These are days of freezing temperatures in the Valley. The Kangris are out. The warmth generated by them over hot cups of tea give people leisure time to reflect over the year gone by. And the year gone by was punctuated by the stone pelters. This is the talk this winter. The question on every one’s lips now is will these stone pelters be back again come June? Nusrat Alam may be behind bars and the valley is being visited by a Core oversight committee groping for a solution. But another Alam may replace him and it may yet be early days for the oversight committee. These were the thoughts that struck me when I was in Srinagar. Then I happened to move to the LoC. Some things I saw cheered me, and I wondered, if being a good Samaritan, as the Army was in the villages including on the LoC, was the balm that would put cheers in the Kangri wielding Kashmiris next time around when the valley freezes again. Then, perhaps, hopefully all talk would devolve on how the pelters were kept away
A state-of-the-art gymnasium, volleyball and basketball courts as well as a cricket ground dot the breathtaking landscape of this village in the Himalayas. Nothing spectacular you might think. But this is the Army model Village of Teethwal situated on the line of control and overlooking the Lipa Valley notorious for its terrorist launch pads. Following the devastating earthquake of 8 October 2005, the army re built this village under “Operation Sadbhavna” in a record time of seven months. Basic infrastructure such as road, water scheme, street lighting, a community development centre are available in this model village which is separated from Chilliana village in PoK by the Kishanganga river.
As in Tithwal, so also across vast swathes of mountainous terrain, the Army has restored a sense of normalcy in these remote and once dark corners of the nation Recognising the people as the centre of gravity, the Army has over the past decade and half, been running schools and orphanages, building connectivity through roads and bridges, providing potable drinking water, improving health care though free medical care, and camps to people bereft of hospitals and dispensaries and who would otherwise have had to trek for days to reach nearest hospitals. “Army Goodwill Schools” are functioning in several districts of the state. The Army has aided in building the infrastructure and providing civilian teachers for these schools. It even provides transportation to children ferrying them to the schools from their villages. The educational tours have been a runaway success. It has exposed the Kashmiri children to the 21st century India of sky-scrapers, express ways and metro trains. Such excursions have brought Kashmiris closer to rest of the country and the future generation is exposed to the fruits of peace and economic development. These actions have been replicated in Ladakh and Kargil, where schools, computer labs, women empowerment centres, promoting handicraft and animal husbandry has prevented the alienation of the people and kept the jihadis at bay.
The Army has not only ameliorated the plight of people in inaccessible and distant lands, but helped in projecting a better and positive image of the government. By organising regular interactions with the villagers and co-opting them in their own development through self empowerment, the Army has been able to curtail the support base of the terrorists. It is in the main for this reason that the villages of the Valley have remained insulated from the violence that rocked its towns last summer. It is but the small things that matter to our people residing in a “sea of deprivation”. Ask Nitish Kumar who empowered the deprived and the women and instilled hope in their hearts. How about trying out another small thing? Next time around get some stone pelters languishing in jails to stay in our Commonwealth Games Village. Perhaps, will bring goodwill to the government engaged in a peace effort. Being risk-averse is not the way to do it.
And talking of small things that matter, one need only to remember the Baiga tribals of Kawardha district, Chattisgarh who reminisce about the times when the rivers had clear water and the jungles were full of wild life and their ancestors could grow 12 crops, 16 vegetables and 7 varieties of grass and had access to herbs and forest produce. That is before the bauxite miners arrived.
It is the small things that matter, if done consistently and over a period of time.
Go back to doing the small things being done in Teethwal or those ubiquitous mountains of Ladakh and Kargil. These are the things that will turn the tide, as they have done in the state of Bihar.
Rohit Singh is an associate fellow at the Centre for Land Warfare Studies, New Delhi.