Takeaways from the Chaophraya Track-2

Statecraft

HAPPYMON JACOB

The recently concluded 12th round of the Chaophraya India-Pakistan track-two Dialogue (17 – 18 July 2013, Bangkok) was, to my mind, valuable and instructive for a number of reasons. Before I discuss what I found interesting about the latest round of the track-two, here’s a brief summary about the initiative itself. The Chaophraya Dialogue (http://chaophrayadialogue.net) is an Indo-Pak Track-two initiative co-organised by Indians and Pakistanis to encourage informed discussions on bilateral relations and enhance stakes in peace. The dialogue is primarily meant to give an opportunity to opinion makers from India and Pakistan to interact with each other on a sustained basis. Indeed, the Chaophraya Dialogue is credited with providing a forum for a non-official dialogue when the official dialogue process between India and Pakistan had frozen, following the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai. 

The Bangkok meeting made it abundantly clear that India-Pakistan relations can move beyond terrorism and Kashmir, both of which have traditionally constituted the core of Indo-Pak rivalry. Up until recently, it was well-nigh impossible to talk about peace between the two countries because their negotiations would not progress beyond the ‘T’ and ‘K’ words.  The latest round of the dialogue witnessed very few Indian references to Pak-sponsored terrorism. Even when the issue of terrorism was mentioned, it was to tell the Pakistani side that an act of terror by Pak-based organizations would seriously derail the current rapprochement between the two sides. The Pakistani participants at the dialogue did not mention Kashmir even once. Not because Pakistanis do not think strategically, but perhaps because they do think strategically. 

While avoiding the mention of Kashmir from a bilateral track-two might be good for a successful Indo-Pak dialogue, it does have its own adverse implications for the eventual resolution of the Kashmir conflict itself. First of all, let us understand why not discussing Kashmir in an Indo-Pak dialogue is the ‘progressive’ thing to do. This is clearly indicative of the change within Pakistan on how to deal with India in general and what strategy to adopt vis-à-vis the Kashmir issue in particular. This change is also indicative of the internal transformation that Pakistan itself is going through. Read it with the fact that India and Kashmir were hardly ever mentioned during Pakistan’s recent elections.  This means that contemporary Pakistan is not obsessed with India (Kashmir has been the popular expression of Pakistan’s India obsession for a long time). This is obviously good news because it is time that Pakistan gave up its obsession about India and started worrying about its own future. I would argue that Pakistan’s loss of interest in Kashmir is one of the key features of Islamabad’s new strategic imagination. Secondly, not holding the Indo-Pak peace process hostage to the Kashmir conflict would pave way for many of the other important issues to be seriously addressed. 

The problem with the Pakistani side losing interest in Kashmir is that once Pakistan stops needling India on Kashmir, New Delhi is likely to push the Kashmir issue to the backburner given the fact that the international community does not bother with what happens in Kashmir anymore. Stability and peace in South Asia is a moving target for the international community, led by the United States, and Kashmir does not form part of that target anymore. It is a different matter that if New Delhi tries to conveniently forget about Kashmir, because no one is telling it to resolve it, it would only be harming its own long-term interests. 

Focus Kabul
If Kashmir and terrorism are no more the key drivers of Indo-Pak relations, what is it that is bothering the two sides? It’s the unfolding of the Afghan geopolitics that seems to be drawing the attention of strategic pundits in New Delhi and Islamabad.  Indeed, Afghanistan consumed almost half the sessions at the Bangkok conference. The dominant Indian fearwas that Afghanistan would eventually go back to the 1990s with Pakistan installing a Taliban regime in Kabul which would prove to be a major security threat to India. On the other hand, the prominent Pakistani argument was that Afghanistan is in its sphere of influence and thatit has invested in it heavily: with sweat, blood and money. Hence India should stop interfering and hurting the Pakistani interests in Afghanistan.

However there were also some fresh, though not so dominant, arguments on Afghanistan. Some Indian participants argued that India should have nothing to do with Afghanistan, as it cannot afford to spend huge amounts of resources on stabilizing Afghanistan let alone projecting force into Afghanistan. Moreover,India has no strategic interests there and Indian involvement will only make the situation murkier in Afghanistan.

