Why India Orchestrated the Drama of the Uri Base Attack?

By Sajjad Shaukat

According to media reports, four “fidayeen,” highly-trained militants who were carrying guns and grenades stormed a base in Uri, close to the Line of Control (LoC) with Pakistan on Sunday (Setember18, this year), and killed at least 17 soldiers in one of the most deadly attacks on security forces in the Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) in two decades. The four attackers were killed by the army, as an Indian army officer told the BBC.

Like the previous terror attacks, without any investigation, Indian high officials have started accusing Pakistan for the Uri base terror attack. In this regard, a senior Home Ministry official and a spokesman of the Indian army allegedly said, “It is clearly a case of cross-border terror attack…the militants infiltrated across the Line of Control from Pakistan before attacking the base in Uri.”

Pakistan rejected allegations that it was involved in the assault at the Uri base. In this respect, foreign ministry spokesman Nafees Zakaria told Reuters on the same day, “India immediately puts blame on Pakistan without doing any investigation. We reject this.”

It is notable that renowned thinkers, Hobbes, Machiavelli and Morgenthau opine that sometimes, rulers act upon immoral activities like deceit, fraud and falsehood to fulfill their countries’ selfish aims. But such a sinister politics was replaced by new trends such as fair dealings, reconciliation and economic development. Regrettably, India is still following the past politics in a modern era.

Hence, with the help of Indian intelligence agencies, especially RAW, India has itself arranged and orchestrated the drama of the Uri Base attacks not only to defame Pakistan, but also to achieve a number of sinister aims.

Since July 8, 2016 against the martyrdom of the young Kashmir leader Burhan Wani by the Indian security forces in the Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) in wake of continued sieges and prolonged curfew, Indian forces have martyred more than 100 innocent persons who have been protesting against the martyrdom of Burhan Wani.

In wake of new phase of uprising in the Indian held, pressure on the Indian government led by BJP Narendra Modi has been mounting both domestically and internationally.

In this context, A. S. Dulat, former chief of India’s spy agency RAW, published in the magazine, ‘The Wire’ on August 27, 2016 said “Pakistan’s role is not the only catalyst for the crisis, talks about the need for the Indian government to start talking to separatist leaders in the Hurriyat Conference, Pakistan, and other important political players.” Indicating as to how Vajpayee’s and Modi’s strategies on Kashmir are poles apart and elaborates on why Kashmiris warmed to Vajpayee, he stressed, “India should engage in principled dialogue with people in the Valley, instead of taking a naïve and aggressive line.” His condemnation of the Modi government for not talking to Hurriyat and for its high handedness in IOK is spot on. He rightly concludes that the Kashmiri uprising is 100% indigenous.

While, in response to the letter of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif in which he pointed out the deteriorating situation in Kashmir and the large-scale violations of human rights, being committed by Indian security forces, on August 19, this year, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon deplored the ongoing killings in Indian-held Kashmir, and urged India and Pakistan to settle Kashmir and other issues through dialogue. Ban Ki-moon explained in the letter, “I stand ready to offer my good offices... to facilitate dialogue in order to achieve a negotiated settlement…I deplore the loss of life in Kashmir and hope that all efforts will be made to avoid further violence.”

Besides, addressing a joint news conference with Sartaj Aziz at Islamabad on August 20, 2016, Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) Ayad Ameen Madani in Islamabad expressed grave concern over extra-judicial killings of people in the Indian-occupied Kashmir. He stated that OIC Contact Group on Kashmir has been playing an active role for the resolution of the Kashmir issue. Ayad Ameen Madani also urged the international community to be more vocal on the deteriorating human rights situation in Indian-held Kashmir and added, “OIC will support Pakistan on Kashmir issue”.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has pledged to emphatically highlight violence against the innocent Kashmiris in the IOK in a speech during this week’s annual session of General Assembly.

It is due to these reasons that Indian security agencies arranged terror assault at the Uri base to divert the attention of international community from the war of liberation in the Indian controlled Kashmir, as it has, now, been accelerated.

Notably, keeping silence over the Indian new phase of state terrorism and protests of the Kashmiris, during the visit of the US Secretary of State John Kerry to New Delhi, speaking at a joint news conference Kerry and Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj said on August 30, this year, the two countries renewed their commitment to track down and prosecute perpetrators of several terrorist attacks on Indian soil—as Swaraj stated that Kerry had had a “meeting of the minds” on cross-border extremism that India and its neighbors face from militants in Pakistan.”

However, it is part of the US double game and double standards in relation to New Delhi and Islamabad.

Pakistan denies any role in cross-border terrorism, and has called on the United Nations and the international community to investigate atrocities it alleges have been committed by the security forces in Indian-ruled Kashmir.

