‘Police committed to providing level playing field to all in LS Polls’
Srinagar, Mar 16: Asserting that the fight against terror is a multi-pronged battle, Director General of Police (DGP) R.R. Swain today said the police’s efforts are not limited to neutralizing militants but also focus on disrupting the entire terror ecosystem. “The terror ecosystem meant not only fighting against the man with the gun, it meant fighting against terror financing, logistics and the narrative which glorifies, endorses and legitimizes violence,” DGP said in an interview with a Delhi-based TV channel.
“We have a multi-pronged strategy to counter this hydra-headed threat. Our offensive spans from conducting intelligence-based surgical operations against terrorists to choking their financial pipelines, disrupting their supply chains, and countering their toxic propaganda,” Swain said.
When asked about the changes post Abrogation of Article 370, Swain said “Let us be very objective. The big change is about going back. Beyond merely neutralizing the man with the gun. It was always important to fight the man with the gun because it was immediate. There is a person, as I always say, I always say that a man standing at the door, with a gun, or you go out in the market and four gunmen are roaming around. So how will you roam? How will you go to school? So neutralizing them, controlling them, it is very immediate. But going beyond that, as they say, there is a supply going on in a pipeline, in a pipe.
You will get tired because there is an incessant supply of water, poisonous, toxic water. So when we say fighting the terror, it should be against the ecosystem.
You should go beyond and find out where is the supply of, where is the source of this toxic water coming from. Incessant. Unless you disrupt that, you will get tired.”
“And that is what exactly the enemy was aiming at. They were aiming at a strategy. Their strategy was very simple. That they will wear out the Indian state by making it spend more and more and more and more. By holding the Mugga and the bucket, holding the water and throwing it here and there. And there is no name to end there.”
On being asked to what extent do you think that the political parties were acting as a stumbling block? Preventing you from taking action against the terrorists in the past. And now there is no such hindrance after the abrogation of Article 370, Swain said “See, it is a simple matter. When there was a terrorist incident, we did not even ask the family members properly. How did it come to your house? I mean, to say that every family member was afraid of it was not true. It was not at all logical. So you did not let us investigate. You did not let us ask where you were studying. Which mosque did you go to? So when you do not ask this thing, when you do not investigate this thing, then the people who glorify it, there is no question about them. The people who clap in the village, raise it. Why does a person join? If you see, the 20,000 young people, if you look at the different data, the people who have lost their lives in this, all of them belong to poor families.
Why is that? Because for them, a shortcut was glory.”
“The glorification is being done by a few people who have made this an atmosphere. In schools and colleges, particularly, as we say, some schools have made an extracurricular environment article where it was glorified, you clapped, you gave it a feeling. So to make a shortcut for that, to become JKPS, to become JKAS, to become IPS, to become FS, to become a successful businessman, to become a successful farmer, to become a successful painter, to become a successful carpet weaver, it takes hard work, sir. That work is not hard work. You can do it quickly. Then it comes out, what else? This is to investigate it. All those involved in this work, to get the finance, to continue the process of throwing stones, who does it? When you will not let it investigate, you will not take it to its logical conclusion, then it will continue, sir.”
Do you think that somewhere these politicians also were providing that oxygen to the ecosystem of terror? And they were also glorifying their vested interests and that has now stopped to a great extent. You see, I have very honestly said that I am speaking when people talk about white papers and reconciliation, etc.
“As a manager of the security establishment, and a senior leader of the security force, I will be lying to myself, I will be lying to the blood and sweat of more than 1600 policemen and three times that of other security forces and several tens and thousands of civilians who have lost their lives. I would be lying to myself if I said that this aspect is also not included. Meaning? Who stopped? When did a serious effort take place to stop the violence and to cut the cycle of violence? Suddenly there was a gap in the effort. Suddenly there was something amiss when it came to stopping the supply.”
“And the terror ecosystem meant not only fighting against the man with the gun, it meant fighting against terror financing, it meant fighting against terror logistics, it meant fighting against terror narrative which glorifies, endorses, and legitimizes in several subtle and not-so-subtle ways. And when you allow that, you create an environment where anyone who is a foot soldier with a gun and without the gun becomes a glorifier. So that glorification, that financing, that incentivization, in several hundred ways, you have not disincentivized it. We have tens and hundreds of examples in which… So, I mean, the conclusions have to be drawn. It is objective,” DGP said.
“Even a judicial inquiry can be put to what I am saying. And I have reasons to say that any genuine inquiry into this would bring out very, very startling and very painful. We also used to talk about healing touch. And now, you also talk about the healing touch. How is your healing touch different from the healing touch they used to talk about? See, sir, as a blue-blood police leader, I would certainly keep away from politics because I am duty-bound to provide a level playing field, especially when the elections are legally bound and obligated to provide a level playing field for the democracy to unfold in its truest and its purest form. Having said that, I mean, I ask myself who do I heal? Which wounds are to be healed?”
“If the wound has been self-inflicted or if the wound has been. The person who has inflicted the wound himself, do I heal him? So, I am asking a question as to who is the real victim. Whose I mean, who… Whose wounds are to be healed? I make a distinction. I mean, I cannot have a confused, mixed-up situation where the killer and the killed, the perpetrator and the victim are to be put on equal pedestal in the same breath. I would be confusing the community, the common man,
my fighters and the common citizens. They will lose faith in me. They may not be able to say it because of the overwhelming terror network but they will know the truth.”
