Stone pelters are now targeting school-children in Kashmir

‘Peaceful’ and ‘misguided’ youths as Lutyens’ media and Human Rights Commission fondly refers to them, targeted a school bus of Rainbow School in Kanipura village in Shopian. This cowardly act has caused head injury to one student and created fear and trauma in the hearts and minds of rest of the school students involved in the incident.  The injured student was immediately taken to the SMHS hospital for treatment. There were around 50 children on the bus.  The Police said their search is on and stone pelters will be arrested soon.

The stone pelters are now deliberately targeting tourists, civilians and school children to create fear among people. They are avoiding army and security forces as they fear retaliation and this is why now they are targeting unarmed civilians. Tourism is a major source of revenue in Kashmir. Thousands of Kashmiris depend upon tourism for bread and butter. The Stone pelters targeted even these tourists on 3^rd April at Anantnag district of J&K. Seven tourists suffered injuries in that incident.

The Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister, Mehbooba Mufti condemned the incident. She tweeted, “Shocked & angered to hear of the attack on a school bus in Shopian. The perpetrators of this senseless & cowardly act will be brought to justice.”

But the truth is that this condemnation of Mehbooba Mufti will not serve any useful purpose as long as her government keeps on dealing with stone pelters leniently. In February 2018, her government approved the withdrawal of stone-pelting cases against 9,730 people. 

This decision was taken to bring the young stone-pelters back into mainstream. However, this incident again showed how soft approach has been ineffective. What will they do by bringing them into mainstream when those youths who are already in mainstream with good jobs and degrees in engineering and other subjects, are joining terrorist organizations? India is the only country where stone pelters get so much of sympathy and care. Russia and Israel deal with stone pelters in their own unique ways. In India when people like Major Aditya and Major Gogoi, those who take action against stone pelters, are punished. The liberal media, placard gang, candle-march gang and human rights commission made a huge hue and cry when strict action against stone pelters was taken by aforementioned two brave soldiers. Both the government and the army should employ more strict approach to these criminals. They are no misguided youth. They are ‘passive terrorists’ who act as a shield for ‘active terrorists’.

Instead of taking strict actions against these ‘passive terrorists’, people here debate in the TV studios. We are the only country to do so. Countries like Israel, China, Russia and USA directly take action without any second thought. In India, any crowd control measure in lieu of deadly force gets instant backlash from the the liberal media, limiting the options of security forces to counter these elements.

‘Intellectuals’ give lame excuses in support of these stone pelters. First is that they say these stone pelters are sponsored by the Pakistan and the Hurriyat. Even if we agree with this, then what? How does it even justify revolts and open attacks against the unity and integrity of our country? They are criminals and should be treated as such. The second lame excuse they give is that these educated youths are unemployed. As various Kashmiri groups have repeatedly asserted that this is an ideologically motivated ‘fight’ and not borne out of economic grievances, so this excuse does not hold any water. Are they going to mention this stone throwing in their resume as practical experience whenever they will apply for the post of terrorist in MNCs like LeT? If economic grievances drive people towards stone pelting then why have we not seen unemployed youths of UP, Bihar and Naxal affected areas pelting stones on security forces? Rather than offering pseudo-intellectual excuses and unfounded explanations for the problem, we should focus on solution-centric activity. Unless and until a tougher stance is not taken, the problem will persist.