Similarly, some Pakistani participants stressed the need to have joint indo-Pak projects in Afghanistan (this is something that Pakistanis have traditionally rejected). The dialogue, in this context, recommended the following: “India and Pakistan should explore the possibility of undertaking joint projects in Afghanistan on IT, training and education, telecommunication, healthcare, agriculture, capacity building, etc.” 

There seems to a realization in Pakistan today that despite all its bravado about Afghanistan being its sphere of influence, and not of India, post-2014 Afghanistan might become too hot for it to handle. Perhaps this is partly responsible for Pakistan’s new found realisation, at least among track-two interlocutors, that cooperating with its neighbours to stabilize Afghanistan, is after all not a bad idea. There is also a palpable reduction in the Pakistani diatribe on the alleged Indian designs in Afghanistan. 

One understanding that a lot of Indians and Pakistanis seem to share about Afghanistan is that the security situation in Afghanistan will get worse post-2014 and because the Americans and their allies have lost interest in Afghanistan they are unlikely to bother with it anymore. As a result, Pakistan will be a victim of the geopolitics that will eventually play out in Afghanistan. Pakistan, under such circumstances, cannot be overly combative about its sphere of influence. It should therefore try and seek more cooperative rather than zero-sum outcomes in Afghanistan.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, 21 July 2013. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jul/21/takeaways-from-the-chaophraya-track-2-18.asp )

Many shades of truth

Statecraft

HAPPYMON JACOB

The problem with looking for truths is not that you may not find them, but that there are too many to choose from. That’s why if you want to be careful, you should refer to them as discourses or narratives rather than truths. These narratives and discourses, in a fundamental sense, structure human societies for the character and nature of societies are also defined by what they talk, debate and ultimately consider as truths. Societies have meta-narratives and minor narratives with a clear hierarchy among them. Often, and sadly so, those sections of the society which lose out in this battle of ideas tend to suffer, in some societies more than in others. The Kashmir conflict is also, in a certain sense, a battle of ideas, of varying definitions of nationalism and political destinies. Through today’s column, I wish to explore some of those narratives about Kashmir and the subtexts within them using the selection of Parvez Rasool into the Indian cricket team as a central reference point.

The ‘feel-good’ story of Parvez Rasool
Indian media is celebrating the ‘feel-good’ story of the selection of Parvez Rasool, the first Kashmiri cricket player (born and brought up in Kashmir), into the Indian squad. How this “son of a shop owner”, coming from “humble origins” in Kashmir where there are hardly any state-of-the-art cricketing facilities, has finally made it. Even the fact that the Bangalore police had once detained him, making a claim as bizarre as “Though we have not found any explosives in the bag, we suspect that some residue of explosive material may be in it as the bag may have been used in the past for carrying such materials elsewhere”, is being seen as the triumph of the youngster against all odds and, of course, how justice-conscious the Bangalore police is for letting him go after finding no evidence against him!

The subtext
This larger narrative about the selection of Rasool into the Indian team shouldn’t prevent us from ignoring the subtext of the story, less visible and even less attractive to the mainstream Indian media that it may be. The structuring of this narrative would have us believe that Rasool’s detention by the Bangalore police was an exception and he came out with flying colours from this agnipariksha! Rasool is one of the few Kashmiri youngsters who have survived the deep-seated prejudice and bias that most Kashmiri Muslims face in many Indian cities. 

Indeed, news reports quoted Rasool say after his selection “I had to prove that I am a cricketer and not a terrorist, which I had to show with my bat.” The onus, in other words, is on the Kashmiri to prove he is not a terrorist but someone concerned with doing his/her studies, business etc. And each one of them is seen as guilty until proven otherwise. Our media, our narratives and our criminal justice system have ingrained this metanarrative about Kashmiris as the standard operating principle in dealing with them. Having been working in New Delhi for many years, I often come across Kashmiri youngsters who share their tales of ‘encountering India’, of having to prove their innocence, of having to get ‘responsible people’ vouch for their character. Unfortunately, not every Kashmir gets a chance to play for the Indian cricket team to prove that he is not a terrorist, and hence is under a constant cloud of suspicion. This subtext of the story about Rasool’s entry into the Indian cricket team, for many Kashmiri youngsters, is the real story. A story that plays out in their daily lives.

