Soibugh, India: Just as 300 elementary school children were finishing their morning prayer, this village became the latest battlefield between Indian soldiers and Kashmiri guerrillas.
A military convoy of 95 vehicles rumbled into this hamlet of 12,000 people recently, in a search for the rebels. As it passed, the children dropped to the ground and their parnls, working in rice fields nearby, or Sitting in the village square, ran for cover, By dusk, two Indian soldiers and six militants were killed. One civilian also died, caught in the cross fire when he was forced by the army to Approach the rebels and demand their surrender In the army’s Onslaught, the 6 year old, three-story wooden house where the rebels were hiding burned down. Three weeks after five Western tourists were kidnapped by a Kashmiri militant group, lille has changed in the daily mayhem of the northern region’s battle for independence. The Indian government has promised to keep its soldiers away from the little~ known AlFaran group that is holding the hostages in the Himalayan foothills of Jammu Kashmir state: an American, two Britons, a German and a Norwegian. The rebels five threatened to Kill the hostages if soldiers come 100 close.
AlFaran has said two of the hostages were wounded last week in a gun battle with Indian forces, but New Delhi denies that. It also refuses to mectarebel demand and free2I jailed guerrillas
India, a predominantly Hindu country, has 300,000 troops in Jammu Kashmir, the country’s only Muslim majority stato, 10 crush the campaign for the independence of Kashmir. More than 13,000 people have been killed since late 1989. Every day, an average of about to people most of them militants and civilians, are killed in skirmishes.
Anti-Indian sentiment is so deep that even little children shout Freedom! Freedom!” when see soldiers walk by.
Soldiers returned to Soibugh, 15 miles west of the summer capital Srinagar, the day after the battle there and searched every house for rebels and weapons.
Fifteen young men were taken inside the empty school for interrogation, Later, they accused soldiers of mistreating them.
“I was beaten and they put my head in a water bucket,” said college student Javedi Ahmmed. “They then.
Shouted, ‘Where are the terrorists? You tell us and we’ll free you.
‘The young men were fleecing the village, vowing to get even with the Indian military. “If have a gun, I can talk in the same language as that of the Indian army” Said one.
Article extracted from this publication >> July 28, 1995
