CROSS ROADS
Khalid was very close to me. It had been over four years now, but the sight of his lifeless body at the encounter site in Panchanpathri, riddled with two bullets, one through his chest and the other one through his chin, had been etched in my heart since I saw him falling down with his rifle firmly in his hands and his head hitting the ground, just a few feet from where I was standing.
Not a day has passed that I don’t think of him. He had turned 26 just three months before his death. Tall, a well-kept light beard, broad shoulders, jet black hair and deep brown eyes. Always eager to be the first, playful, sometimes bordering mischievousness, and extremely talkative. He would talk about everything. So much that at times I would snub him and angrily tell him, “Khalid, for God’s sake, shut up!”
I am an Inspector in J&K Police and Khalid had joined the force as an SPO. Once a week, he would bring the most delicious Nadru Yakhni, cooked by his mother, for lunch and always offer it to me, which later became a regular ritual. This boy’s salary, as an SPO, was Rs. 6,000 a month. Rs. 6,000 per month! Enough for perhaps 10 kg of Nadru.
But he never complained.
His previous superior had told me that he would nag him day in, day out to join the SOG, and now that he was in the SOG, after a simple training of just 50 days or so, he would be the first to volunteer to go on anti-terrorism operations to fight dreaded terrorists. He would beg and pleadwith me to be allowed to fight vicious terrorists who had years of training, sophisticated weapons and a death-wish.
Of course, I knew that his pleading and begging to be sent to fight terrorists with mere 50 days of training under his belt was not because of him just being fearless.
He had no option.
He, just like the other tens of thousands of SPOs in Kashmir, wanted to be officially inducted in the J&K Police force as a simple Constable. And that was only possible if he would join the SOG, participate in encounters, conduct room-interventions, face bullets and bombs, performand most importantly, survive.
At times, I want to pull out my hair or take my service pistol and pierce it through my eye first, in order to ensure that the bullet will go through my head and exit at the backside of my skull with no room for survival when I would indeed shoot myself. Young boys, with a training of just 50 days and a salary of Rs. 6,000 risking their youth, the dreams and expectations of their parents, the responsibility of their siblings, their young lives.
For what?
These youth are our future, our ambitions and our desires. And they were being used as cheap labour to fight hardcore terrorism. Used as cannon fodder!
Holding a bounty of a permanent job of a Constable with a salary of around Rs. 40,000 as a carrot and asking them to risk their lives. Youthful, childlike budding teenagers thrown to the lions. To be ripped apart with bullets of hatred.
And as if being a Constable in the J&K Police department, or an SP or a DIG is easy and unperturbed. These young boys have no idea how arduous, painful and sometimes thankless it is to be a policeman in Kashmir.
I have been a policeman for 22 years and have risen to the rank of an Inspector, and while I know the pride of wearing this uniform, I also know the uncertainties, fear, social exclusion, gazes of hatred and distrust and the discrimination that comes with it. There are times that we policemen are seen as saviours, mostly when on duty, and there are times that we are seen as traitors, collaborators and apostates, mostly when off duty and when retired. We policemen of J&K Police operate, live, survive and retire while being caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.
I wish I could talk to someone. A psychiatrist or a psychologist. But the Police Department does not have such conveniences. A budget of over 9000 Crores per year, but not one psychiatrist or psychologist with whom I can sharemy fears, my mental state, discuss the dead bodies I have seen, the colleagues I have buried, the uncertainty of my family, the pain I have to endure when visiting the orphans and widows of my colleagues every year on their respective death anniversaries or the grief of Khalid which keeps haunting me.
My parents and my siblings have disowned me. Not publicly, but they have made it very clear to me that I am not the son they wanted me to be. My brother told me when I was just an ASI that it would be better for everyone if I would not visit too often as the neighbours kept telling him, “Farooq Sahib has inflicted a lot of damage to the Tehreek”. Since then, I visit my mother once in two months for an hour or so. My father and brother do acknowledge my presence whenever I come by, but without the warmth longed by me. Sitting anxiously on the floor in the corner of the room next to the kitchen, they keep peeking into the kitchen through the glass window, waiting for me to leave.
After finishing my duty, I change into regular clothes and go home in my private vehicle without any security or policemen. Often, I take different routes and park my car at different places outside on the road or in the alley. When I enter my home, my wife Zahra, and my daughter Zohra, heave a sigh of relief and have this tentative smile and look of uneasy contentment in their eyes.
While very close friends and relatives know that I am in the police, the neighbourhood doesn’t. Of course, they suspect, which is evident from their glances or the inferences the ladies of the locality make to Zahra, but we haven’t told them. You never know whose relative, friend or acquaintance might be an OGW, informer or terrorist. In Kashmir, nobody knows who is who.
The eyes and smirks of the neighbourhood harbour this intangible suspicion and disdain, which terrifies me.
When at home, I cannot switch off my phone as according to the Police Manual, a policeman is on duty 24/7. There have been regular instances when deep in the night I had to sneak out of my home, like a professional thief afraid of waking anyone, and report to the police station.