And the other story in Kashmir Two Kashmiri youngsters were killed on the 30th of June this year when the 13th battalion of the Rashtriya Rifles fired at them in the Bandipora district of Kashmir. It was not even covered most Indian newspapers unlike the news of army men getting killed in Srinagar by militants on the eve of the Prime Minister’s visit to the Kashmir valley. The NC-Congress government in Srinagar is outraged at the killing, the J&K police have filed an FIR, and the Indian army has ordered an inquiry into the incident, as usual. The dead are dead and will be forgotten soon but no one believes that those responsible will be prosecuted, let alone awarded punishment for manslaughter. Of course, Kashmiris are happy about Rasool’s selection into the Indian team and are celebrating, but then that’s just an occasional distraction from the ordinary Kashmiri’s daily struggle for civilized existence, without humiliation.

The final story
In the previous story, Indian army was the villain and the J&K government was the savior and the saint. The narrative changes and ‘truth’ becomes complicated when you look closely at Kashmir and start asking further questions. Consider this: J&K police flouts all notions of justice when it arrests Kashmiri minors for petty (alleged) ‘crimes’, impose the dreaded Public Safety Act, and throw them behind bars for prolonged periods, away from their families, at a point of time in their lives when these children should be with their parents, at home. A report “Juveniles of Jammu and Kashmir: Unequal before the law & denied justice in custody”, published by the New Delhi-based Asian Centre for Human Rights describes chilling details of how minors are often thrown into prisons by J&K police.  The villain in this story is the savior form the previous story. 

Parvez Rasool is lucky: the Bangalore police spared him as no one had plated any explosives in his bag at the Chinnaswamy stadium. He was not shot by the security forces in Kashmir for some petty crime nor was he thrown into the KotBalwal jail during his school days for throwing stones at policemen. Not every Kashmiri youngster is that lucky. 

(Source: Greater Kashmir, July 7, 2013. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jul/7/many-shades-of-truth-17.asp )

Apology and reparation for Kashmir

Statecraft

HAPPYMON JACOB

External Affairs Minister and Congress leader Salman Khurshid’s recent visit to Kashmir, to my mind, was clearly more statesmanlike than those of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress scion Rahul Gandhi and UPA Chief Sonia Gandhi. Why? Because Salman Khurshid did what most Indian leaders refused to do so far: apologise for the gang rape of 36 women in Kunan Poshpora by the Indian Army two decades ago. Answering a question on the rape case, Khurshid said: “What can I say? I can only say that I am ashamed that it happened in my country. I am apologetic and appalled that it has happened in my country”. He is the first union minister of India who has ever acknowledged the pain and humiliation that the people of Kashmir felt at the doing of the Indian army, and apologized for the same. Of course, while the foreign minister’s gesture is good, it is not good enough. India should not only issue an apology from the nation’s highest office but also punish the perpetrators for what they did. Let me reiterate, it is not my point here that apologizing is good enough for what happened in Kunan Poshpora, but that apology is a very good starting point. 

What Khurshid did was in complete contrast to what the other three did in Kashmir. The other three leaders were focusing on rail connectivity, economic development, employment generation etc. And yet, there is a common thread that runs through what all of them did in Kashmir. 

If what Khurshid did was to offer an apology, what the other three leaders were trying to do can be seen as offering reparation to the people of Kashmir (these leaders clearly don’t go to other Indian states and announce development/economic ‘packages’ as often as they do in J&K). And Apology and reparation together constitutes two major pillars of conflict resolution. In a sense, therefore, the Indian state was engaging in the time-tested method of conflict resolution in Kashmir in the past weeks, not in a self-conscious manner though. But because it was not a self-conscious, well-designed, well-articulated and well-executed strategy, it also means that these gestures might not produce the intended results. More importantly, what about the intent itself behind these actions? Don’t intents matter in politics? Did they mean to apologise and offer reparation? If these two acts were without any conscious and pre-planned coordination, as they do seem, then do they have any value at all in terms of conflict resolution? After all, when you say sorry, the other person should not only hear it but also realize that you mean it. 

