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| Settle for once and all | | | | After twice being deferred to the reasons beyond one’s control, the all important dialogue between a four-member negotiating panel appointed by the Governor NN Vohra and the representatives of Shri Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti may take off on Saturday for a final and decisive round. Based on credible inputs from reliable sources, this newspaper, as also some other media outlets have learnt that this final phase of talks may end the row on Shri Amarnath Shrine land transfer. The sooner the better. It is however, strongly suggested that both –the Shri Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti and the government –should not allow any time buying or adhoc strategy to settle down the issue. Any such approach will be akin to what New Delhi has done over Kashmir for past 60 years. The opportunities for the final settlement of the issue were never seized and only time was bought. Whatever is happening today in both regions of the state is a result of such adhoc policies of the Government of India. There is no doubting the inept handling by the government of India and its advisers. Religious ferment is the consequence of what has happened in the two regions, not the cause. The cause is the lack of political will and the inability of successive governments at the Centre to take decisions when they should have. Influenced by a hawkish bureaucracy and ill-informed intelligence agencies, New Delhi has failed to appreciate the depth of people’s alienation in the Valley and the widening gulf between Kashmir and Jammu. The Muslim-majority Kashmir and the Hindu-majority Jammu had been going apart for some years. Yet the government did very little to reverse the trend by balancing the share of both in governance or development. If Jammu erupted today, none but the Government of India is to be blamed for this. Why all these 60 years, New Delhi kept its eyes shut when the Kashmir Valley continued to rule the roost at cost of Jammu. Was there none in Government of India to predict that this badly discriminated nationalist sentiment will eventually erupt? Similarly, the Valley’s estrangement from the rest of the country has been increasing since 1990Some people like Arundhati Roy are suggesting that India should quit Kashmir. They do not realise that the Kashmir leaders will be pushed out in no time and the Valley will be taken over by the Taliban or terrorists. New Delhi, still clueless, knows only one way: the use of force. Whatever can be retrieved from the ashes of our traditional secular culture is valuable. This will be important for tomorrow’s democratic, pluralistic society. |
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