Apart from the underlying, not easily visible social stigma of being in the police in Kashmir, there is also another kind of discrimination I face. A kind of discrimination and unfairness from those who should have, perhaps, hailed people like me.
Nobody, not the state administration, New Delhi, Islamabad or the people of Kashmir can deny that it is the J&K Police which has defended the tricolour in Kashmir. With blood, sweat, tears and more. We have given supreme sacrifices to defend our country, its honour and pride in the last 35 years. Despite the ostracization, guns, bombs, abuses and stones, we stood tall and high and defended these majestic mountains, beautiful lakes, unpredictable glaciers, thick and deep forestsand our people in 1947, in 1965, in 1989, in 2008, 2010 and in 2016.
Even in 2019, when everyone, including our own country and leaders thought that we would revolt.
We didn’t!
We remained loyal, steadfast and implemented the government’s decision irrespective of the fact that some of us did not agree with it. We have upheld our oath while sacrificing our lives and turning our children into orphans and wives into widows. The wrinkles on our parents’ faces and their dried-up tears testify to the blood-drenched immolations that the J&K Police daily offer.
However, surely there might be still lacking something in our conflagrationthat we are treated differently from forces like the BSF, CRPF, ITBP, SSB, AR and others.
Our risk allowance in this conflict-torn place is anything between Rs. 125 and Rs. 300 per month depending on our rank. Our hardship allowance is 10% of our basic salary which translates to around Rs. 14,000 per month for an Inspector like me. Our medical allowance is a mere Rs. 300 per month. The hardship allowance of these Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) starts at Rs. 21,600 per month and goes up to Rs. 31,600 per month for gazetted officers. That is almost the basic pay of a constable in J&K Police for which Khalid gave his life.
Sadly, our hardships are not considered hard enough.
Our maximum uniform allowance depending on the rank is Rs. 10,000 per annum while that of the CAPF starts at Rs. 10,000 per annum and goes up to Rs. 25,000 per annum depending on the rank.
Do they wear two uniforms simultaneously, I sometimes ask myself?
If we are injured on duty, we must pay for our treatment ourselves and only afterwards we can claim reimbursement. On the other hand, the CAPF can make use of the Ayushman card which not only provides cashless medical treatment at enlisted private and government hospitals across the country for them, but also for their dependents.Currently, there are more than 40 Lakhs CAPF personnel with Ayushman cards.
Would another 1 Lakh Ayushman cards for the J&K Police and their dependents bankrupt the country? Or are we and our dependents not worthy of proper healthcare in return for defending our country?
Earned leave for the CAPF is 60 days and Casual leave is 15 days per annum. Our Earned leave is 30 days, and casual leave is 15 days, which is not a matter of right. Leave is granted depending on the workload, which is an iceberg refusing to melt. Last year, I was only able to take 12 days of leave. In 2019, I couldn’t take a single day of leave. This year, I worked on both Eidsand also when my mother-in-law died.
The CAPF jawan can take a flight to his hometown, as he and his dependents are eligible for a defence quota concession on flights, which typically offers up to 50% discount on the base fare for domestic flights. This applies also to retired personnel.
I do not have this luxury when posted in Jammu or Samba and now that J&K is a Union Territory, when I will be posted in Mizoram or Puducherry. To get home, I will have to take a Sumo or a train from these places.That too, without any concessional rates.
There are discussions within the power corridors of the Ministry of Home Affairs to increase the total leave of the CAPF from 75to 100 days per annum in order to enhance the work-life balance of these personnel.
What about me? For pity’s sake, I too have a family which I love dearly. Don’t I deserve a healthy work-life balance?
The J&K Police is the first line of defence. Whenever there is an encounter, it is people like me and Khalid who stand in the line of fire. The CAPF stand behind us. They assist us.
It is us who take the first bullet.
And after three years of assisting us, the CAPF jawan will complete his tenure and leave Kashmir.
I can’t leave.
I have to live here. Every single day now and every single day after retirement.
With all the gazes of suspicion, the social stigma, the fear of being killed by the brother of the terrorist I shot, the anxiety that an OGW would conspire against me and my family, the worry that the fruit-vendor in the street might inform upon me.
Our children have to grow up here. Grooms for our daughters will have to come from this very society. Our parents will be buried in this soil. My wife will continue to face the inferences of the ladies of the locality.
And I will continue to have never-ending nightmares of the many Khalids which were consumed like thin air.
Every single day and night.
I am not the son of father and mother anymore. And to India, my other mother, I am a step son.
What should I do more to prove my loyalty? What is required from me to be treated equally like the other sons of India of the CAPF?
What will make me Indian enough?
Perhaps, a policeman of the J&K people must die twice.
God knows, Khalid did.
With his death, I too perished.
My body, transformed into the coffin of my own soul.
(Author is the Director of European Foundation for South Asian Studies (EFSAS) and can be reached at: [email protected])
