Back-packers, not guided tourists

Instead of its policies on Kashmir being determined by Pakistani and American propaganda, it’s time that Delhi learns to think for itself. This can be done only if the Centre has its ears to the ground

If the government does have a Kashmir policy, it is obscure to most. Nevertheless, virtually every step it takes in respect of J&K is imbued with two concerns: how it would go down with the Americans; and will the Pakistanis cut a deal? This is evident even on the eve of an election in the state. Nothing else explains the recent tortuous moves to, say, bring the Hurriyat on board.

The two considerations are linked. Anything you do will be received with favour in Washington if Islamabad sees it benignly, and an India-Pakistan dialogue can begin. But no one has any idea what such an interaction should concern itself with.

If Lahore and Agra are any indication, the dialogue is dead on arrival - unless you agree to part with the Valley, at the very least. Actually, it ought to be a gift-wrapped 'Muslim' package, including Kargil in Ladakh, and Doda, Rajouri and Poonch in Jammu, besides the Valley of course. This is the nub of Pakistan's demands and also that of the Hurriyat's, although some elements in the Hurriyat may have other ideas.

And why should India oblige? The Pakistani answer is typically communal: because Kashmir is nearly all-Muslim. The US invokes the power of suggestion to say that if you don't cough up Kashmir, world peace will be threatened because Pakistan now has the bomb. So, you might as well swallow the bitter pill.

Thus, it becomes India's sole responsibility in western eyes to preserve world peace - not Pakistan's, not even America's as it goes about brandishing the gendarme's staff in just about everybody's face. But the trouble is the US wanted India to concede Kashmir - without ever saying so officially - even before Pakistan got itself the bomb.

It's said India should sort out the Kashmir 'dispute' with Pakistan. But why is the subject a dispute at all? The only reason one can think of is that Pakistan says so. Islamabad also says Kashmir runs in every Pakistani's veins and, therefore, it must have it! So, is the part of J&K that went over to China excluded from Pakistan's bloodstream? What about the territory that was once Pakistan but has since gained sovereignty?

New Delhi seems to have lost sight of the ground situation in the Valley and has come to absorb assumptions made about it by Pakistan and the US. The most important of these are that Kashmir is in turmoil, that the Hurriyat is the only true representative of Kashmiris, and that the Centre must talk to them as well as to Islamabad if it wishes to explore a permanent solution to the 'problem'.

This sort of propaganda has been so pervasive over the years that many commentators outside the government also accept it readily, and base their prognoses on that basis alone. Their credulousness perhaps stems from the fact that they do not place their ears to the ground, and that they interact almost exclusively with the Hurriyat or para-Hurriyat tendencies to learn about the state of affairs across the Pir Panjal. It's time they headed for Kashmir with back-packs and followed all the trails. Ditto for representatives of foreign governments.

Kashmir's reality, they might all discover, is not so unilinear, and in many respects quite different from what is generally supposed. What turmoil there still exists is essentially Pakistan-induced. This is well understood in the Valley. The support for the jehadi ideology and for terrorism has shrunk dramatically, and ordinary people now appear to have few qualms about reporting terrorists to the authorities.

Much discussion appears to centre on supposed Kashmiri 'alienation'. The implication is that the alienation is from India, and that this leads them on to the trajectory of separatism that induces a sympathy for terrorism. Perhaps the situation is better summed up by the word 'trauma'. Caught in the cross-fire of terrorist violence and the often crude and hostile tactics employed by the security forces, the entire Kashmiri society is thoroughly traumatised, even though it is reasonably well off in material terms.

For any policy to have an impact, this must be changed quickly. The state government and the Centre have failed even to recognise the issue. The separatist lobbies have never paid attention to the problem. Perhaps that is one reason why they are short on internal support. As for elections, people don't seem to care too much for the political preferences of the separatists. A few bombs or assassinations will keep voters indoors anywhere in the world. It's up to the authorities to keep the environment secure.

But a relatively low voter turn-out will not negate the 'sea-change' in Kashmir. Policy makers need to bear this in mind, now and after the polls, rather than proceed from any preconceived notion. Elections may be the right time for political leaders, even those not having stakes in the Valley, to visit Kashmir, if only to gain a fresh perspective that will hopefully inform policy in the near future. If nothing else, they could speak about the 'idea of India', to use Sunil Khilnan" splendidly evocative expression.

As for the Hurriyat, its stock doesn't seem to be high. It was a dramatic moment when I saw outside its office in Srinagar (where a pathetic demonstration was in progress) an elderly woman running across the road, screaming out something in Kashmiri as she angrily jabbed the air, all the while pointing to the Hurriyat headquarters. Laughing shopkeepers translated merrily, "The ministers and these people are all 'daku' (robbers)." All that it might take is withdrawal of western affections to knock the bottom out of the Hurriyat.

It is a collective failure of the media that Kashmir's changing reality has been allowed to go unrepresented, leaving observers with overwhelming biases. Kashmir has suffered as a result. The urgent problems of its people, such as full-blown educated unemployment and the pain of thousands of displaced and psychologically dislocated households that have known murder and worse, are not sufficiently appreciated outside. All of this concerns domestic policy - not international roulette.

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