By Lt. General P.C. Katoch (Retd) Former Director General of Information Systems, Indian Army

Within a month plus of his release from jail after four years on March 7, Masarat Alam was back in the news chanting "Hafeez Saeed ka yehi paigham, Kashmir banega Pakistan" at a rally in Srinagar under separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani as thousands of people flocked the streets, some raising Pakistan's flags and shouting anti-India slogans. That his release from jail on March 7 itself was questionable but then Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Saeed passed on the buck saying that the release was facilitated by the legal proceedings under the previous regime under Omar Abdullah. Post the Srinagar rally, the Home Minister spoke to CM Mufti, after which an FIR was registered against Geelani, Masarat Alam and Bashir Ahmed Bhat alias Peer Saifullah. Later, Geelani was put under House Arrest and Masarat too arrested as reported by the media, basically to stop another rally called by Geelani at Tral. Masarat was defiant that he would continue such activities. It was more than three decades back that one could see on TV the India Tricolour being burned as Pakistan lost a cricket match to India being played in Srinagar. Nothing appears to have changed much. In fact, we have permitted such type of activities to continue and grow because terrorism has become an industry and the political parties in J&K like the PDP and NC are hand in glove with radicals, drawing upon them for support to win elections, stay in power and making money. Interestingly, the FIR lodged was for "provocative activities" which is hardly anywhere close to treason against the Union of India. But that was expected when first thing that Mufti did after becoming Chief Minister was to publicly thank Pakistan, that too in presence of our Prime Minister. Of course, his political party, PDP, has active support of the Hijbul Mujahiddeen based in Pakistan. But why blame the J&K State when the Centre itself has been dealing with separatists and their Pakistani mentors in knee jerk fashion. The previous government facilitated visa to Pakistan for hardcore separatist Hurriyat leaders to Pakistan, to even meet the rabid anti-India mullah Hafiz Saeed. Sushil Shinde, the then Union Home Minister referred to Hafiz Saeed in Parliament as "Shri Saeed", even as Congress spokesman Digvijay Singh is now referring to the traitors as "Masarat Sahab". You also had Salman Khurshid, then Foreign Minister breaking protocol, in face of serious cross-border raids by Pakistani army, rush off to host the Pakistani Prime Minister on a private visit to Rajasthan in face of definitive MEA advice not to do so, even as the said Pakistani Prime Minister passed an anti-India resolution in the Pakistani Parliament after returning home. Though a veteran R&AW officer did not take any names when stating that some of our politicians were under ISI blackmail having used hawala for illegal black money transactions, it is not difficult to put two and two together. But what has changed with the change of government in India. Last year, Foreign Secretary level talks were called off because Abdul Basit, the Pakistani High Commissioner at New Delhi was entertaining Hurriyat hardcore separatists. The government stance was that Pakistan must abjure terrorism to facilitate talks. Then suddenly, our Foreign Secretary travelled to Pakistan under cover of visiting SAARC countries, even as Sartaj Aziz, Pakistan's National Security Advisor stated that India had been forced by America to open dialogue with Pakistan. But we did a complete about turn when Abdul Basit was permitted to entertain hardcore Hurriyat leaders on Pakistan Day at the Pakistani Embassy, the idiotic part being making a veteran army chief attend the event. It goes without saying that it was perhaps at this meeting that Geelani was briefed what actions should be organized in future to incite the population in the Valley against India. So, we need to get our own act together unless we want Pakistan to keep applying the thousand cuts. Those under ISI influence whether through blackmail apart, we need to understand that Pakistan will not change course since it has successfully played proxy to both the US and China and both continue to arm and finance it. Among all the hoopla of cooperating with India to counter terrorism, the recent largesse of some US$ 952 million military hardware cannot be lost sight of. Sartaj Aziz has officially stated that Pakistan should not attack those terrorist groups who are not attacking Pakistan. The message is very clear that the proxy war against India will continue. Isn't that the reason that 42 terrorist training camps are running full steam in POK? India needs to resolve that separatists are not exploited by Pakistan to their advantage. We cannot be lackadaisical to treason, the punishment for which must be severe and immediate.