Insurgencies feed off people’s discontent

Lt Gen Harwant Singh (Retd)

Former vice chief of Army Staff

The botch-up on December 4 by security forces in Nagaland, where a group of workers on their way home were gunned down, has reignited the demand for the repeal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). Obviously, the security forces failed to follow the proper procedure when fed with an intelligence report about insurgents travelling in a vehicle down that road. A barricade could have been put up to stop the vehicle and a check on those in the vehicle carried out, rather than just open fire. This tragic incident seems to have stalled the ongoing peace talks with Naga groups.

Often, troops have to operate in an environment where you either kill or get killed. Equally at times, the line between an insurgent and a peaceful citizen is hazy, often due to faulty intelligence inputs. Failure to act can prove costly, as was seen in the 2019 Pulwama tragedy, where failure to check and intercept the explosives-laden car resulted in the death of 40 CRPF personnel. Viewing unintended human rights violations in isolation from other factors prevalent in insurgency environments is somewhat unrealistic.

The Army must carry out a thorough investigation into this case and the guilty should be strictly dealt with. This is not the first time that such an incident has taken place. It goes to the credit of the military that all such cases, where troops have acted without due care, caution and diligence, resulting in the death of innocent civilians, are handled with severity. Equally, it is not uncommon for troops to be blamed even where they had acted with due diligence and the victim was a terrorist. The well-known case is that of Manorama, who was shot dead by Assam Rifles personnel. She was a hardcore terrorist and had been involved in the killing of soldiers and at the time of her arrest, a transmitter was found in her possession. She was shot when she tried to escape. Yet there were large-scale protests over her killing and demands for abrogation of AFSPA raised.

Normally, the Army does follow the dictum: “if in an encounter with the insurgents, there is the possibility of an innocent civilian getting killed, then let the insurgent escape — to be dealt with on another occasion.”

While we continue to dwell on the so-called high-handedness by the Army in such rare incidents, we have rarely focused on the background and underlying causes for the Army to be called in to tackle insurgency. It is only when the situation runs completely outside the control of police, including Central Police Organisations (CPOs) that a call on the military is made. Though there is no dearth of police forces, both state and Central, and to deal with insurgents, they are as well equipped with appropriate weapons as the Army, still a demand to call the Army persists. Call on the Army is made only when the situation continues to be grim and well outside the capacity and capability of these police forces to manage.

Since the Army does not have even the police powers to arrest, interrogate and use weapons to engage insurgents, its employment in counter-insurgency tasks in any manner would be counter-productive. For making a call on the Army, the area has to be declared as ‘disturbed’ and then AFSPA is brought in, which provides immunity to the Army personnel against any legal action without clearance from the Central government. The Justice Jeevan Reddy Commission did recommend the scrapping of AFSPA and in its place bringing in the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act. Interestingly, the latter incorporated many provisions of AFSPA, making it more rigorous and its applicability in less virulent situations objectionable.

Counter-insurgency operations are akin to low intensity conflict, but distinctly unlike a regular war. Its setting is amongst our very own people, where at times the environments may be that of a war zone, but the rules of engagement are different though never well defined, nor can these be exactly the same in every situation. Often, troops have to operate in an environment where you either kill or get killed. Equally at times, the line between an insurgent and a peaceful citizen is hazy, often due to faulty intelligence inputs. Failure to act can prove costly, as was seen in the case of the 2019 Pulwama tragedy, where failure to check and intercept the explosives-laden car resulted in the death of 40 CRPF personnel.

Therefore, to view only the unintended human rights violations in isolation from other factors prevalent in insurgency environments is somewhat unrealistic. These legal provisions and their applicability need to be assessed in the prevailing conditions in insurgency environments, which has some semblance of a war-like texture. What must be kept in mind is that insurgency in India is engineered and abetted by a hostile neighbour, and at times does take the form of a proxy war.

Some people seem to contend that AFSPA has become a symbol of oppression in the Northeast and Kashmir. They miss out on the basic fact that what prevails in some parts of Northeast and J&K does not even remotely exist elsewhere in India.

Perhaps, there may be some justification for the local civil population and so-called human rights activists to seek abrogation of AFSPA. However, we need to address two related issues which result in enforcing of AFSPA. The first being the inability of the police, both state and Central, which otherwise are as well equipped as the Army to handle insurgency. Is it in motivation and training or leadership, or else in all of these, where a shortfall exists? One may recall the days of the so-called insurgency in Punjab. Since the police would not stir out at night, insurgents ruled the roost.

Consequently, there were no intelligence inputs about their activities and whereabouts forthcoming. It is only when the Army was called out and it started intensive night patrolling and visiting farm houses and villages that locals gained confidence and intelligence reports of the movement of terrorists started pouring in.

The second reason is that these areas in the country’s Northeast, where insurgency persists, have seen little or no development. My one company post at a tehsil headquarters in Arunachal Pradesh was 14 days walking distance from the road head. There is no industry and hardly any job opportunities. Similar are the reasons for the coming about of the Maoist Corridor, which runs through the very centre of the country and where the government’s writ does not fully run. In the case of the Northeast, we have also tried to meddle with the people’s traditional way of life without offering a viable and attractive alternative.

Civil officials in these areas operate from their very well-protected residences and offices and do not go around their districts to see for themselves the state of affairs. While now and then, Central police and military parties run into an ambush and their vehicle are blown up by a landmine, no deputy commissioner or superintendent of police in all these districts have ever encountered such a situation or got killed. They simply do not stir out of their safety circle.

Unless we look deep into the causes of these insurgencies and take proper action to drastically improve the state of affairs, insurgencies will persist and our neighbours will keep exploiting people’s discontent. In such a situation, there will be no option other than to call the military and with it we will have to promulgate AFSPA.

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