These were clearly two unrelated acts without any pre-planned strategy connecting them and hence the intent, crucial as it is, may be missing here. And yet, as an analyst, I wish to see these acts in the larger context of how India today is evolving as a nation state that is willing to understand the political arguments behind insurgencies and popular unrests in the country, more than ever. In other words, India has changed since the 1990s, so has its approach to addressing internal insurgencies. New Delhi’s approach to conflict resolution has undergone a significant transformation due to both internal and external factors. 

For one, India has over the years become more confident of itself as a nation state and is hence willing to deal with its internal issues without the fear of being marginalized and humiliated by the international community which indeed was the case during the 1990s. When the international community had accused India of human rights violations in Kashmir, which it committed in no small measure, it refused to admit to any. Nor was it willing to make amends in Kashmir at the instance of the international pressure. Today, there is more willingness among the various segments of New Delhi’s strategic elite and decision makers to own up the ‘mistakes’ of the past and use conflict resolution strategies that are more people friendly. Internally, there is more awareness in the country today that conflict resolution is essentially a political strategy and not a military one. Given this new found awareness, stemming from a variety of sources, there is a new willingness to honor human rights and the aspirations of the people when resolving conflicts. It is in this new consciousness about the political basis of conflict resolution that one has to locate the acts of apology and reparation that we just witnessed in Kashmir. 

Let me clarify: my argument is not that New Delhi has come clean of its sins nor has it stopped sinning altogether. Far from it: I am simply arguing that there is a not-so-conscious realization in India today that politics lies at the heart of conflict resolution, not violence and coercion. And this is a welcome realization. 

Having said that, how is this useful if it’s a subconscious strategy? There are two ways of looking at this question. It is true that since this is not a conscious strategy, it may not necessarily lead to any concrete, tangible policy action, certainly not in the short term. However, it is useful because nations and national characters do undergo radical changes, and understanding what happens in the character of states at the deeper subconscious level is important as it can enable us to quicken the process of change, privilege the argument for change and simply make it more visible to the rest of the nation. 
Finally, why are national imaginations and national characters important in understanding conflict resolution processes? They are important because it is indeed the political culture and self-definitions of countries that, in a sense, shape their perceptions, policies and actions. Nations are not immovable, unchangeable, un-malleable entities. In the life of every nation, there is a time for growing up and lets hope that the Indian nation too grows up and be mature for the sake of its people.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, June 30, 2013. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jun/30/apology-and-reparation-for-kashmir-14.asp )

The shame of Kunan Poshpora

Statecraft

HAPPYMON JACOB

The Kupwara court’s recent order to reopen the 1991 case in which 36 women were allegedly raped by personnel of the 4 Rajputana Rifles in Kunan-Poshpora, dismissing the closure report filed by the J&K police, has come too late - 22 years after that shameful act. But at least now, New Delhi should show the courage to put the accused on trial. If the Indian army was alleged to be responsible for the gang rape of 36 women in this twin village, it was the J&K police and some Delhi-based journos who are believed to have hushed it up. There may be far too many cases of rape in the rest of India on a daily basis with New Delhi being the ‘rape capital’ of the world, but what is different about Kunan-Poshpora is that this bears such uncanny similarity to how invading forces ravage occupied territories and rape the women there. You don’t hear of the women of an entire village being raped by policemen or security forces in the rest of India, but you do hear that in Kashmir, and that’s precisely why many Kashmiris call their land ‘Indian Occupied Kashmir’.

While a number of women have been raped, many Kashmiri men have been subjected to sexual violence/molestation during the custodial torture they are often subjected to. “Inshallah Kashmir: Living in Terror”, a recent documentary film by Indian film maker Ashvin Kumar, has managed to tell many untold stories about human rights violations in Kashmir.

Here’s why they hate us!

