony at Pannu War Memorial in Akhnoor under the aegis of the Crossed Swords Division on Wednesday.

A contingent of the 5 Sikh Regiment comprising Junior Commissioned Officers and other ranks was also present. It also paid homage to the heroes of their unit.

A defence spokesman said: “During the 1971 Indo-Pak war, a Company of the 5 Sikh Regiment was entrusted with the vital role of defending the important approaches to the Chhamb sector under the leadership of Major DS Pannu.”

“Over a period of four days, the brave soldiers successfully repulsed as many as 14 attacks, thereby foiling the designs of the Pakistan army in the sector. The brave soldiers stood fast till the end despite all odds and inflicted prohibitive losses on the enemy. Many of them, including Major DS Pannu, the Company Commander, sacrificed their lives in the line of duty in the finest traditions of the Indian Army,” he said.

On the solemn occasion, Maj Gen Rajinder Dewan, General Officer Commanding, Crossed Swords Division, Col NJS Pannu (retd), brother of Late Major DS Pannu, who was awarded the Vir Chakra posthumously, and other serving and retired soldiers laid wreaths at Pannu War Memorial.

A kirtan, ardas and langar were also organised at the memorial. A number of ex-servicemen and locals also attended the ceremony and paid respects to the brave sons of the nation.

In a sign of improved India-China ties, a senior Colonel of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army is currently in India for a year-long course in military management. Sources said the officer is currently with the College of Defence Management in Secunderabad, Telangana. He arrived in March this year. In another sign of the thaw in relations, the two armies will hold a counter-terrorism military exercise named ‘Hand in Hand’ in Chengdu between December 10 and 23. The joint exercise was cancelled in 2017. India will send 130 soldiers of the 11 Sikh Light Infantry.

India and China have exchanged personnel for courses in their military establishments but it was discontinued after a trust deficit between the two countries, especially after the 73-day stand-off in Doklam, Bhutan, last year.

“This is a good development. India and China are mature nations committed to improving relations further,” said Lt Gen SL Narsimhan (Retd), a member of the National Security Advisory Board.
He said more of such activities would result in improving mutual understanding.

The exchange of officers had started about 20 years back but it had few takers. The maximum exchange took place in 2003, when once officer each from the Army, Navy and Air Force went from India to China for a course in their military establishments.

New Delhi, January 25

It was love at first sight for Mahajabeen, wife of Lance Naik Nazir Ahmad Wani, when the two met at a school in South Kashmir around 15 years back.

Nearly one-and-a-half months after Wani’s death in an anti-terror operation in Shopian, Mahajabeen, a teacher and mother of two, says his immense love for her and fearless persona are a source of motivation for her to encourage youngsters to become good citizens.

“I did not cry when I was told he is no more. There was an inner resolve which did not allow me to cry,” she said after the government announced the Ashoka Chakra, India’s highest peacetime gallantry award, for Wani who hailed from Cheki Ashmuji in Kulgam district of Jammu and Kashmir.

Wani, a militant-turned-soldier who had joined the Army’s 162 Infantry Battalion (Territorial Army) Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry in 2004, will be conferred the award posthumously on Saturday by President Ram Nath Kovind.

“He loved me so much. For me, he was my guiding light. He always encouraged all of us to make people around us happy, to address people’s problems.

“As a teacher, I am dedicating myself to creating good citizens for my state. Leading the young minds in the right direction is my resolve and I am drawing inspiration for it from my beloved husband–the best in the world,” said Mahajabeen.

Refusing to share details about their school and college days, Mahajabeen said, “We met at school. It was love at first sight. He was a great husband, always fiercely protecting us.”

Recalling the fateful day of November 25, Mahajabeen said she was at her parents’ house when the shocking news came.

“He had telephoned me the previous evening and enquired about our well-being. I had told him to take care of himself. But destiny had something else for him,” said Mahajabeen in an interview to PTI.

“He always wanted to make his 162/TA Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry battalion proud. For him, duty was supreme. He was a source of inspiration for people in our area and community,” said Mahajabeen, who is in her late 30s.

On November 25, 38-year-old Wani lost his life in a counter-terror operation against six militants at Hirapur village near Batgund, in Shopian.

Under intense hail of bullets from the militants, he eliminated the ‘district commander’ of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and one foreign militant in a daring display of raw courage, officials said.

In the ensuing gunfight, he was hit multiple times, including on his head. He also injured another militant before succumbing to grievous wounds, they said.

Apart from his wife, he is survived by two sons Athar (20) and Shaid (18).

“He was a brave soldier and a hero right from the beginning. He always served for peace in his home state of Jammu and Kashmir,” said a senior Army official.

Wani was a recipient of the Sena Medal for gallantry twice in 2007 and 2018. “He always had the interest of the nation in his heart. He operated with the Rashtriya Rifles units in Kashmir. Throughout his active life he always willingly faced grave potential threats and was a source of inspiration to others,” said one of his colleagues. PTI