Col Satish Singh Lalotra
‘The world is too little aware of the waste of life, limb, and land which anti-personal landmines are causing among some of the poorest people on earth’..Late Princess Diana’.
The world over since the late 19 th century, a race has been going on to sharpen the lethality and reach of weapons to maim, kill, or even instill the fear of getting split in body parts. But even before that the first recorded use of a ‘Concealed explosive device’ was done by the ‘Song dynasty’ of China to fend off invading Mongolians in the 13 th century AD. In the 16 th century AD of Italy, so called ‘Fourgasses’ were used in the battlefields-canons were buried in the soil and detonated to spread soil, rocks, and rubble on soldiers passing nearby or maneuvering for an attack on an enemy position. During the American civil war, General Gabriel Rains designed the first modern landmine to defend his outnumbered troops, leading to the first landmine caused mass casualty in history. Germany then revised General Gabriel’s design in the years just before the outbreak of First WW and developed the earliest version of an anti-tank mine in 1929. The outbreak of 2 WW saw a proliferation of mine warfare with both allied & axis powers using it to their max advantage. Today the use of anti-personal mines is banned in 164 countries under the UN’s ‘Mine ban treaty’ (also known as the Ottawa treaty). But despite this can one forget the evocative visuals emanating from war torn Angola few decades back when in January 1997, late princess Diana visited Angola as a guest of the IRC (International Red Cross) & carried out her world famous march in a live minefield wearing a protective visor, and a flak jacket in Huambo(Angola)? Angola a war torn nation had more than 15 million landmines scattered all over the country side with every one (1) in 330 people having lost a limb at the time of Princess Diana’s visit. Same was the case with war torn Afghanistan with hundreds of men, women and children spanning from Mazar-e-Sharif till Jallabad and even spilling over to Pakistani cities of Peshawar and Quetta as refugees having lost their limbs due to Soviet/ Taliban action against each other since 1979. These two countries still carry the moniker of ‘Most heavily land mined’ countries with Ukraine having joined the group since the war started two years back in the former republic of erstwhile USSR.
Mines, explosive remnants of war, and improvised explosive devices ( IED) continue to cause death and injury long after the rumblings of war have faded from the conflict zones. On an average, one person is killed or injured by such explosive devices very hour thus portraying the gigantism of the problem plaguing the human race. Children and women being the most vulnerable group in a conflict zone are the worst casualties that a conflict may come to see. Towards this end,the world body of UN has declared the theme -‘Safe futures starthere’ for celebrating the ‘international day for mine awareness’ that happens to be on 04 th of April. As a sequel, from 09 th April to 11 th April 2025, the UNMAC (United nation mineactioncommittee) and the ‘Genevainternational center for humanitarian demining’ will co-host the 28 th international meeting of ‘Mineaction national directors; and ‘United nations advisers'( NDM-UN 28).International days and weeks are occasions to educate the public on issues of concern , to mobilize political will power and resources to address , and to celebrate as well as reinforce achievements of humanity.This in person meeting will bring together mine action leaders and experts to network and exchange views on pressing issues facing the sector. It was on 08 th December 2005, the UNGA (United nations General assembly) declared that 04 th April every year shall be observed as the ‘International day for mine awareness and assistance in mine action’. More than the spread of landmine awareness in the world, it is the ‘Assistance in mine action’ that forms the overall part of the celebrations ; since the aftermath of mine blasts lasts a life time in the victim’s life often tearing asunder his or her entire fabric of existence including his family and near and dear ones. Hence the importance of rendering assistance to theblast victims.Though it is a very vast subject to be covered in a mere article of mine , my endeavour will be to lay focus on ‘ Assistance In mine action’ primarily taking the vulnerable areas of India , in particular J& K & NE this international day of Mine awareness-2025.