“You see, if, say, for example, we know that who killed Mirvai Saab ka, Father Saab ko, the same place, the victim and the perpetrators are to be put on the same pedestal, I Somebody has to stand up and call the bluff. I wish the leadership, not only at the security level but even at the political level, should have the, you know, the courage and the moral obligation to be able to distinguish between the two. If we don’t do that, it is in absolute clarity of thought as I said a little while ago that we would like to make a clear distinction between a common citizen who comes out to give information risking his life and his family. They are the two patriots.”
“So they are to be rewarded. You see, getting information through any other method, I call it that when a patriot gives this information, I call it as clean and green information. It comes without any side effects. And why shouldn’t this state reward and recognize such a, you know, risk-taking conduct as it is the law says that every citizen is duty bound, to stand by the side of the law and not by the side of the lawbreakers or the treasonous behaviour of some people who, you know, work against the country and they say. So it is in that connection. I think the police department’s policy of rewarding only the patriots and people who give information as citizens. This is only going to take deeper roots and every SHO would be, would be, would be required to have cordial and warm relationships with the community.”
And the information will come only because we would like to protect the community. We would like to reach out to the community to say that you can move freely, your daughters, your sons, and your children can go to this school, can learn, can play, can innovate, can participate, can compete in any walk of the field and there will be no, no strings attached to it.
No one can say that education will follow only after a particular political framework is implemented. No, it cannot be. Just as no one can say that the sun will stop rising in Jammu and Kashmir or the breeze that we have right now should stop until such a time when a different political regime comes. These are free goods and these free goods are available to mankind irrespective of,
there cannot be any hindrance. And similarly, much less than that human-devised disruption of peace, order and of security cannot be given away to a handful of bullies and certainly not to enemies of the country. And there they will find Jammu and Kashmir police as a serious bulwark, a dedicated bulwark which will,
which will have both the muscles and which will have the, the firearms and the tough arm but at the same time make a distinction between the bad man
and the vast majority of common men who are willing to live a life of dignity, of order and peace.
On being asked how perturbing it had been. In the past, we have seen how some of the villains, were projected as victims and some of them even made Messiah of peace. I am talking about Yasin Malik, a killer who was made a peace builder, projected as a peace builder, projected as Mahatma Gandhi and the victims were demonized. Like Kashmiri Pandits, they were demonized. Their pain was belittled. So now he is at the right place where he should have been long back. So as a person looking after the law and order here, so how you really feel now and how you used to feel then and you think that this is somewhere actually a kind of a closure for those who have been looking for justice?
“I think in the force when I speak to my colleagues, when I speak to my, both middle ranking senior colleagues and to the Jawans, to the men and women, police women at the cutting edge level, believe me, I am not lying. I have hundreds of interactions with them in different formats, in Badakhana, in my orderly room meetings. The feedback that I get is, sir, this confusion must be ended as to who is a martyr. If the Indian state and its representative local government, because it is part of the overall Indian state, the then S2I government of the J&K or the UTI government is only part of the overall Indian state edifice, isn’t it? Their response is, sir, if there is ambivalence, then how do we fight? I mean, that ambivalence must be ended. You cannot be a nationalist in the four walls and public you make some other statement. This is very demoralizing for any force because forces move and go for the enemy when there is clarity. So, if, as I said a little while ago, when this clarity is blurred, deliberately, it is a huge pain and it is a huge setback to any law enforcement. Can you have a law which says that this is a murder and this is not a murder? So, if this is part of India, is there any doubt about it? Then the common man is saying, govern it like that.”
Last question. Mehbooba Mufti said there would be no one to hold the tricolour after the abrogation of Article 370. But we are seeing a kind of a change that very few youngsters, are joining terror ranks. And more and more here at the Lethpur also I saw that they are there to not only look for the tricolour fortune but also to give their life for the country, nation, motherland, India. So, what is your message to them, those who had been prophesizing and predicting this thing?
Can I tell you something? The training school, a commando training school in which we are discussing this, my training school vacancies are falling short because people are falling head over heels to come and join and be fighting soldiers, fighting policemen. So, the spirit is so high. That should be an answer to what you say, that every common Kashmiri given an opportunity will be on our side to fight it. We are unable to give him that opportunity. So, I think the time will come when they will become soldiers in their rights and we cannot have everybody wearing a uniform, but we would send a message that every individual in Kashmir and Jammu and Kashmir in the larger sense of the term is a soldier, is a policeman in his own right and his contribution many times by even staying away from anti-national activities. You see, when people ignore these calls from across to go and participate in hartals and bans, I call them policemen, you know. So, they say that the least that we can do for you, sir, is that we will abstain. What else do you require? What will be your challenge for the Lok Sabha election? More and more participation? I think in the Lok Sabha, we have three goals. A, of course, to provide a free, fearless, and fair framework of participation where every individual, if he wants to compete and contest in competitive democratic politics, he should feel free to do it. People, common citizens, should be able to fearlessly and be able to come and vote. The overall environment should be such that anybody’s diktats from across or from within, should be seen as proxies to disrupt it, should be disrupted and foiled. This is the overall environment which J&K Police is committed to creating in the run-up to the elections.
