A Journey in Jammu Kashmir & Allied areas (JKA)............................
from Subject to Citizen
.........autocracy to democracy
.........Dogra Raaj to Awaami Raaj
.........1947 CE to...........................
#WhiteFlags
#Neutrality
#WaterManagement #MirpurtoLondonviaCentralAsia
At midday today we surpassed the half yearly mark of 2022 viz. 182 days x 2 = 364 + 12 hours.
This has by far been our most consistent run of daily weblogging since we began weblogging in 2008. We are well on course this year to beat the peak of 330 daily entries in 2019.
Remember that 2022 would have had an 100% record of daily weblogging, if not for the 4 complete days that I spent in Kotli jail during March.
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It was also Day 27 of our 'Public Policy Workshop' at Maqbool Bhat Shaheed Square in Dadyaal, where we sit in 'court' between 0800hrs and 1000hrs every morning without fail. We also hope to maintain this momentum for 365 days, without a break.
I did begin to sit down to write at 2020hrs but.......connectivity issues....
As it rained last night in healthy quantity, the electricity has predictably become more present than absent.
I've hinted before that Pakistan has an unhealthy reliance on hydropower-ed electricity (particularly from our territory) and its selfish - coupled with myopic - strategy has created havoc with the environment - particularly in the last few years - such that the natural flow of water is not increasing enough in summer - despite the melting of glaciers - thus a reliance on rain to aid the water flow into these hydropower projects.
Rain deprives us of electricity when it comes - because of weak infrastructure - but once it recedes, the additional flow of water creates more power generation, leading to more electricity for us.
I will give you a widely quoted figure of roughly how much electricity is produced in AJK and how much we need:
I'm just breezing through an academic collection of work on our territory: 'Society and Politics of Jammu and Kashmir' edited by Serena Hussain and published by Palgrave Macmillan 2021 at Cham, Switzerland. I find it refreshing that some academic measurement is being made of what the people here - on the ground in particular and those striving in some manner in the diaspora - go through to get their voice heard or written about, when the structure of statecraft is so heavily stacked in favour of India and Pakistan, crafted with such dexterity that only the British could possibly conjure up.
At first glance, it also makes me feel that I'm missing out on something somewhere.
Whatever it is, it is what I need to address as part of my daily routine.
Now that we haven't seen rain for a few days, the electricity is playing up again and we are witnessing about 12 hours of load-shedding, just like we were before the few days of rain.
We are essentially suffering because of a greedy and myopic neighbour, who wants to use the hydro powered electricity of this territory (which is expensive to build but whose running costs are minimal) and what it produces in its own territory (Tarbela is its major source), to try and fulfill the electricity needs of its own country, while always trying to give us as least supply as it thinks we can tolerate.
If Pakistan were to try and supply electricity to everybody it would have to buy oil or gas based electricity, which it would have to use foreign currency to do so, which it doesn't have in sufficient supply. It has already borrowed way beyond its ability to repay, from the rest of the world.
Thus, despite Pakistan producing at least 10 times more than our own need for electricity - from our territory - it still strives to deprive us of our need, for over 12 hours a day.
When it rains, the immediate short term effect is that the electricity goes because the transmission infrastructure is weak. However, once the rain subsides there is more water to power the hydro power projects built in our territory. This increases the supply of electricity in the short term but only until the water levels recede.
This is the pattern we have witnessed over the past few weeks.
These large hydro projects, involved uprooting many people (our people, not the people of Pakistan) and they have had a disastrous effect on the environment too. Boring long tunnels to divert rivers is one such example. Given the natural altitude decline from our territory to the plains of India and Pakistan and given the abundant sources of water flowing down from here; many relatively smaller - run of the river - electricity generating projects could have been created.
They would have been environmentally friendly and people wouldn't have been uprooted on the scale we have witnessed.
However, our neighbour being greedy and myopic - as declared at the outset of today's weblog - has made us sacrifice ourselves for its behaviour. Mega projects enable mega corruption (not so easily possible on smaller projects) and so what if our people have to pay the price? A few religious anecdotes about big brother in Islam etc. is usually sufficient to appease our people, or what usually transpires is that our people also get corrupted to emulate their Pakistani brothers in Islam.
The relatively strong exploit the weak. The Pakistanis exploit AJK and GB. The Pakistani sponsored power elites in our territory then exploit the weaker amongst us.
Our own resources are used to exploit and subjugate us.
This vicious cycle repeats itself from generation to generation.
Our motivation is to break this cycle and make our people productive enough to genuinely compete with the rest of the world, based on what should be our competitive advantages bestowed by nature upon us.
To not be unproductive rent/commission seekers, a haven for black money and terrorism or a destination for bad loans.
AJK and the rest of JKA - including GB - would do well to stop emulating Pakistan.
What happened yesterday evening in Muzaffarabad should be an eye opener for the remaining few people whose eyes have remained shut over Pakistan's crimes in reference to Jammu Kashmir & Allied areas.
27 year old lady Haseena Bibi and her 18 month old innocent flower (child) were killed by 4 people, assisted by 4 others.
End of translation....
I'll try and summarise the story too, which can be read in Urdu at the link above.
Paalri in Dawaarian, which is in the Neelam Valley is where this gory incident happened.
