Post floods, 6 boys join militant ranks

Agencies concerned for South Kashmir.

Srinagar: With people and administration struggling to deal with post flood situation. few youth in South Kashmir had other ideas.

If reports are to be believed at least six youth have joined various militant outfits in south Kashmir’s Shopian district in last fifteen days.
While the valley was submerged in flood waters and most of the security apparatus was busy with the relief and rescue operation,
these educated youth in Shopian and
Pulwama districts took advantage of the situation and joined the militancy without being noticed by the agencies.

The joining of local education youth into militancy has already been a wide concern for all the security and other intelligence agencies.

According to sources six youth have joined militancy in last two and a half weeks. “Two youth (Waseem and Saddam) in the age group of 15 and 20 from Heff Shirmal village of
Shopian district have joined the militant ranks.” These two youth as per reports have joined Hizb-ul-Mujahidin Similarly, as per sources, another youth from Turkawangam village who was recently employed Village Level Worker (VLW) and two
others from adjoining villages of Shopian township have joined militancy, but as per the police sources it is still not confirmed which militant outfits the other four youths have joined.

The enthusiasm towards the gun is attracting more youth. According to police sources, in coming months the number of youth joining militancy may witness a steep increase as
militancy is also showing effective presence in Shopian and Pulwama districts.

The biggest concern among the intelligence agencies is what forces these youth to join the militancy. There were many debates in past
that it were unemployment and other related issues that forces these youth to pick up the weapon, but the joining of a youth who was a
government employee holding a good post of VLW from Shopian’s Turkawangam village has put a question mark over these debates.

Army’s General Officer Commanding of Srinagar based 15 Corps, Lt General Subrata Saha, believes the if there are local youth joining militant ranks, it is a disturbing trend.

“If educated youth are joining the militancy ranks, then it is quite more disturbing,” Saha had said.

Most of the political leaders in the opposition said the educated youth are joining militancy because they are not happy with whatever is
happening around.

Political experts also believe when the peaceful voices of dissent youth are silenced youth they have no option other than to pick up the gun. “You have curbed the voices of
youth in educational institutions. In Kashmir University students are not allowed to raise their voices in peaceful means. In this scenario educated youth picking up the
weapons is due to happen,” said a well-known educationist, who teaches at Central University of Kashmir.