Satya Pal Malik, who was governor of J&K during the Pulwama terrorist attack of February 2019 and the abrogation of Article 370 in August that year, in an extensive interview to news portal The Wire, revealed that the attack on the Central Reserve Police Force convoy in Pulwama was a result of “incompetence” by the CRPF and the Home Ministry.
Rajnath Singh was the Home Minister at the time of the incident. Malik gave details of how the CRPF had asked for aircraft to transport its jawans but was refused by the Union home ministry. He also spoke of how the route was not sanitised effectively.
Malik also said that there was grave intelligence failure in the Pulwama incident because the car carrying 300 kilograms of RDX explosives had come from Pakistan but was travelling around the roads and villages of Jammu and Kashmir for 10-15 days without being detected and without anyone knowing.
The Interview of Satyapal Malik with Karan Thapar is full of intrigues and lack of credibility that a governor should have with his superior in the central government, lack of confidence between the two and effort of the governor to maintain his stature as the administrative head of a very important State, which has been boiling for over seven decades and has been an extremely sensitive one.
While all the fingers are being pointed at the PM, NSA and the then Home Minister, one can’t overlook the fact there was a complete abject failure of state police and the CRPF top brass.
There were adverse intelligence reports right through January and continued to be even till mid February and yet, despite those reports, over 2,000 CRPF soldiers travelled by a huge convoy. How was it that this was permitted to happen despite the risk involved? It was clearly asking for trouble.
As regards denying the demand of aircraft requisitioned by the CRPF, even if Home Ministry, in its own prudence, had turned down the request for airlifting the troops, it was the responsibility of the CRPF top brass to ensure that the entire movement was undertaken at the highest degree of preparedness, security, safety and coordination.
Although the attack was masterminded by Pakistan, letting this happen had been a big failure on part of CRPF, J&K Police and the overall administration under Malik. Being under Central rule, the Governor was the administrative head of the State.
The Pulwama tragedy was an outcome of total local administrative failure.
When a large military convoy moves on the road, especially in disturbed areas of Kashmir and the North East, there are certain Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) that need to be followed.
A Road Opening Party (ROP) is deployed well in advance on the route from which the convoy is scheduled to pass well in advance to sanitise the entire route.
The ROP’s task is to keep a vigil on the route to ensure that there is no ambush attack or Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) on the road to trigger a blast. These are very common phenomena in trouble-prone areas. It’s the State police and or the paramilitary force which should have sanitised the area.
So, the question here arises, why the basic drills of road clearance and road sanitisation were not carried out properly?
If required, the CRPF brass could have taken assistance of local Army formation and state police to ensure proper safety and security to the column.
It has been mentioned that the vehicle with such a large quantity of explosive was roaming around the entire state in its free will without being intercepted and apprehended.
If there was such an intelligence input, why wasn’t it located and the terrorists neutralised before triggering the blast?
There was ample opportunity available with the local authorities to prevent this attack. The Malik administration is equally to be blamed for this massacre as much as the Centre, perhaps even more.
Both the Centre and the State administration need serious lessons in security management of the country. Security agencies can’t work in silos.
They have to share their knowledge and expertise to work as a cohesive team. Playing the blame game won’t ensure the safety of the nation.