Most Indians are often stumped when they see graffitis in Kashmir that read “Indian dogs go back”. They fail to understand why Kashmiris have a problem with India. All they get to hear – if one is not an avid observer of Kashmiri politics – is the Prime Minister routinely announcing generous economic packages for Kashmir something that many parts of India can only dream of. They also hear about the Congress scion making occasional visits to Kashmir and promising employment for Kashmiri youth. So what then is the problem? Why do they still hate us, in spite of all that we are doing for the Kashmiris?

What most Indians do not get to hear are reports of atrocities committed by Indian army and security forces in Kashmir. Well, even if they heard about them, they would rationalize it in the name of terrorism and Pakistan. It has taken far too many years for the Indian public to wake up to see what is happening in Kashmir. The bold statements by Justice J. S. Verma committee on impunity by armed forces in places like Kashmir have helped the average Indian understand what is done to the Kashmiris.

The land of impunity

The Indian army hardly ever permits civilian authorities to try its soldiers accused of rape or such other crimes nor does it readily order internal inquires. One reason is that the army leadership fears that the morale of the soldiers would be adversely affected with the other reason being that any such inquiry would negate its moral high ground. Not only that this line of reasoning is ludicrous, but the civilian leadership often forgets that it is indeed the lack of exemplary punishment in the initial stages that spreads a culture of impunity among the forces. Indeed, punishment, in the form of deterrence, serves as a major social-control function without which human societies would decent to the law of nature.

The politics of impunity

The average Indian can be forgiven for not being aware of what happens in Kashmir. But the country’s civilian authority has no such excuses. The Congress government in New Delhi has a poor record of giving permission to prosecute army personnel involved in rights abuses. In 2010, defence minister A. K. Antony himself told the Indian parliament that while the government received 38 requests for permission to prosecute army personnel involved in rights abuses in Jammu and Kashmir, no permission had been granted. That is some human rights record!

Politicking in Kashmir over the fate of AFSPA between the Congress and National Conference is even more shameful. While the NC keeps up the tempo for the removal of AFSPA, the local Congress leaders oppose it saying that the Chief Minister has not consulted them on the matter. While senior congress leader A. K. Antony, as the defence Minister of the country, fails to defend the rights of Kashmiris, his partymen in Kashmir make it a point to continue with the anti-people policies of the party.

Beware of the international opinion

India today, more than ever before, is concerned about what the international community thinks about it. It sees itself as a rising power with a good track record of upholding norms and values. If so, the country, and its defence minister, should be more serious about the human rights abuses in Kashmir. More importantly, India is party to a number of international treaties and conventions that prohibit human rights abuses. New Delhi is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which prohibits torture and other forms of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of people. It is also party to the Geneva Conventions of 1949. Article 3, which is common to all four Geneva conventions of 1949, applies to situations of “non-international armed conflicts” (meaning internal conflicts) which explicitly prohibits rights violations as well as outrage of personal dignity such as rape.

Before New Delhi preaches values and norms to the international community, it needs to clean up its act at home, starting with Kashmir.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, June 23, 2013. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jun/23/the-shame-of-kunan-poshpora-38.asp )

Kashmir’s ‘educated’ militants

Statecraft

HAPPYMON JACOB

Hope and hopelessness are two extreme emotional reactions and yet there is a thin line separating them. Once you lose your last straw of hope and cross over towards the edge of hopelessness, just about everything around you ceases to make sense: you would then move on in search of new meanings to life. Joining the armed struggle in politically oppressive environments is something like that. Those living in the midst of political oppression and uncertainties keep their hopes of a better life alive, and when they lose it, they tend to move on to the next level of creating meanings to their political existence. Politics then becomes personal. Armed struggles are particularly attractive to the youth because youngsters are constantly on the lookout for meanings in their lives and armed action against perceived injustices sometimes gives more meaning to their lives like nothing ever could. 

Just about everyone in today’s Kashmir is concerned about the increasing phenomenon of educated youth joining militancy. From the Chief Minister to the Army Commander to senior police officials have raised concern about the disturbing phenomenon. They also argue that the number of those joining the militant ranks is very low and hence not a big problem. I think we should be extremely concerned about it for a number of reasons. Phenomenon of this kind often has a snowball effect: it’s the beginning that is difficult, one the threshold is crossed and gains a certain social legitimacy, it gathers strength, steam and, eventually, legitimacy. Is it religiously driven or politically driven? I am of the opinion that while religious inspirations are indeed part of this, much of this is a result of political disillusionment and in that sense the hanging of Afzal Guru has had triggering effect. 

