"CORNER TURNED" IN KASHMIR
RAIDER'S MAIN STRENGTH NOW BROKEN
| Indian Troops have fought armed raiders near Bagdom, less than ten miles south-west of Srinagar and five miles from the airfield India is using as reinforcement base in Kashmir. "Raider's infiltration tactics against that airfield are reported. |
New Delhi, Nov 5 - According to New Delhi Radio, Indian Government forces are officially stated to have broken the main strength of the Kashmir raiders says Reuters. The Kashmir Government claimed in Press note that the corner had been turned. The raiders were being steadily pushed back and mopped up in pockets, heavy casualties being inflicted. The Indian Air Force had destroyed much of the raider's equipment. "There is definite proof that Pakistan Army officers are operating with the raiders" the report said.
Reliable reports from the North-West Frontier Province said that a Jehad (Moslem holy war) has been
officially declared and that more tribesmen have been seen moving towards Kashmir, "The Times" correspondent says. Raiding tribesmen shunning main roads and swarming down from the hills in thousands, last night launched attack after attack on the airport outside Srinagar, says the "Daily Express" correspondent. The hard pressed defenders held the attacks with long bursts of fire throughout the night. They knew that if the airfield fell their last hope of reinforcements from the Indian Dominion was gone.
As they fought, transport planes came in on each other's tail. Sikh troops jumped from the planes and assembled in battle formation. Thousands of refugees waited to fill their places for the return journey. The Deputy Prime Minister of India (Mr. Patel) and the Defense Minister (Sardar Baldev Singh) arrived by air and conferred on the spot with the head of the Kashmir provisional Government (Sheikh Abdullah) and then flew on to Jammu to meet the Maharajah of Kashmir (Sir Hari Singh).
An Indian Army officer who has returned to New Delhi from Kashmir told the American Associated Press correspondent that the invaders' threat to Srinagar became grave when they developed infiltration tactics against the airfield on Monday night.
Indian troops, through a victory at the village of Pattan on Sunday night, had forced the raiders to abandon their advance along the Baramula-Srinagar road. The raiders broke up and pus their way through to the village of Bagdom and would have gone straight on to Srinagar if Indian troops had not been able to bold them there for several hours.
HEAVY CASUALTIES
Indian troops claimed to have inflicted 50 per cent casualties when they engaged a force of 700 armed raiders near Bagdom on Monday night, less than, ten miles south west of Srinagar ad only miles from the airfield that India is using as a reinforcement base.
An Indian communique said that Indian troops were heavily out-numbered but attacked against heavy mortar and machine-gun fire and sustained comparatively light casualties. Air reconnaissance later spotted the corpses of more than 100 raiders.
An Indian Defense Ministry communique said that Indian troops on Monday afternoon, ten miles south west of Srinagar, held the raiders for several hours and inflicted heavy casualties. Parties of armed bandits, were terrorising Srinagar Valley Royal Indian Air Force planes were operatine against the raiders.
RELIEF TRAINS
Another communique said that a shuttle relief of trains during the first three days of November had carried 34,000) Hindus and Sikhs to India from Pakistan and 37,000 Moslems from India. The American Associated Press correspondent says the relief service used nine trains, each carrying between 3,000 and 7,000 refugees packed in and on every inch of space with their belongings-luggage. bedding, dogs, parrots, pigeons, fowls and mongooses.
The British Air Ministry announced today that Royal Air Force Dakotas and York aircraft, working on the relief service for the Indian and Pakistan Governments. carried more than 20,000 passengers between August 15 and October 27. Many flights involved heavily laden planes landing and taking off from abandoned airfields with a minimum of ground organisation.
The Pakistan Government in a statement issued today, accused Indian troops of having opened fire near the Sialkot border on Moslem refugees from Jammu (West Punjab). Home Guards went to the rescue of the refugees and exchanged fire with the Indians. The Pakistan Government also issued a "gazette extraordinary" ordering an non-scheduled aircraft flying over West Punjab to land at Lahore on both outward and homing flights and proceed only after clearance.
EXTERMINATION PLAN
The Prime Minister of Pakistan (Liaquat Ali Khan). in a broadcast today, said that the people of Kashmir were fighting for their freedom and very They had been caught in a widespread plan to exterminate Moslems, he said. The plan had succeeded in all States acceded to India. "Presumably after such an extermination in Kashmir, India proposed to hold a referendum," he continued. "What use is a vote when the voters have been driven from their homes or silenced in death?"
Liaquat Ali said that it was dishonest to present rebellion of enslaved peoples an invasion from outside. India was helping to wipe out the oppressed, enslaved and entrapped people of Kashmir. India had regarded the accession of Junagadh to Pakistan as a threat to India's security.
The accession of Kashmir to India was a much greater threat to the security of Pakistan "We do not recognise this accession." he said. "The choice before the people of Kashmir is freedom or death."
He charged that thousands of Sikhs, on the pretext of being refugees, entered Jammu at the end of September. but they came from East, not from West Punjab, and then "set about the formal business in Jammu and Punch of repeating the horrible drama they enacted in East Punjab."
Referring to reports that "Free Kashmir" troops were armed with modern weapons. Liaquat Ali Khan
said that many of those fighting the invading troops of India came from the 6000 former army men of Punch who were not incapable of capturing arms from their enemies.
The Governor of the North-West Frontier Province (Sir George Cunningham) has refused the request of the Jirga (tribal gathering) of Lower Mohmand tribesmen to go to Kashmir "and save their Moslem
brethren from the tyranny of the Dogra ruler." He told the Jirga to consider the whole m?n.tter without getting excited and assured them that the Pakistan Government would be able to bring about a satisfactory solution of the Kashmir problem.
A Briton, Lieut.-Col. Dykes, was killed on Monday by tribesmen who attacked the convent at Baramula, says Reuters correspondent and apparently lost his life while trying to save his wife. Mrs. Dykes's body was recovered from a well. Their three children are believed to be safe in Rawalpindi.
Khurshid Hassan. the 25-year-old private secretary to the Governor General of Pakistan (Mr. Jinnah)
who on Monday was arrested in Srinagar, was released last night. "My holiday is over, but I can not get out." he said. "I have asked for a plane from Karachi"
Courtesy : The West Australian, Thursday, November 6, 1947
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