New Delhi, Sep 13 (IANS) Sixteen people were killed across the Kashmir Valley Monday during protests initially triggered by reports of the Quran being desecrated in the US on a day India’s top cabinet committee on security deferred a critical decision on the demand for withdrawing the special powers given to the armed forces.
The three-hour-long meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and attended by his core team, decided to convene a meeting here of all political parties on Wednesday to ‘elicit their views on the way forward’ in Kashmir, an official statement Monday evening said.
The meeting was expected to have taken a decision on withdrawing the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) from parts of Jammu and Kashmir. Political parties and separatist groups in the state have demanded the repeal of the AFSPA and the freeing of political prisoners as a precursor to initiating a peace process in the state.
The CCS meeting came in the backdrop of escalated violence Monday that left 16 people dead and some 70 injured two days after Eid. This has taken the death toll in the violence in the state since June 11 to 86.
Monday’s violence flared up after Iranian TV channel Press TV reported late Sunday that copies of the Quran had been burnt in the US. A pastor in Florida, US, had threatened to burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks but later called off the plan.
The state government swung into action as protesters violated curfew — it was the second consecutive day of 24X7 curfew in towns in the Valley — in many parts of Srinagar.
North Kashmir’s Tangmarg town witnessed the worst violence as mobs torched a Christian missionary school, the office of the social welfare department and a police vehicle.
Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who rushed to Srinagar Monday from New Delhi, chaired a meeting of the cabinet and appealed for peace and harmony.
State police chief Kuldeep Khoda told reporters in Srinagar that the police had evidence that Hurriyat leaders had incited Monday’s violence.
The official statement issued in New Delhi Monday evening said:
‘The CCS has decided to convene a meeting of all political parties at New delhi on Wednesday and elicit their views on the way forward’ in Kashmir.
‘The government hopes that following the all-party meeting, it will be able to engage the people of Jammu and Kashmir and take certain initiatives and measures that will build confidence among the people of the state,’ the statement added.
The statement was handed over to reporters by Home Secretary G.K. Pillai after the CCS meeting at the prime minister’s official residence.
‘The CCS is deeply distressed by the turn of events since Eid and specially the event that took place today following certain rumours. The CCS expresses its profound grief at the loss of life and offeres its sincere condolences to the brevered families.’ the statement said.
It said that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government believed in dialogue.
‘The government has always held the belief that the diaogue and discussion is the only way forward to find and honourable and lasting solution.
‘In the past too, the UPA government had taken several initiaves to hold the dialogue with different political parties and groups, including the Hurriyat,’ the statement said.
‘Those efforts did yield some results,’ it added.
‘It has and remained the intention of the UPA government to restart the process of dialogue,’ the statment said, adding: ‘The dialogue can embrace all issues that agitate the minds of people of J and K especially the youth.’
‘The dialogue can address issues such as the trust deficit and governance deficit,’ the statement added.
‘Meanwhile, the ccs appeals to the people of J and K, especially the youth, to refrain from violent protests and maintain peace and order. Every life that is lost and every person that is injured, beside casuing immense grief, add to the complexity of the situation,’ the statement said.
Defence Minister A.K. Antony, Home Minister P. Chidambaram, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna also attended the CCS meeting.
Meanwhile, US Ambassador Timothy J. Roemer appealed for calm, saying he was ‘dismayed’ to see reports of a church and school in Kashmir and Punjab being attacked and destroyed by rioters.
‘One misguided individual’ had desecrated the Quran by tearing pages from it Saturday, Roemer said here, condemning such acts as ‘disrespectful, intolerant, divisive and un-representative of American values.’