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This is an important development in the story of Asmaad Aslam, the young boy who accidentally crossed over the LOC from Tithrinote, Hajeera in November last year:
Here's the much anticipated comprehensive video interview of Malik Waseem Kashmiri conducted by myself a few days ago:
Title and description was as follows:
Malik Waseem Kashmiri vs The State of AJK
The land and people of Jammu Kashmir & Allied areas (JKA)
If we tolerate the strong occupying the weak inside our territory, then how do we reason with external occupiers?
Large or small, occupiers are occupiers.
A comprehensive video interview of Malik Waseem Kashmiri by Tanveer Ahmed, in reference to the land of Sardar Singh and Ratan Singh in Naluchi, Muzaffarabad.
A comprehensive written report on this 'test case' will also be published very soon.
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Meanwhile, DC Muzaffarabad is trying his best to trace Malik Waseem and get him illegally arrested once again, to prevent him from agitating for his rights.
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We are reminding both our public as well as the institutions built courtesy of that public that cleaning our environment is a basic requirement for civilisation:
Here's the text describing the embedded video above:
Waste management, soil management, water management and human/data management at Maqbool Bhat Shaheed Square - Dadyaal
If it succeeds in this square it will succeed throughout the c.85K square miles of JKA.
Slavery is a curse and freedom doesn't come without getting your hands dirty.
Bringing regular - and hopefully - increasingly positive changes in one's daily routine at the age of 50 brings much change in one's body. It feels as if a whole circuit board is being changed.
Long may this continue.
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I know - we Muslims - get very emotional and furious when it appears that somebody has insulted our holy prophet (peace be upon him). We do it by instinct because of our love and devotion but we must take heed of the following examples from our beloved prophet's own life:
It is indeed. It is also to be noted that - at least in this day and age - it is more likely that non Muslims will understand the universal messages of Islam rather than Muslims themselves. In general, Muslims adopt the faith but not the guidance > complications 4 all humanity.
There was always likely to be a sharp turn in matters related to Malik Waseem Kashmiri versus the State of AJK. I've been studying this 'test case' since the middle of December last year. In fact, I dedicated a folder for this issue and began collecting evidence on all matters related to it, on the 13th of December 2021.
There was a twist yesterday and it is just ballooning as an issue, with more thrust than at any point since Malik Waseem and his family were evicted on January the 17th 2022, from Sardar Singh and Ratan Singh's land in Naluchi, Muzaffarabad; that they had occupied as refugees from the other side of JKA (Kupwara) in 1949. after migrating in 1947.
The man on the ground representing the 'strong arm of the law' was Deputy Commissioner (DC hereon) Muzaffarabad Nadeem Janjua, who used all available tools in the British colonial manual to allegedly detain, intimidate, harass, torture, beat and blackmail Malik Waseem and his family.
He was following orders from the Supreme Court of AJK, claimed he and almost every other asset of the 'governance system' in Muzaffarabad.
Yesterday morning, news reached most parts of AJK that a stolen car (from Lahore last year) with government of AJK number plates, was in the 'custody' or 'use' of DC Muzaffarabad.
According to the following video report by a Pakistani news channel, namely City 41:
From 05:46 in the video....
DC Muzaffarabad is clearly implicated as 'custodian' of this stolen vehicle. The presenter also mentions that DC (Muzaffarabad) implored the owner to not publicly disclose this information; that the stolen vehicle with government of AJK number plates, was found in the DC's 'custody'.
On the contrary, DC Muzaffarabad Nadeem Janjua issued the following press note, yesterday too:
In this press note, DC Muzaffarabad Nadeem Janjua claims to have nothing to do with this stolen vehicle and considers it to be a cunning conspiracy against him and the 'honourable' office that he holds. He finishes by declaring that he is in the process of taking stern 'penal' action against all these 'conspirators'.
I wonder what action he should anticipate, if he is found guilty in a responsible court of law?
Will the endemically corrupt governance system in the State of AJK - even as much as investigate - his alleged 'misuse of authority' on an increasing list of alleged crimes?
Or in the words of a learned co-citizen: Will anybody investigate the Pakistani TV channel City 41?
Remaining with yesterday, DC Muzaffarabad summoned Malik Waseem's elder brother Malik Naeem to his office - on the pretext that he wanted to show him some shelters (fabricated building structures) - for the alternative land that the government of AJK had arranged, as compensation for Malik Waseem and his family (which incidentally is already disputed by two other parties).
DC Muzaffarabad Nadeem Janjua
Leaving aside for now the legal basis for this contrived agreement (blackmail according to Malik Waseem), DC Muzaffarabad is alleged to have kept Malik Naeem restricted to the former's office all day and ended with open threats to the latter. Ranging from, "Bring your brother Malik Waseem here or else I will make all hell break loose on your family once again," to "This time I detain your brother, I promise you that you will never ever see him again," to "Go get lost, you will not get any land" and "Go to Modi, where you belong!" etc.
Meanwhile, this is how Malik Waseem may have felt on January the 17th 2022:
Meanwhile, the following was a protest outside national press club Islamabad today, by students in response to Punjabi students conducting a lethal attack on Kashmiri students at Qaid e Azam University a few days ago. They demanded that the attackers be immediately arrested:
