How to Eliminate Terrorism from the Kashmir Valley

To eliminate terrorism and remove the Burhan Wani ( terrorist ) effect completely from the valley, we need to ensure three major things in J&K :- Development, Defence and Dialogue ( 3D Approach ). The Development of Kashmir could happen through various aspects such as giving them better education facilities, introducing industries and healthcare systems. Industrialization in the areas near the Indo-Pak border will strengthen India. Better education will create job opportunities for the Kashmiri youth and the younger one will think hundred times before joining any terrorist organization. Educated youth will never get brainwashed easily as they will understand militancy through a broader perspective.

Removal of article 370 and 35A has set the stage for the development of Kashmir as the people of Kashmir will now get exposed to the Indian culture and they will get benefited by different schemes of the Indian government. Burhan Wani provoked the Kashmiri youth to join the terrorist organization Hizbul mujahideen in the name of religion and also provided them the salary (around 30-35k/month) for their work. This was enough for the young minds to join the organisation as it seemed to them as an heroic activity and an employment since they were quite poor and unemployed. Burhan Wani fantasized terrorism as a war to save their religion and used jihad in a negative manner. The meaning of Jihad in Islam is to purify oneself which is being negatively used by terrorist organization as the people do not actually know the real meaning and gets brainwashed easily.

The PMKVY ( Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas yojna ) needs to be implemented at the grass root level as it will improve the skill set of Kashmiris rapidly and help them get a job and earn a living for themselves. Now comes the Defence, which is the most important factor in developing Kashmir and making it a prosperous state. We can slowly change the ideology of our Kashmiri brothers but what about Pakistan, it will never stop terrorism in Kashmir since we know that the deep state policy of Pakistan is to unstabilize India and it always act as a catalyst to provoke militancy in the valley. Their army itself is based on the philosophy of taking Kashmir back and they feed this ideology to their general population. Therefore our defence security strategies need to be very sharp and proactive. The operation “All out” has done wonders, the joint operations of the armed forces and the CRPF along with J&K police is being executed very well, the local intelligence played the key role and needs to be applauded for their tremendous work and need to safeguarded as the terrorist organisations are now targeting the local police officers and people who are associated with intelligence agencies. A National security doctrine if comes will definitely prove to be a Boon for the country.

Our Late CDS General Bipin Rawat also demanded NSD (National security doctrine) from the government. The making of integrated joint theatre commands of the Indian armed forces will play a key role in eliminating the terrorist activities and tackling Pakistan as well as China. Modernization of our armed forces and providing our Border security forces with latest technology weapons along with UCAV’s (unarmed combat aerial vehicle) and UAV’s (unarmed aerial vehicle) will help them curb the illegal intrusion of the Pakistani terrorists in the Indian territory. India should plan to do military exercises with different countries in Kashmir, this will tense Pakistan and will create India’s dominant status in that area. We should emphasise more on making our own weapons rather than buying from different nations as it will save cost and meanwhile that money could be invested in other purposes as well which will eventually strengthen our economy. Strengthening our cyber security is the need of the hour, since we know that Pakistan and China are doing information warfare with India.

Today no country wants to go on a conventional war as it is very costly and the economic depression after a war is immense. Terrorist organisations nowadays use social media to a greater extent to propagate their ideology and they especially target the teenage group as they are easy to radicalise. Burhan Wani extensively used social media to incite Kashmiri Muslims against India. He sometimes made videos of him holding Quran in one hand and AK-47 in the other and by doing so he managed to radicalise a large number of people in the valley in the name of religious sentiments. Now this was actually a religious warfare used by Pakistan since they know that they can’t defeat India in conventional warfare. This information warfare needs to be tackled with a proper strategy because we know that banning the internet will not be a permanent solution to this problem. Making of a specialised team which will trace terrorism related posts on social media will help our intelligence agencies gather information in a more efficient manner. Constant dialogue with the people of Kashmir is the most needed aspect if we want to see Kashmir as a developed and terrorism free state. Terrorist organisations such as Jaish-E-Mohammed and Lashkar-E-taiba generally recruits terrorists from Pakistan and Afghanistan region but the terrorist organization Hizbul mujahideen always tries to recruit the locals of Kashmir in their group since these locals are very well versed with terrain and the language. So the logistic support these people get in the valley is more in compared to foreign terrorist. After Burhan Wani’s death a large number of people gathered to attend his funeral. Since he was a local and it seemed to them as if he was their saviour and the rate of locals joining different terrorist organisations got increased after his death.

In this case the fault was of the government as they should not have given the dead body to his family which system got understood later. He became the poster boy of Kashmir and the youth living there started admiring his works, the then Pakistan P.M Nawaz Sharif also paid tribute to him, saying that his death ”infused a new spirit in the struggle for freedom” in the Kashmir valley. But the worst part is that some of our Indian journalists still calls him a rebel instead of calling him a terrorist. Regular dialogue of the Government officials with the Kashmiris will ensure that the central government thinks of them and wants their welfare as we have seen before Mr. Ajit Doval our National security advisor visited Kashmir after the abrogation of Article 370 and 35A.

Today people of Kashmir are showing immense cooperation with the operating forces in killing the terrorists hiding in the valley. This is happening because they are now trusting the Indian government and our armed forces. People living in Kashmir have seen extreme violence generation after generation, many of them have lost their loved ones in this ruthless bloodshed done by these Pakistani supported terrorist organisations in the name of religion. Kashmiris can bring the change by saying “NO” to terrorism in the valley. Government should start implementing its policies at a rapid rate. We want our Kashmiris to be nationalistic and if this happens, it will be a slap on the face of Pakistan and these terrorist organisations.