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| Kashmir Impasse: Trifurcation is the way out | | | RUSTAM
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Dec 3: Should we continue to devise solutions based on the assumption that the Valley and its leaders belonging to a particular religious sect represent the general will and that recognizing the Valley as the sole factor in the state's political situation and accepting the political demands of a section of the Kashmiri leaders would be the same as meeting the political needs of all the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh? Or, should we look beyond the Valley and go in for the reorganization of the state's existing polity on a regional basis in order to first accommodate the political aspirations of the people of Jammu and Ladakh, who have borne the brunt of neglect and indifference during all these years of independence, and then initiate a dialogue with the Valley leaders of all shades of opinion, including those representing the internally displaced Kashmiri Hindus, to find what could satisfy them?
These are the only two options available and we have to choose one. The first option we cannot afford to exercise because it is fraught with dangerous ramifications. The reason: it only tends to recognize only those who can articulate or those who resort to violence, disrupt political and economic institutions, terrorize law-abiding citizens, forcibly seek to convey the impression that they are the chief factors in the situation. Acceptance and implementation of such a solution will - apart from causing political explosions in Jammu and Ladakh and elsewhere in the state, including camps housing displaced Kashmiri Hindus -- only embolden the extremists to unleash a wave of armed struggle throughout the country leading to the rule of the jungle and the country's balkanization. In fact, armed struggle is already going in hundreds of districts in different parts of the country, with the Maoists/Naxal doing their best to overthrow the elected governments.
If the protagonists of greater autonomy/self-rule/ independence/merger with Pakistan want to demonstrate their sincerity, the first step is recognition that J&K is mini India, which houses a large number of religious and ethnic minorities like Gujjars and Bakerwals, Christians, Sikhs and Shiite Muslims with conflicting political aspirations. The other most important step is the fulfillment of the political aspirations of the people of Jammu and Ladakh and other neglected communities, whose demands range from statehood to regional council to Union Territory status. If it is done, discussions with the Valley's Sunni leaders will not be complicated by the different view points of provinces that have nothing in common in culture, ethnicity, history, language and economy.
Clearly, we have to go for the second alternative. Time is running out and there are cogent reasons to believe that unless the state's polity is reorganized on a regional basis, the best opportunity for any action would be lost. This action is imperative.
Even otherwise, there appears no justifications in preserving the existing political arrangement or the state (which came into being in March 1846 by a quirk of history - a development the Valley leaders opposed tooth and nail between 1846 and 1946 on the ground that the British sold the life, honour and freedom of the people of Kashmir to the Dogras of Jammu in 1846 for just Rs 75 lakh ---) as it is. The people of Jammu and Ladakh are conspicuous by their absence in Kashmir. Most of them who had some immovable property in Kashmir have already sold it or abandoned it and settled down permanently in Jammu and Ladakh. A few employees from Jammu and Ladakh, who used to hold certain positions in the government or semi-government departments and organizations in Kashmir prior to the eruption of militancy there, have got themselves transferred to Jammu and Ladakh. If there are some officials from Jammu and Ladakh still in the regional services of Kashmir, their number is not even 1,000 out of a total of nearly 3.5 lakh government employees. So is the story in the fields of trade, commerce and industry and in the Kashmir-based technical and professional institutions.
Not only this, no persons from Jammu and Ladakh could ever become Chief Minister of the state because the Valley leaders and the Central Government hold the view that since Kashmir has 46 seats in the 87-member assembly, the office of the Chief Minister has to be with the Valley.
These and several such things have only created an extreme form of inter-regional bitterness and animosity. In fact, while the people of Jammu and Ladakh consistently complain that "they are being treated as second class citizens by the Kashmiri leaders," the Valley leaders always accuse the legislators of Jammu and Ladakh of hobnobbing with the Centre to bring down what they call their "legitimate governments" and foist "Delhi agents" on the state. In this context, they refer to the role of the legislators of Jammu and Ladakh which actually led to the fall of Sheikh Abdullah's government in 1953 and 1977, Farooq Abdullah's government in 1984, the ouster of Gul Shah in 1986 and the collapse of the Ghulam Nabi Azad's government in 2008.
The reorganization of the state's polity on a regional basis, it needs to be underlined, will remove all negative trends and promote in each province sound politics based on purely democratic and economic issues. Such a reorganization would not only meet the long-pending demand of the people of Jammu and Ladakh for their political and economic empowerment and closer integration with India, but also in the words of the former President of India, R Venkataraman, enable New Delhi to "deal with the Kashmir Valley as a separate entity" (R. Venkataraman, My Presidential Years, Harper Collins, 1994). |
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