The youth bulge argument Or should we blame it on the youth bulge in Kashmir? This statistically well-grounded argument is that youth bulge in the state is responsible for the increasing agitations in the valley. It could even be the reason behind educated youth joining militancy. I do not completely disagree with this argument about youth bulge being one of the factors behind Kashmir’s problems today, but then youth bulge is not limited to Kashmir alone. More importantly, the argument that ‘youth bulge leads to unrest’ is fundamentally an economic one, not a political one for at the heart of such an argument lies the premise that it is due to the lack of opportunities that the youngsters take to militancy. That is not so accurate in the case of Kashmir. In Kashmir, political arguments can better explain the unrest and related problems than economic ones. Hence treating youth bulge as the cause for militancy is treating the problem symptomatically sidestepping the fundamentally political nature of the problem. 

Our youth and their youthYouth bulge is not a problem confined to Kashmir alone as pointed out earlier. It is a phenomenon in the rest of India as well. This is increasingly seen as a phenomenon that can lead to social and political tension, and sometimes to socio-political change as well. The recent anti-rape protests across the country, which shook the seat of power in New Delhi for days together, is a direct result of this phenomenon. However, when the youth took to streets in New Delhi and protested against the government’s apathy, no bullet was fired and no one was killed. When the police used force against the protesters, there was widespread condemnation from all over the country. In fact, the reaction of India’s youngsters was perceived as praiseworthy by the media and the Indian middle class. Even though it was mostly an urban phenomenon, it is unlikely that when rural youngsters ask for good governance they would be mistreated by the state. 

Compare that to the reaction of the state in Kashmir. Kashmiri youth are generally seen as troublemakers. More importantly, the use of force against the protesting Kashmiris is extreme which is in complete contrast to how the state deals with the youth elsewhere in the country. The fact is that the Kashmir youngsters are also demanding good governance and accountability from the state just as their counterparts are doing in the rest of the country. In other words, the Kashmiri youngsters are no different from their counterparts in other parts of the country in what they do because their demands are similar. But they are treated differently because of deep-seated biases. Indeed, this differential treatment is one of the major reasons why the Kashmiri youth tend to cross over from hope to hopelessness and to militancy. The young Indian protesting against the government is well aware that he can make a difference through his protest, but the protest of the Kashmir youngster is stifled and he/she knows that his/her protest is unlikely to make any difference at the end of the day. 

Our governments have a tendency to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. A critical analysis of the political developments in Kashmir since 2008 shows that we brought this situation on ourselves thanks to our politically inept and sociologically unwise handling of the situation in Kashmir. Today, we have a new problem to be worried about, of the educated Kashmiri youth joining armed militancy, but this unfortunate turn of events is unlikely to teach us how to handle political problems with wisdom and statesmanship. That indeed is the sad part.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, June 16, 2013. URL: http://greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jun/16/kashmir-s-educated-militants-12.asp )

On the Importance of Definitions

STATECRAFT

HAPPYMON JACOB

Research students at Universities are often reminded about the importance of asking the right questions as well asaccurately defining the problem/research puzzle even before they begin their research. Of course, defining a problem is done after having undertaken an initial study of the many variables that can have an impact on the issue at hand. The reason for this insistence is that uninformed, incomplete and underdeveloped definitions of a problem/situation can lead a researcher to wrong conclusions and disastrous policy prescriptions thereafter. More importantly, researchers are also often encouraged to reevaluate their definitions from time to time to weed out avoidable biases and make it more contemporary. While a research student’s conclusions may not have much policy implication, the definitions and the conclusions arrived at by politicians and officials can have serious implications for a lot of people. True, politicians and Babus may not be trained in such research methodologies, but one expects them to have learned such skills from their experiences of handling day-to-day political problems. But they often disappoint us. 

