NEW DELHI, 30 March 2007 — Chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a meeting of Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) was held yesterday to discuss the issue of withdrawal and relocation of troops in Jammu and Kashmir. “This was an informal CCS meeting,” Information and Broadcasting Minister P.R. Dasmunsi said after the meeting.
While he remained tight-lipped about the meeting’s outcome, sources indicate that ahead of the meeting Kashmir Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad apprised Home Minister Shivraj Patil of there being threat of increase in violence if troops are removed from civilian areas.
Azad arrived here yesterday on being asked to on Wednesday evening by Congress high command. Among others who attended the CCS meeting were External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Home Minister Patil and Defense Minister A.K. Antony. During his meeting with Patil, Azad also laid stress on taking other parties into confidence before taking any decision on troop withdrawal from Kashmir in keeping with the demand made by People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
The government has decided to go a little slower than expected on forming a committee to look into the issue of troop reduction in civilian areas and to review anti-terror laws in the Kashmir valley.
This has placed the PDP, which has threatened to pull out from the coalition government in the border state, in a dilemma.
The PDP was earlier scheduled to meet today to decide on withdrawing support from the Congress-led coalition government. However, on being asked by senior government functionaries, PDP officials say they have postponed the party’s Political Affairs Committee meeting for tomorrow. Certain developments suggests that while Congress does not want to take any decision on troop withdrawal on being cornered by the PDP, neither does it want the latter to claim political credit for the same.
With the Kashmir coalition government having crossed its half term, both the Congress and PDP have set their eyes on the gains they foresee for their own respective parties in the next assembly polls, which are 18 months away, analysts said.
Despite being formally against conceding to PDP’s demand for troop withdrawal, Azad has begun talking in a different tone while addressing public rallies in Kashmir.
Claiming that government has begun a steady and calculated withdrawal, Azad said earlier this week: “Over the past two years, security forces have withdrawn from 24 hotels, nine gardens and other buildings and public places in Kashmir. So, recent talks about withdrawal f security forces, we started it two years ago.”
