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| Tuesday, 3 February 2004 |
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Indian Kashmir Govt offers cash rewards for surrendering rebels SRINAGAR, India, Monday (AFP,Reuter) The government of Indian Kashmir offered huge cash rewards to Islamic rebels ready to lay down their arms, while a militant group warned that guns in the restive region would not fall silent. Those who surrender would be given a cheque of 150,000 rupees (3,320 dollars), which they can cash only after three years of "good behaviour", Kashmir's chief secretary Sudhir Bloeria said in a statement. "To sustain them after they choose to surrender, a monthly stipend of 2,000 rupees (44 dollars) will be paid to each of them," Bloeria said. He said the scheme has been cleared by the federal government and approved by the state cabinet Earlier 0ian authorities in Kashmir said they had freed 34 prisoners. The prisoners were released from jails and detention centres across the region over the last week to allow them to join their families for the festival, said a senior official. "The entire process was carried out away from media glare as we don't want them to be made heroes," he told Reuters. The released prisoners included sympathisers of militant groups and rebels accused of minor crimes, he said. "The policy aims at providing an opportunity for the return of those militants who have undergone a change of heart in the fast changing atmosphere." Bloeria was referring to a thaw in relations between India and Pakistan and first ever high-level peace talks between moderate Kashmiri separatists and Indian Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani on January 22. The chief secretary, however, said the scheme would not cover rebels "involved in heinous crimes". "The scheme also excludes those militants who have rejoined militancy after surrendering to the authorities," he said. Government would also help militants set up self-employment units and provide free training to them. Without elaborating, Bloeria said there would be specified places of surrender and that cash rewards would also be given for weapons handed over. The Greater Kashmir English newspaper, meanwhile, quoted the chief commander of Kashmir's dominant rebel group, Hizbul Mujahedin, as brushing aside any chances of an end to hostilities with Indian troops. It ridiculed moderate separatists for entering into dialogue with India. "Some people are breeding hopelessness among the masses and consciously or unconciously trying to make a sellout of the movement," Gazi Shuhabuddin, chief commander, operations of Hizbul, told the paper. "No one will be allowed to make a sell-out of the blood of martyrs," the commander said, and added that the group would continue fighting Indian troops. Kashmir's Shura-e-Jihad (Council of Jihad), a conglomerate of several militant groups, termed the ongoing peace talks between moderates and the Indian government as a "dirty political game". A Shura statement published in the Greater Kashmir said United Nations Security Council resolutions on Kashmir in the late 1940s provided a basis for the resolution of the Kashmir dispute. The resolutions call for the holding of a plebiscite to provide Kashmiris a choice between arch rivals India and Pakistan. "The guns will fall silent only when those resolutions are implemented," the statement said. Meanwhile people were injured in a grenade explosion triggered by suspected Islamic rebels in a busy market in northern Indian Kashmir, a police spokesman said. The spokesman said the casualties occurred when the rebels hurled a grenade at a moving Indian army vehicle, which missed the target and exploded among civilians in Magam, 30 kilometres (19 miles) from Srinagar, Kashmir's summmer capital. |
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