Sometimes our definition of a situation can affect the future trajectories of that situation. Let me give you an example. New Delhi’s definition of the contemporary nature of the Kashmir conflict does have a definitive impact on the manner in which the conflict evolves there. In New Delhi’s definition of the Kashmir conflict, the India-Pakistan dimension of the conflict looms large. It is worried that the Pakistan army might, after the current lull, revive militancy in the Kashmir valley. The alienation and the sufferings of the Kashmiri people are not central to its definition of the Kashmir conflict.  Nor has its definition of the Kashmir conflict improvisedbased on the changes in the external environment. New Delhi’s contemporary definition of the Kashmiri conflict is does not appreciate the fact that the most significant aspect of the Kashmir conflict today is the internal conflict between New Delhi and Kashmir. Refusing to accept this fundamental change, New Delhi continues to control Kashmir using its outdated definition of the situation. 

One of the many ways in which New Delhi’s – and Srinagar’s - outdated definition of the Kashmir conflict persuades it to exercise control in Kashmir is the way in which it denies democratic rights to the non-mainstream leadership in Kashmir. Syed Ali Shah Geelani has been under house arrest for such a long time and he is not even permitted to offer Friday prayers at the Mosque; indeed, he is not even allowed to come out of his house. Why is the world’s biggest democracy so scared about an 83 year old man who it believes does not even have much support in the valley? Leader of the other faction of the Hurriyat, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, is also often put under house arrest. His passport is expired for the last six months and the government is not in a mood to give him a new one because it is concerned that he will create problems for India internationally! The government also often uses the threat of not renewing the visa of Mirwaiz’s US-born wife.

Yasin Malik is yet another leader who finds himself locked up whenever things go wrong in Kashmir. Recently he, along with some of his party workers, had gone to the Doda district to distribute relief among the earthquake victims but was arrested and sent back to his home. His passport has not yet been renewed and there are rumors that it may not be renewed for a few years so as to teach him a lesson in patriotism! 

Sajad Lone is no more a separatist politician. He is the Chairman of a mainstream Kashmiri political party – the People’s Conference. But even he has not been lucky to get his passport renewed for the last six months. He often finds it difficult to get visas for his wife, a Pakistani citizen, and his children to visit him in Kashmir.  If this is what the government does to Kashmir’s mainstream political leaders who swear by parliamentary democracy, what might be the plight of the separatist politicians? 

For none of this, of course, can the Indian armed forces be blamed for this is clearly the doing of the J&K police and/or the Union Home Ministry. Sometime the local courts pass orders to release these leaders from house arrest but the local police often find ingenious ways to keep them confined. 
I often wonder why a robustly democratic state like India ends up violating the democratic and fundamental rights of sections of its citizens in a systematic manner. The argument seems to be that of making democracy safe. That is, the situation in Kashmir is not safe for proper democracy to function there and hence there is a need to ‘clean up’ the place before democracy can be properly established there, indeed forgetting that denial of democracy is one of the major causes for the conflict in Kashmir in the first place.

The other reason for this seems to be the existence of an unintelligent sort of policy conservatism thatdissuades governments from reevaluating their policies from time to time. Official assessments of anything is painfully difficult to change and it is notoriously so in India. Kashmir clearly needs some out of the box thinking, it needs to be continuously assessed by New Delhi to realize that the changed nature of the conflict in Kashmir requires newer ways of dealing with it. 

Why doesn’t the government have any incentive to change their assessment? I imagine that there is an ‘imagined consensus’ in India about Kashmir that it is a serious national security issue and therefore it needs to be contained at any cost. I say ‘imagined’ because even this so-called consensus in India on Kashmir seems to be undergoing a great deal of change in the recent years. 

