The latest decision by the Union Government for deferring for the time being the withdrawal of Army seems to have been taken with seriousness keeping in view the recent spurt of violence in Jammu Division and Kashmir valley. The armed forces have been doing well and have been successful in containing the terror violence in J&K to a great extent, but the recent incident of terror attacks in the last few months, perhaps has forced the authorities to rethink their earlier decision.
This seems imperative in the backdrop of the ensuing G20 Summit being held in Srinagar. The Government does not want to take any security risk that could affect G20 Guests, Delegates, visitors, tourists and the public at large.
In the last week of February 2023, reports surfaced that the Union government was considering withdrawing the Indian Army from Kashmir's hinterland in consultation with the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, the Ministry of Defence, the armed forces, and the J&K Police.
The plan was that while the army would continue to patrol the Line of Control, the Central Reserve Police Force would fill the void in the hinterland.
A withdrawal of this magnitude, which had been reportedly discussed for some time, was indeed a prudent and long-overdue step. Moreover, the political and economic upheavals going on in our neighborhood that have been responsible for exporting and fanning the terror activities in India was probably also a factor driving toward the decision. But the latest developments in the recent months on the terror front on this side of LoC gave credence to the fact that the mindset has not changed across the LoC. Withdrawal of state sponsorship, whether complete or partial, cripples an insurgency and usually results in its defeat. But though defeated, the terror groups have not fully relented and their potential to play havoc with their terrorist attacks cannot be ruled out.
The Indian Army has two major roles in the UT of J&K: guarding the LoC and operating the Counter-Infiltration Grid.
The latter, which has been established between the LoC and the hinterland, is designed to neutralise militants who manage to sneak across the LoC's Anti-Infiltration Obstacle System into the hinterland.
Considering the fact that with the expansion and professional evolution of the expanded J&K Police and the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF), many CI/CT tasks are now handled jointly by the RR-J&K Police-CAPF combination, or solely by the J&K Police and the CAPF.
The understanding that the J&K Police and the CRPF have gained sufficient experience and are well versed in counter terror operations, has now been put on hold for some time to ensure smooth sailing for the most sensitive and important events life G 20 and other activities for rolling large investment in Jammu Kashmir. While such a decision may change with the change in situation for good but to avoid collateral damages is more important as the human lives are precious.
