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| ARMY CLAIMS SURRENDER OF 12 MILITANTS | | MILITANTS THANK TRANS-KASHMIR BUS SERVICE AND MOBILE SERVICE TO KNOW GROUND REALITIES | |
Srinagar, July 31: Twelve militants today surrendered before security forces at Baramulla and laid down their arms before the army authorities.
Without disclosing their identities and places they belong to, three out of twelve young men shared their experiences with media at the training camps in Muzaffarabad, which the masked men said were "horrible" by all means.
According to Army the militants belonged to Hizbullah, Hizb-e-Islami and Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, the three different organizations.
Thanking the opening of trans-Kashmir Srinagar-Muzaffarbad bus service launched on April 7 last year and the mobile telephony service, they said these developments made them aware of the ground realities in Kashmir .
"We got the information about the ground realities in Kashmir from those Kashmiris who crossed over to Muzaffarabad from this side through trans-LoC bus, though the realization of leading a normal life and eschewing the path of violence had dawned upon us much earlier," they said.
Sharing their seven year long experiences in the training camps in Muzaffarabad, the trio said the condition of Kashmiri youth there was "terrible and pathetic". They said that most of the Kashmiri youth there want to return to their homeland to lead a normal life.
"Pakistan's ISI (Inter Services Intelligence) is using Kashmiri youth as scapegoats for their own nefarious aims and objectives. They don't believe in any Jehad. They only want us to spread terror here so that we are later slaughtered by the Indian Army," said one of them, who added that there were more than 250 Kashmiris in the training camp he received training from.
Replying a question about the total number of Kashmiris there in the camps he said: "Hazaroon Main Hain (They are in thousands). I can't tell you the exact number but they are in thousands."
"First Jehad is to obey parents. We owe an apology to our fathers and mothers. And we ruined our future by resorting to violent path. Had we not done this we also would have been doctors, journalists, and engineers like you," said another militant, who had crossed over to Muzaffarbad in 1999 when he was studying in 8 th standard.
All three of them had almost same story to tell. They said they crossed over to this side very recently after being convinced from this side that they will be allowed to live a peaceful life after their surrender.
"We put pressure on our commanders to launch us. They did. But we had made up our minds for surrender and we did it before 19 infantry division of Army in Baramulla," they said.
Lt Col Sunil Dutt Nautiyal of 9 GR told reporters that the "surrenders" were a healthy development.
"Things are changing fast. More and more people are coming back to mainstream and willing to shun militancy. We have had 62 surrenders in Baramullah district alone during the recent past," Mr S D Nautiyal said.
Referring to 12 "surrendered" youth, he said their stories are of "disillusionment, frustration and a strong desire to return to their homes to rejoin mainstream", adding, "We're hopeful more of such surrenders will take place in near future".
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