As regards terrorism-related events of India, this could be judged from the incident, when on April 6, 2008 in a house of the fundamentalist outfit Bajrang Dal in Nanded, a bomb went off. The investigation proved that the militants were found in bomb-making. Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) of the Maharashtra arrested a serving Lt. Col. Srikant Purohit along with other army officials, indicating that they were helping in training the Hindu terrorists, providing them with the military-grade explosive RDX, used in terrorist attacks in various Indian cities. ATS further disclosed that Lt. Col. Purohit confessed that in 2007, he was involved in bombing of Samjhota express (Train between Pakistan and India in which a majority of Pakistanis travel), which burnt alive 70 Pakistanis.

In one of his various tapes, LT. Col Purohit said about Indo-Israeli nexus, “We are all on the same plane, Hindu Rashtra (Nation)”. He even claimed, “Gen. J. J. Singh (Singh was Army Chief till Sept. 2007) is with us…one of our own captain had visited Israel”, and demanded “continuous supply of arms, training, an office with a saffron flag in Tel Aviv, political asylum and support for our cause of a Hindu Nation in the UN.”

Regarding Hindu terrorism, the then Indian Home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde pointed out on January 20, 2013 that organized training camps run by the fundamentalist parties; RSS and BJP (Ruling party of India) were promoting Hindu Terrorism. He also explained that these extremist parties were behind the Samjhauta Express, Meccca Masjid and Malegaon blasts.

While, Indian top officials and media had been accusing Pakistan-based banned Lashkar-e-Tayba and country’s intelligence agency ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) of these terrorism-related incidents, including Mumbai terror attacks of November 2016, the Indian parliament assault of December 13, 2001 and militants’ attack at Indian Air Force Base in Pathankot, which occurred on January 2, 2016.

It is of particular attention that on July 19, 2013, the Indian former home ministry’s official and ex investigating officer Satish Verma disclosed that terror attacks in Mumbai in November 26, 2008 and assault on Indian Parliament in January 12, 2001 were carried out by the Indian government to strengthen anti-terrorism laws.

Nevertheless, all these terror attacks were planned by India security agencies to defame Islamabad and ISI and Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-Taiba.

As regards the terror attack at the Indian Air Force Base in Pathankot, Indian media and top civil and military officials started claiming that the attackers had arrived from Pakistani Punjab’s Bahawalpur district, and had links with Jaish-e-Mohammad and Pakistan’s primary intelligence agency, ISI. But, despite Islamabad’s cooperation with India like formation of the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) consisting of professionals to investigate the Pathankot attack, crackdown against the militant group Jaish-i-Mohammad—lodging of a First Information Report (FIR) in relation to the incident, New Delhi failed in providing any proof of Pakistan’s involvement in the Pathankot episode.

Indian authorities did not cooperate with Pakistan’s Joint Investigation Team which visited India to probe into Pathankot attack. The JIT members visited Pathankot Airbase on March 29 where Indian National Investigation Agency officials briefed and showed them the route from where the attackers stormed the airbase.

In fact, besides fulfilling other sinister designs against Pakistan, New Delhi orchestrated that drama to postpone secretary-level talks with Pakistan, which were scheduled to be held in Islamabad on January 15, 2016.

Sources said that the lights along the 24-km perimeter wall of the Pathankot airbase found to be faulty on the eve of the attack. The Pakistani investigators were allowed to enter the military airbase from the narrow adjacent routes instead of main entrance and their duration of the visit was just 55 minutes, enough to take a mere walk through the airbase. The JIT could not collect evidence in this limited time.

The sources also pointed out that the visiting team was only informed about the negligence of Boarder Security Force (BSF) and Indian forces. It was disclosed that at the time of the assault, the BSF was sleeping, even though they had been alerted of a possible attack 48 hours earlier. 

India’s orchestrated drama of the Pathankot incident could also be judged from the fact that earlier, Indian Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar had said in confusion that New Delhi would not allow access to the JIT into the base, though it was allowed on very limited scale to fulfill the formality. It can undermine the seriousness of bilateral commitments to find the truth.

As a matter of fact, Ajit Doval, the ex-spymaster who is now National Security Advisor of Indian Prime Minister Modi is the real author and controller of India’s offensive-defensive doctrine. Besides planning various terror attacks in Pakistan as part of Indian offensive-defensive doctrine, Ajit Doval also advised to arrange various subversive acts inside India and to shift the blame game to Pakistan like orchestrated drama of Gurdaspur episode, boat incident etc. to defame Pakistan and its security agencies.

In this context, on January 2, 2016, the terror attack at Indian Air Force Base in Pathankot was preplanned under his directions. 

Nonetheless, we can conclude without any doubt that India has itself arranged and orchestrated the drama at the Uri base to achieve Indian sinister designs.

Sajjad Shaukat writes on international affairs and is author of the book: US vs Islamic Militants, Invisible Balance of Power: Dangerous Shift in International Relations

Email: sajjad_logic@yahoo.com