Ahmed Ali Fayyaz/Magam(Budgam)

During his exclusive conversation with Awaz-The Voice at his Magam residence on Srinagar-Gulmarg Road, Padam Shri Ghulam Mohammad Mir aka Moma Kanna said that militants carried out innumerable attacks on him, his family members and relatives, and his properties.

“The reason was nothing other than my role in helping the security forces to keep the Indian flag high, establishing a vast network of informers, and getting thousands of militants neutralized. Many of them died in the encounters and operations carried out on the information of my network. We captured many of them alive. Many of them surrendered before us. We operated in the entire central Kashmir as also in parts of northern and southern Kashmir”, Kanna said.

“However, I paid a huge price for sailing against the wind. Some officers and BJP leaders—particularly then Governor of Sikkim Kedar Nath Sahani and then Union Minister of State for Defence Chaman Lal Gupta—helped me in the beginning. But nobody has called me or enquired about me in the last many years. Governor NN Vohra was the last who spoke to me and enquired about my health”, Kanna added.

“My stepbrother Ghulam Ahmad Mir and real brother Ghulam Hassan Mir’s son, Ghulam Ahmad Mir, were captured by militants and brutally shot dead at Nowlari, Pattan, on 28 March 1991. Nobody lifted their bodies for three days. My son Nissar Ahmad Mir was fired upon and left critically injured in another attack. His wife, Shahzada, was critically wounded in a grenade attack at my house. Later, she succumbed to injuries”, Kanna revealed, claiming that at least seven more relatives were targeted in different terror attacks.

Kanna himself survived several attacks on his life. “I was traveling with the Commanding Officer of ITBP 4th battalion at Wusan, Tangmarg. Our vehicle was ambushed and targeted with a 100-kilo IED. God saved us. In another incident, around 200 AK-47 rounds were fired at me and the C.O of 122 Bn BSF. Again, we had a providential escape”, he added.

Ghulam Mohammad Mir at his house in Magam, Kashmir

Sahani and Gupta, according to him, saved his son Nissar as they arranged for 28 pints of blood, good treatment at different hospitals, and also got some doctors for his treatment from the United States of America. Nissar had been given a compassionate appointment of a class-IV job in the State Health Department under SRO-43 over the assassination of a relative.

“In addition to many armed attacks, my house was set on fire three times. Some residents and government officials under the influence of the militants cut hundreds of trees on a piece of land I had purchased. They said a part of it was ‘shamilat’ (community land in a village), but they did not touch big land encroachers. They helped many relatives and friends of the militants to grab the community and State lands. They were a State within a State with its control in Pakistan”, Kanna added.

Kanna made a startling revelation that most of the militants, who killed his family members and other civilians, were not only alive but were also given government jobs. 

“One Cabinet Minister got all such killers and their relatives recruited in the government. The bother of one slain militant, who fired at my son Nissar, is now posted in the Civil Secretariat. On the other hand, all of their victims, like my family members, are unemployed despite high qualifications and degrees”, he added.

“They have supporters in bureaucracy and politics. Their network is still intact. Big crocodiles are in place. So are their arms and ammunition. They are tactfully in friendship with some political leaders and waiting for the right time. They are silent because of the pressure from current LG (Lieutenant Governor) and the Home Minister. They can raise their head anytime”, Kanna warned.

Those captured alive by Kanna include Harkat-ul-Ansar chief Sajad Afghani, a Pakistani, who later died in an attempted escape from Jammu’s Kot Bhalwal Jail. The IC-814 hijackers in 1999 also demanded Afghani’s mortal remains when three top-ranking militants—Masood Azhar (who later floated Jaish-e-Mohammad), Al-Umar Mujahideen chief Mushtaq Latram, and the British terrorist Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh (who later beheaded American journalist Daniel Pearl - were released in exchange for the hostages at Kandahar.

The citation of Padam Shri of Ghulam Mohammad Mir

“I captured Sajad Afghani when he was hiding at a headmaster’s house at Hanjibug. He didn’t have a gun. But later we recovered four bags of AK ammunition from his hideout”, Kanna added. 

“Then Deputy C.O. of BSF 122 Bn, Raj Kumar, with his 20 other personnel were with me in that operation”, Kanna recollected.

On another occasion, Kanna also seized Tehreek-ul-Mujahideen chief Abdul Gani Dar aka Abdullah Gazali. Years later, Gazali was released. A rival faction of his militant organization charged him with the assassination of the Jamiat Alh-e-Hadith chief Maulana Showkat Shah in a cycle bomb blast at Maisuma, Srinagar. Some years later, unidentified persons killed Gazali inside the same mosque at Maisuma.

However, his biggest catch was Col. Masood. “He was an ISI regular with a reward of Rs 25 lakh on his head. My network worked hard and we got him trapped at his hideout at Batpora, Kanihama. Six militants, including Col. Masood and three other foreigners, died in that encounter. We lost one soldier of RR 34th battalion”, Kanna said. According to him, 6 to 12 militants each died in many of his operations.

The Government of India, according to Kanna, was “deeply perturbed” when militants kidnapped a resident Kashmiri Pandit—Congress leader Khem Lata Wakhlu, who was a Minister in Ghulam Mohammad Shah’s government in 1984-86, and her husband, Dr O.N. Wakhlu, former Principal of Regional Engineering College Srinagar. Another embarrassing situation was created when militants kidnapped two Swiss engineers working at the Uri Hydroelectric Project.

“On both occasions, Governor Girish Chander Saxena, Chief Secretary, and DGP J.N. Saksena were under tremendous pressure. They sought my services. After much trouble, I managed the Wakhlu couple’s release as I traced them in the Dodbug village of Tangmarg. I also traced and got the Swiss engineers released from the Tangmarg forest area without any bloodshed. All these operations were launched on my information”, said Kanna who lives at a nondescript mud-plastered house under the CRPF and J&K Police protection.

ALSO READ: Padma Shri G M Mir who helped forces end terrorism in Kashmir lives a modest life

Now battling multiple diseases, Kanna had called it quits 20 years ago. “My country has done nothing for the rehabilitation or employment of my family. But that doesn’t dampen my morale and spirit. I have never been apologetic or repentant over how I chose for myself and my children. I am ready for all consequences”, said Kanna who met Prime Minister Vajpayee several times and received Padma Shree from President Pratibha Patil in 2010.