Sajjad Bazaz
The month of October reminds me of ugly situation that hit the Kashmir Valley on October 27, 1988. I was just a few months old in the field of my profession – Journalism. It was a routine pleasant day before a series of bomb blasts were reported from different locations in the valley. It included a powerful bomb blast, which rocked historic Lal Chowk, Srinagar and some shootout incidents were also reported from several locations in the city on the day. Actually, a breed of Kashmiri armed militants emerged on the scene, and took everybody by surprise. This specific date (October 27, 1988) was deliberately chosen by the armed militants because it marked the anniversary of Indian troops landing in Srinagar in 1947.
The first shootout was carried out by the Kashmiri separatists on October 27, 1988 near Fateh Kadal in which they fired five shots from their Kalashnikov guns smashing the window panes of a bus and a matador. Then followed a powerful bomb blast in historic Lal Chowk which blew one Maruti car into pieces and injured ten persons, which included a Munsif and a lady advocate. These two were badly injured in the blast and one leg of the two was amputated. This incident sent shivers through the spine of the then government and the people. Kashmiri separatists in their press statements declared that a new phase of “Kashmir liberation plan” was launched.
Historically speaking, Kashmir got wedded to India on October 27, 1947 and there was no hartal call and all business establishments remained open. An English author and an expert on Southeast Asian politics Stanely Wolpert in his book “Jinnah of Pakistan” mentions a series of events that led to Kashmir’s accession to India.
“On October 23, 1947, British trucks and jeeps of Pakistan army loaded with some 5000 armed Pathan Afridi, Waziri and Mahsud tribesmen of the North-west Frontier crossed the Kashmir border and headed East along the Muzaffarabad-Baramullah road that led to Srinagar itself. That ‘Invasion of Kashmir from Pakistan would long be called by Pakistan a purely ‘volunteer’ action undertaken ‘spontaneously’ by irate ‘tribals’ rushing to the aid of oppressed Muslim brothers,” mentions the author in his book “Jinnah of Pakistan”.
It is interesting to note that Stanely Wolpert in his book says that “ reports of raiders burning and seizing Muzaffarabad reached New Delhi unofficially on the night of October 24, 1947 and the next morning, Pakistan army headquarters officially informed New Delhi sister dominion command that ‘ tribal volunteers’ had ‘entered’ Kashmir. Mountbatton summoned an emergency meeting of the Indian defence committee that morning and they agreed to assemble all arms and aircraft they could find for possible immediate dispatch to Srinagar.”
Mr. V. P. Menon, the then Secretary of state Ministry was rushed to Srinagar to persuade Maharaja Hari Singh to sign an accession agreement. It was on October 26, 1947, early Sunday morning that Mr. Menon returned to report to Mountbatton, Pandit Nehru and Patel that Maharaja ‘had gone into pieces completely’ and “could come to no decision” – mentions Stanely Wolpert in “Jinnah of Pakistan”, Page No. 348.
However, the then prime minister of Jammu and Kashmir Mr. M C Mahajan proved “receptive” to Menon’s mission and accompanied him to New Delhi, where he met with Nehru and Patel.
Quoting from a book “My Brother”: “I requested immediate military aid on any terms”, Mahajan recalled urging Nehru to “give us the military force we need. Take the accession and give whatever power you desire to the popular party. The army must fly to save Srinagar this evening or else I will go to Lahore and negotiate with Jinnah.”
The first batch of Indian troops under the command of Lt. Col. D. R. Rai was flown to Srinagar in the early hours of the morning of October 27 after the Indian Defence Council met and took the decision. One company of Sikh regiment was brought from Palam in air force Dakotas and another company from Willingdon airport. When the first batch of Indian troops arrived in Srinagar airport they were carried in buses and trucks to different parts of the city to push back the tribal raiders. The very sight of Indian soldiers resulted in “wide spread jubilation’ among the people in Srinagar. In Lal chowk, the soldiers were cheered. Not only this, the transporters made available their vehicles for carrying the soldiers to forward areas.
“As soon as Jinnah learned of India’s airlift to Srinagar, he ordered his ‘acting’ British commander in chief General Sir Douglas Gracey, to ‘move two brigades of the Pakistan army into Kashmir…one from Rawalpindi and another from Sialkot. Precisely, October 27, 1947 witnessed the armed conflict between tribesmen,assisted by the regular Pakistan army and the Indian army. The conflict divided the J&K State, with one known as Pakistan Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (PoJK)
