CRPF men caught between azadi and higher-ups

IN THE LINE OF FIRE Men in uniform say they take stones from protesters in Kashmir but are forced to retaliate with ‘restraint’

SRINAGAR: “Indian Dogs Go Back” reads a graffiti on the streets of Old Srinagar. Junctions are christened ‘Shaheed Burhan Chowk’ after Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani, whose killing last month triggered protests.

Near the Jamia Masjid, where two militants and a CRPF commandant were killed on August 15, sit a group of the force’s men — from Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Kerala and Tamil Nadu — with their blue armoured vehicle parked nearby.

The mosque is empty, so are the streets. But that is for now. “Every evening, there is heavy stone pelting,” says the Andhraite jawan. “We take the stones, but are supposed to retaliate with ‘maximum restraint’... reduce using pellets and tear gas shells.”

The protests since Wani’s killing had boiled over as agitators started raining stones on security forces.

The retaliation left 67 dead and thousands injured, triggering a debate over the use of pellets and tear gas shells to quell protests.

“If we get injured, no newspaper publishes our photo,” the jawan said, explaining how they are caught between the devil and deep sea — the frenzied mob and the “orders from above”.

During Hindustan Times’s tour of restive Srinagar, witnesses said protesters shout slogans against the CRPF rather than the local police.

“You don’t know what will happen when the stone pelting starts,” says the Bengali trooper.

Pointing to the vehicle, he says, “This bunker… they can put petrol and burn it down,” leaving them without a vehicle to go back to their camps.

The wait for another one might take hours. Worse is when the phone lines go down, cutting out contact with their families, who “get worried watching news”.

“If I tell my wife back in a village in Karnataka that I face stones from protesters every day, she will say leave your job and come back home,” says a jawan.

An Assamese trooper, standing guard near Lal Chowk in Srinagar, however, said his family would be happy to know about him and asked if his picture would come in the papers.

None of the CRPF personnel wished to be named as they were not authorised to speak to the media.

But one jawan, who did not want even his native state to be reported, summed up the situation: “Kashmiris want azadi. India won’t give it. Between the two, we are caught in the line of fire.”