Murderous mob of stone-pelters or innocent people?
   20-Dec-2018

 
 
Security forces remain under constant threat in Kashmir valley. Moving in Kashmir valley is difficult for them though they are responsible to provide security to the citizens of India. Also, the security forces has to take care of securing the borders of the country, which has always remained under the constant threat from an unfriendly country that is always making pretext to usurp the boundary illegally as it has done in 1947.
 
 
The security forces face double whammy whenever it goes for counter terrorism operations to neutralize the terrorists in Kashmir valley, which is one of the smallest parts of the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir. On the one side security forces have to neutralize the terrorists and on the other they have to face the murderous stone-pelters who generally gather at any place of encounter between the security forces and the terrorists. Especially, the five districts of the state of Kashmir valley viz. Srinagar, Baramulla, Anantnag, Shopian, and Pulwama remain under constant threat of terrorists and separatists whereas rest of the state largely remain peaceful. The incidents of stone-pelting are reported from these districts only. The stone-pelters are lethal as the stone pelting may result in grave injury and can take a human life.
 
 
 
 
 
The Government of J&K mentioned in the legislative council that as many as 11,566 security personnel were injured in 4,736 stone-pelting incidents in the Kashmir valley during the last three years (2017, 2016 and 2015). The year 2016 saw 9,235 personnel getting injured in stone-pelting, the highest figure for these three years. In the month of October, 2018 a 22-year-old soldier, Sepoy Rajendra Singh, suffered a head injury in an incident of stone-pelting in district of South Kashmir. He later succumbed to his injuries in Base Hospital in Srinagar. Last year, a DSP of Jammu and Kashmir police, Ayub Pandith was lynched to death outside Jamia Masjid in old city of Srinagar by these very people who are called innocent by our media and politicians. The Army Chief General Bipin Rawat called them the ground workers of terror outfits and he suggested that stern action must be taken against them.
 
 
 
 
The security forces are responsible for the security of the citizens of this country but some of these citizens are murderous and can cause great harm to them. Surprisingly, the media often cover news if any stone pelter is injured but the same is not done in the case of security forces, who always remain under the constant threat for their life from terrorists and stone-pelters. The security personnel are presented as expandable and their martyr was demeaned by the very people who have been living a comfortable and secured life because of them. Unfortunately, neither human rights organizations nor political parties give serious consideration to the constant threat that these stone pelters create for the security personnel. Stone pelters cannot be innocents in any manner and by any standard. Stone pelters are purely stone pelters and not innocents.