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The Rediff Special/ Chindu Sreedharan

'Yeh Hindustan hain. Pakistan thodi nahin'

"Yeh Hindustan hain. Pakistan thodi nahin."

A soft voice in a sea of angry, violent ones, the speaker, Mohammad Usuf Shera is old, bearded. A farmer, belonging to Puyan, one of the satellite villages of Kargil. He continues once he is sure that he has your attention.

"Musalman ke upar zulm hai," he says, "They are blackening the name of the Indian army."

In Puyan, just a couple of kilometres away from Kargil town, you have stumbled across an activity that is least expected in a war zone. An angry crowd gheraoing an army bulldozer. The two jawans in charge are sitting silent while the people block their way.

Inquiries reveal that they are protesting the building of a new road -- one that hogs more of their meagre holdings than they can afford to part with. This little village of 130-odd houses on the outskirts of Kargil is among the few that are still populated. Though protected from direct hits by a moderately high ridge behind, the village has seen quite a few shells landing nearby.

Last year and the year before, many villagers had migrated to safer places. But this time, they have opted to stay back -- if they flee now, in summer when the barley crops, their main source of income, are due for harvest, how will they survive another long winter? Then again, how long will they keep running?

Unfortunately, shells from across are not the only trouble they have to face. More sinister to them right now is the threat to their land, their only means of survival. Many have plots of just 500 square feet -- a part of which they now stand to lose.

"They have taken our land in three places," complains Muhammad Abdullah, "And that, without even asking our permission! The first thing we knew about it was when they landed up at the field and started bulldozing!"

The road, a bypass connecting with the key Srinagar-Leh highway, is necessitated by Pakistan's effort to shell the Point bridge, a strategic link. The plan had been hanging fire for the last three years. The civil administration says that the villagers were opposing it, but now that the army has "made a request", and it is "for defence purpose", they have to go ahead with it, especially since the Point bridge took a near-hit a week ago.

The villagers, however, have a different tale to tell: It is not the army that's behind the move, but the civil administration. And worse is the way it is taking the land from the poor, leaving the rich untouched.

"If the army wants we will give not only our land but our life as well," says Mohd Hussain, "We eat their rations. They are fighting for us. They have always helped us. If brigadiersaab wants us to, we are ready to go and fight the enemy. So why should we object?"

"They (the army) would never do such a thing," holds Mohd Sadiq, "If they wanted our land they would have asked our permission. They would have let us harvest our crops first. And they would have made sure that they took it from both sides, not from only the poor, as these people are doing."

The trouble, it would appear, is that the public works department supervises the exercise. It is the PWD engineer who decides which way the road would run, over whose land. And it is on this point that the villagers feel cheated.

"He (the PWD engineer) has taken money from the zamindars (landlords), " alleges Hussain, "He doesn't want to face us today. That's why he's not present here. Not only he, the district commissioner, the police superintendent and our MLA (and PWD minister Qamar Ali) Akhoon, they all have taken money."

"Saab, aap yeh dekhiye," adds another villager, "This barley is not ripe now. In another 15 days this would have been ready for harvest. Couldn't they have at least waited till then?"

The villagers have more complaints. Of how the DC tried to make them shift from their village, how the police manhandled the women who tried to stop the road-building, how the administration is yet to pay them for the bunkers they built under a special scheme... Their whole ire, thus, seems aimed at the state government, whom they hold responsible for most, if not all, their troubles.

Approach Akhoon and he admits that the villagers are being treated unjustly. "Yes, yes, I know, they are very angry... I will do something," he says, "But the road was for defence purpose... We will pay them for the land we have taken. Rs 70,000 per plot is the going rate, but we will pay them more."

Ask him about the allegations of corruption and he says isn't aware of any. "Actually, this bypass was one of my election promises. The villagers had opposed it earlier. Now the army has made a request and we have to do it," he explains, "The villagers have given me a representation and I am looking into it... I had asked the DC to get a resolution passed by the villagers about the direction of the road."

Was that passed? Is the road being built according to a common consensus?

"No," admits Akhoon, "I haven't got the resolution... Actually the work started when I wasn't here..."

Question him about his deadline for compensating the villagers. Akhoon's promise is, "As soon as the revenue records are ready. Before two months."

The villagers, however, do not buy that. The civil administration, they say, has not even finished registering the plots -- so what revenue records is Akhoon talking about?

The Rediff Specials

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