Justice to Kulbhushan Jadhav, justice to Afzal Guru
By Daanish Bin Nabi
The fuss over crumbling diplomatic relations between India
and Pakistan has been played up in last couple of years, particularly after
Pakistan declared that it will take up the Kashmir issue and human rights
violations in J&K at international fora and India declared that it will
isolate Pakistan, diplomatically. Amid the India-Pak bickering and heightened
tension on the Line of Control and in Kashmir (JK), the peculiar case of
Kulbhushan Jadhav popped up. Jadhav, facing guillotine after his alleged arrest
in Pakistan, indictment wherein he has been charged with spying and trial,
became a common link connecting or
Pak Establishment finally allowed access to Jadhav when it
allowed his family members to meet him in Pakistan. It tried to make a clear
point, that the trial was not shady or a state conspiracy hatched and carried
out in a closed-door atmosphere. Whether Jadhav is guilty or not, is proved
guilty or not, but Pak Establishment had an override on the opinion and
pressure within the state. Now, it is a fact not an opinion that Pakistan
allowed family members of Jadhav to meet him, no matter how the arrangement is
looked at. The act has a humanitarian value, even if it is in the interest of
Pak Establishment. Now consider the Afzal Guru execution – his family members
were not allowed to meet him before execution, were not even informed about the
hanging and later on his body was not even returned to the family. Everything
from arrest to trial to Afzal’s hanging was done without any foreign
interference. Afzal Guru was proved guilty that too on the basis of
“circumstantial evidence” and was executed, the same may be the fate of Jadhav.
How can the two prove or disprove that justice is done, that this is just, that
their investigations and trials are fair, that the law of the land is not
affected by political ideologies, is not biased and based on hate towards a
certain section?
After the pictures of the meeting between KulbhushanJadhav
and his family members in Pakistan Foreign Office were flashed by electronic
and social media in India, there has been an uproar, cries for justice, cries
for humanitarian approach which people in India believe was lacking in the
arrangement. Does “collective conscience” make a distinction in pushing a man
to a certain death and pulling a man from underneath the guillotine?
While New Delhi alleged that Pakistan establishment did not
honour the “meeting agreement” they forget that on this side of the divide they
even did not inform the family of Afzal Guru while he was being hanged in the
Tihar Jail.
The last letter which Afzal wrote to his family and to his
young son reached three or four days later after Afzal was hanged secretly,
which speaks volumes about how New Delhi
values the humanitarian accords.
In the Jadhav family meet, there are allegations that
Pakistan mistreated the family members. Pakistan on allegations of mistreatment
has made it clear that the shoes which did not pass the security protocol for
presence of some metallic substance were the only objects kept by it while
everything else was returned. A lot of people in India are also saying that the
meeting was like in a bunker. The pictures of the meeting place, the room with
a glass barrier has also been widely circulated. It only forces us to think as
what actually did these people expect – perhaps that meeting would take place
in a shopping mall or a resort. The person held by Pakistan has been charged of
espionage which is not a petty crime, neither in India nor in Pakistan.
Therefore expectations had also to be realistic.
But think about Afzal, he also had a mother and a wife who
ran from pillar to post in the corridor of power in New Delhi but to no avail.
They also wept, they also were depressed, they were protesting and always
repeated that their son and husband is innocent but there was none to even hear
their pleas and cries.
If New Delhi was not answerable to anyone in case of Afzal,
why should Islamabad be in Jadhav case?
Why is it always that the concepts of humanity,
international laws or other norms are raked up selectively?
People of Kashmir hold nothing against KulbhushanJhadav. He
deserves a free and fair trial. He needs to be listened. He needs to have a
proper counsel and above all needs to be treated humanely. Only Kashmiri feels
the real pain of such people and knows what their families have to go through.
Kashmiri human rights activist KhurramParvez had summoned
the humane act of Jhadav aptly. He wrote on his Facebook handle: “Irrespective
of KulbhushanJhadav's crime, his human rights don’t cease. He should be treated
as per international law.
“Those clamouring about Jhadav’s rights have always shamefully
incited the brutalisation and permanent denial of human rights of Kashmiris,”
he wrote.
Also, there are hundreds of Kashmiri prisoners lodged in
different jails in various Indian states and across Kashmir. The Ministry of
External Affairs claimed that: “Jhadav’s appearance raises questions of his
health and well-being.” However, New Delhi has kept mum when the issue of human
rights of Kashmiri prisoners was taken up some time ago? Why these double
standards?
Both India and Pakistan need to have a vibrant justice
system, one that is independent and immune to political interests. Till there
is trust deficit between the two and both the nations do not stop subversive
activities, cases like Afzal and Jhadav will keep recurring.
The Indian government should fight the case of Jhadav to the
last end and try to save him. They also have complete right to reach out to
international forum and human rights organisation but the same government
should also bear in mind that there are hundreds of cases like Jhadav in its
own backyard and for them the doors of all the courts be it national or
international have to remain open.
Feedback at daanishnabi@gmail.com
Published on January 05, 2018 in Rising Kashmir