Be that as it may, the governments in New Delhi and Srinagar should realize that the implications and results of depriving people of their democratic and fundamental rights could be dangerous and counterproductive.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, June 9, 2013. URL: http://greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jun/9/on-the-importance-of-definitions-21.asp )

The Young, Political Kashmiri

STATECRAFT

HAPPYMON JACOB

It is widely believed that the new generation in Kashmir and its views on the Kashmir conflict will be decisive in how the conflict is defined and shaped in the years to come; but this fact is hardly ever clearly understood. To me, this is the primary point of analysis and investigation in my ongoing visit to the troubled valley. Interactions during my occasional visitsto the valley or following social network debates are certainly not sufficient in understanding the Kashmiri youth’s views on the present and future of the conflict. But then being based in a New Delhi-based university, all I can do is so much. In the following paragraphs I paraphrase some of the views that I gathered from my many interactions with the Kashmiri youngsters.  One caveat: as is to be expected from any politically charged region, there are differing views on any given issue, and so clubbing them is for purely analytical purposes.  

Increasing trust deficit 
I have known Kashmir for the last two decades and, at least to my mind, the trust deficit that exists in Kashmir is on a constant increase. One university student narrated how the university authorities keep a watch on the students when they engage in political debates and discussions within the confines of the university campus. Many non-Kashmiris may not know that that political activism is not allowed on university campuses in the Kashmir valley.  How can the government hope to produce thinkers and analysts out of its university campuses if it does not allow political activism and debates in its universities? New Delhi keeps announcing new economic packages and political initiatives to bridge the psychological gulf that exists between itself and Kashmir, but hardly anyone I met seems to trust those promises, not anymore. 

Resistance is personal, and ethical
There is a strong belief in contemporary Kashmir that it is unethical not to resist the injustice that is being done to the Kashmiris. People have different ways if responding to injustice; some are more vocal about it than others. But it would be unethical to not to respond to it one way or another, the argument goes. Life may go on as normal on Kashmir’s streets and people may seem happy too, but scratch that ‘normalised’ surface and you will see the rush of disgruntlement and anger coming straight at you. This personal and ethical act of resistance may assume religious forms, infuse violent outbursts, legitimize stone-pelting or simply continue to grow in the depth of their hearts only to find some form of expression one day. 

This enormous and ever-increasing reservoir of discontent, anger and rage that is constantly filling up will one day surely spill out on the streets of Kashmir as it happened more than once in the recent past, contrary to the belief in New Delhi that since there was protest in the last three years, there will be none in the years to come. Indeed, the more injustice and the various perceptions of it prolong, the more time and efforts it will take to assuage those perceptions and feelings. 

Chocked political space 
The worst sufferer in present day Kashmir is the legitimate political space available to young Kashmiris for political expression. The chocking of political space in Kashmir is evident in a number of ways. At one level it is a direct result of the state’s own activities such as shutting down the social media outlets and cellular services at the slightest miff of trouble in the valley. At another level, this is due to the constraints imposed on all kinds of progressive politics in the valley. This is also seen in the manner in which the Kashmiri media is put under a variety of constraints. But more importantly, this is also done by the mainstream political parties when they appropriate the political arguments of resistance without really being sincere to its basic premises and long-term implications.  Differently put, while on the one hand the state actively takes away their right to resist, the pro-state political parties are depriving the youngsters of their politics of resistance that dilutes the purity and sincerity of the politics of resistance itself. Is it not unjust, they ask, for their right to resist to be taken away in such a systematic manner? 

Implications of militarization 
For most Kashmiris, what the Indian armed forces do in Kashmir represent what India is all about. Hailing from where I am, I have different notions of India but I do not fault the young Kashmir for thinking about the way he/she does about India for the India they see is an ugly one. Not only do many of them feel physically insecure by the presence of the security forces in every nook and corner of their daily living space, but are also reminded, every day, of their own sheer helplessness. Women feel irritated by the harassing gaze of the security personnel and feel that their modesty is outraged by the might of the state. It is not just their land, they argue, is occupied by New Delhi’s armed forces but also their privacy, daily livesand political imaginations. As a number of young Kashmiris put it so bluntly the Kashmiri youth will not learn to speak the language of political reconciliation with India if their land continues to be occupied by the Indian armed forces. To make matters worse, when their own elected Chief Minister himself is unable to reduce the military presence from Kashmir’s streets, in spite of him wanting/attempting to sincerely do so, the Kashmiri’s sense of being occupied increases manifold.

(Source: Greater Kashmir, May 26, 2013. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/May/26/the-young-political-kashmiri-6.asp)