NEW DELHI: Even as the J&K Police continues to exhibit sheer ineptitude in effectively tackling the continuing unrest in the Kashmir Valley, the Centre remains a divided house over amending the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), with the home and defence ministries unable to resolve their differences.
Despite PM Manmohan Singh directing the two ministries to break the deadlock at the earliest, senior government officials on Monday said "no progress has been made on the AFSPA front". "Discussions at various levels, among different stakeholders, are being held to achieve common ground. The AFSPA matter is also likely to be discussed in the meeting called by the PM with the all-party delegation (excluding the PDP) from J&K on Tuesday," said an official.
This comes at a time when the J&K Police seems quite bereft of "effective command and control" at its helm, virtually forcing central paramilitary forces to man the frontlines in crowd control and other law and order duties.
Home minister P Chidambaram, on his part, told Parliament on Friday that it was incumbent on the Centre to fulfil its promise about amending AFSPA. His ministry has recommended several amendments to make AFSPA less draconian, in keeping with the widespread sentiment against the Act in the Valley, as also suggested its withdrawal from certain districts in J&K where the Army is not deployed.
But the Army, with support from the defence ministry, remains strongly opposed to "any major dilution" or "phased withdrawal" of AFSPA from J&K as of now. It holds that any such step will impinge adversely on the manner in which the armed forces operate in the militancy-hit state.
Moreover, as was witnessed in Manipur, any withdrawal of AFSPA from a certain area leads to a spike in anti-national and criminal activities in that area, contends the Army.
While not against some changes in AFSPA, the Army says its soldiers need "requisite legal protection" against being dragged to courts since the battle against terrorism simply cannot be equated with normal law and order duties.
This legal protection extends to incidents in which civilians are inadvertently killed in cross-fire or collateral damage takes place in a counter-terrorism operation undertaken in "good faith".
Among the major stumbling blocks is the proposed change in Section 4, which gives Army powers to search premises and make arrests without warrants, "use force, even to extent of causing death", destroy arms dumps, hideouts and to stop, search and seize any vehicle.
If the AFSPA language is changed to reflect "minimum use of force", it will lead to differing interpretations in courts about what exactly constitutes minimum use of force, feels the Army.
Read more: AFSPA tangle still to be resolved? - India - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/AFSPA-tangle-still-to-be-resolved/articleshow/6284840.cms#ixzz0wD9g87qV