Since there are no structured rules and regulations for providing monetary compensation to the mine blast victims in India these hapless victims are thus devoid of any ‘Assistance in mine action’ as has been propounded by the world body of UN. How can you think of ‘Assistance in mine action’ when no help is forthcoming to ameliorate the pain and agony of these blast victims ? For those living along Kashmir’s line of control (LOC), landmines have been a scourge that have been haunting them since independence. About 20 years ago even when I was posted at Gurez valley while still in service , it was a standard but informal practice for the army to select young men from nearby villages for night patrol along the 734 kms long LOC to keep watch for infiltrators from the other side of the border. For this job no informal training, pay or compensation was awarded. Many a time these local lads used to fall victim to an accidental placing of foot on the landmines during their tour of duty, thus completely changing their lives in an instant. The Indian army first planted the landmines immediately after the first Kashmir war of 1947/48 along the CFL ( Cease fire line) now the LC and thereafter every military confrontation beginning 1965, 1971 , the Kargil war and again in 2001 under Op Parakram. Like Pakistan, India too is not a signatory to the MBT (Mine ban treaty). The official stance of GOI regarding non signing of the MBT is that the country has volatile borders, and as and when a non-lethal alternative to these landmines is introduced, the country will ban these land mines. It has been now more than seven decades since the first Kashmir war started with no non-lethal alternatives to the landmines on the horizon as stated by the GOI.
As if the trauma of a landmine blast is not enough for a victim , after a landmine injury , he has to go and file an FIR ( First information report) in the nearest police station in order to qualify for a paltry sum of Rs 1000/ as monthly pension by the ‘Social welfare department’ of the UT. Many times, security forces in order to save their skin from an embarrassed situation file a counter FIR stating that the victim had gone on his own volition to the forest for timber collection where he got accidentally injured by a mine blast. On top of it even if having employed a civilian for its job that entails going across a minefield surreptitiously in the vicinity of the LC,he is denied medical care which has to be borne either by the victim or his family in case of any mine mishap. There are dime a dozen cases in Kashmir valley where such victims have been left in the lurch. Between 1995 to 2015, there were a total of 3191 victims of landmine/ IED blasts in Jammu & Kashmir only, of these 1083 were killed and 2017 injured. Before 2011, the Indian army maintained a website which regularly reported on deaths of insurgents in encounters, but none in the minefields. This is very strange. Even more worrisome is the fact that once the landmines are planted in the fields, for people to stay alive becomes much stronger than the need to cultivate crops or collect fodder for their cattle. Not cultivating crops means a decrease in food production as also stray killing of domesticated animals while venturing in a minefield .A double whammy on the farmers residing all along the LOC in Kashmir.On the worst side of fate are the nomadic or pastoral communities aka GujjarBakerwals who find themselves sandwiched between not able to graze their animals on the grazing grounds that may have landminesthus making their animals have less fodder as also the fear of getting their animals blown off by these landmines/ IEDs. The height of callousness and ham-handedness indulged by the GOI including the security forces is not providing any compensation to the farmers on that land which has landmines planted, but providing compensation on the land which has bunkers, pillboxes, and camps etc. A strange but convoluted reasoning, which requires an urgent resolution.
In the case of NE of India, particularly Manipur state bordering the Indo-Myanmar border since last one year there have been a surge in Landmine blasts leading to fatalities both among the students & villagers who frequent areas while going about their daily chores. The ex CM of Manipur N Biren Singh had in fact got one committee made up of Assam rifle personnel, Manipur police and intelligence officials tasking them with identifying , removing and defusing these landmines. I suppose the findings of this committee has been already communicated to the PM Modi as well as the MEA Jaishankar urging them to take up the case with the Myanmar Government . But what about the ‘Assistance for mine action’ for these hapless victims as has been enshrined by the UN? I am sure a big ‘zero’ as has been the case with J&K victims. India has ratified the convention on CCW (Convention on conventional weapons) and its amended protocol II, which permits certain anti-personal land mines and in India’s views ‘enshrines the approach of taking into account legitimate defence requirements of states especially those with long & porous borders. The ‘international campaign to ban landmines’ ( ICBL) has previously urged India to undertake a comprehensive review of its policy on anti personnel mines. India is party to CCW Protocol V on explosive remnants of war (ERW) but is not party to CCM (Convention on cluster munitions). Be that as it may, I am quite sure; similar is the situation in many of those countries which are grappling with the scourge of landmines. UN’s theme of this year for mine awareness –‘Safe future start here’ will remain in the realm of intangibles only unless concrete action as warranted is undertaken in the right earnest.
(The writer is a retired army officer.)
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