Singh promises more Kashmir troop cuts

Two militants killed in gunbattle near meeting venue

A four-hour militant-military gunfight barely 200 meters away from the venue of Prime Minister's public meeting and a general strike called by the Hurriyat Conference greeted Manmohan Singh as he reached Srinagar for his first visit to the state since he became the PM.

Two grenade-bearing, heavily armed militants were killed and two soldiers injured in a gunbattle hours after troops began pulling out from Kashmir.

This made good a promise the government made ahead of Singh's visit. Singh sealed that promise with an assurance of more troop-deinductions if Kashmiris helped him by keeping the peace.

The mood in the state was sullen and frightened though the Prime Minister tried to soothe feelings. "I have extended a hand of friendship to Pakistan. Our doors are open to everyone who wants to talk to me calmly," he said at the public meeting at the Sher-e-Kashmir cricket stadium in Srinagar.

"My mind is open to new ideas. If this is based on good intentions, I have place in my heart for all of you," he said speaking from behind a bullet-proof enclosure.

"If conditions improve and if the incidence of infiltration and of violence remain under control, it will make it easier for me to seek a further reduction of troops," Singh said at the meeting.

However, there appeared to be few takers for this line of thinking as Al-Mansooriyan, a militant group with shadowy origins, took the responsibility for today's incident. How the militants managed to take control of a cafeteria in an abandoned building despite a three-tier security cordon thrown around the venue of the meeting, is a mystery.

Shops were shut in Srinagar and streets deserted following the Hurriyat strike call. Some militant organisations have demanded Singh apologise for "atrocities" by troops against Kashmiris. Just yesterday, Chief of Army Staff, Gen NC Vij, said a Major alleged to have raped a woman and her daughter in the Valley, was being questioned.

The troop pullout ""about a 1,000 soldiers began leaving Kashmir starting from Ananthnag in south Kashmir and other places in the Valley ""possible effect on the mood of the people.

"The mujahideen and Kashmiris are not fighting just for troop reduction. We took up guns for a complete withdrawal," said Syed Salahuddin, commander of the Hizb-ul-Mujahideen .

Later, at the convocation of the Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, the Prime Minister repeated the government's position: that he was ready to talk to anyone who was willing to abjure violence and was keen to talk to Pakistan but only if Islamabad gave up sponsorship of infiltration and wound up terrorist camps operating on its territory.

He said his government wanted Kashmir to once again become a "symbol of hope, peace, prosperity and cultural pluralism".

"We cannot afford this luxury (the luxury of waiting). The challenge is to begin peace building in Kashmir now," he said adding there may be forces that do not share "our vision" and actively seek to undermine it. "I want the journey to begin here and now in Kashmir," he said.

"I have a dream", he said, paraphrasing Martin Luther King's eloquent phrase.