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What Kashmiris really want
By
Sudha Ramachandran
SRINAGAR - It is a little
over a 100 days since the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)
took over the reins of government in the state of Jammu
and Kashmir (J&K). Its honeymoon with the people,
although waning, continues. This is not so much because
of its performance – it has failed to deliver on several
of its electoral pledges - but because the opposition
parties and the separatist groups stand discredited in
the eyes of the people.
The general atmosphere
in Srinagar, the summer capital of the state, is far
more relaxed than it has ever been in the past decade.
People venture out of their houses even at night, and
commercial establishments remain open until late in the
evening. The calm, however, is an uneasy one.
The improved scenario is confined to Srinagar
alone. A senior journalist told Asia Times Online that
the number of foreign militants entering the Valley from
across the border in Pakistani-administered Kashmir is
mounting, and that killings and counter-killings
continue. There is a fear too that the security
situation in the villages is deteriorating and could
worsen in the coming months, when the snows melt and
infiltration from across the border increases.
In the run up to the state assembly elections
last year the PDP pledged to freeze the implementation
of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, to dismantle the
Special Operations Group (SOG), the much-dreaded and
despised counter-insurgency unit of the J&K police,
and to release jailed militants who did not have serious
charges against them. The PDP government did release 24
jailed militants. However, further release of militants
has been stopped under pressure from the central
government in Delhi. In future, a screening committee
with representatives of the Home Ministry will examine
each case before releasing them. The SOG has not been
dismantled but only absorbed into its parent unit, the
J&K police.
Although the average Kashmiri is
disappointed with Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed's
failure on these two counts, they are not angry with
him. It is Delhi that they blame for the mufti’s
inability to deliver on these two pledges.
The
mufti’s "healing touch" policy appears to have won the
hearts of the Kashmiris and it has started yielding some
positive results. Relatives of militants, who were
earlier denied jobs or access to ex-gratia payments from
government, are now being given government jobs and
financial support. According to informed observers in
Srinagar, it is deepening the divide between local
militants and the foreign militants (known here as the
mehmaan mujahideen or guest militants).
The mufti has been speaking of issues that touch
the common people, like unemployment, violence and
poverty. He has introduced some practical changes that
have improved daily life in Srinagar. For instance,
power cuts have been halved from nine hours a day to
four-and-a-half. No major incident of human rights
violation by the security forces has come to light,
except two, in which the government took immediate
action.
The government has launched a major
drive to demolish illegal building construction in
Srinagar. While some residents welcome the drive as an
important step by the government to bring back law and
order (the encroachments happened during the height of
the militancy when law and order crumbled), the business
sections and the poor, who are most affected by the
demolitions, are grumbling. Whether the demolitions,
which will render several homeless, will trigger off
significant resentment against the government remains to
be seen.
What has helped the mufti through his
first 100 days at the helm in J&K has been the
average Kashmiri’s contempt for the National Conference
(the party that the PDP ousted from power in the
elections), complete disillusionment, even anger, with
the Hurriyat Conference (an umbrella organization of
separatist groups) and weariness with the 13 years of
strife in the state.
That the voters were able
to oust the much-hated National Conference through
elections seems to have revived to some extent the
Kashmiris' faith in democracy and the possibility that
political change is possible via the ballot box. "We
feel proud that we brought change on our own simply by
voting," says a taxi driver.
Even more marked
than their anger with the National Conference is the
Kashmiris' open anger with the Hurriyat. Indicative of
the Hurriyat's isolation in the Valley is the scene
outside its headquarters in Rajbagh, Srinagar. There are
no crowds surging outside the office waiting to meet the
leaders. If people do go there, it is to raise slogans
about Hurriyat leaders having eaten up funds meant for
relief of victims of violence.
If in the past,
hartal (strike) calls by the Hurriyat would lead
to a complete closure of the Valley and cripple normal
life; today the response is quite different. A
hartal call by the Hurriyat on February 7 went by
largely ignored. In fact, few people that this
correspondent spoke to knew why the hartal had
been called in the first place.
Especially the
poor resent the lavish lifestyles of the Hurriyat
leaders. They openly abuse them for the way they have
amassed fortunes and go on shopping sprees to Delhi and
abroad, while the common man suffers the strife in the
Valley. "We braved the militants' guns and voted but
they didn't have the guts to contest the elections,"
says a woman in Ganderbal. "They shout anti-India
slogans, yet hide behind the security provided by the
Indian forces," says a shopkeeper. "They want the Indian
security forces to protect them from the militants they
legitimize and from the people they claim to represent,"
he points out.
The protest marches that leaders
of separatist groups take out these days are hardly
impressive. A march led by Shabbir Shah (a former
militant who has spent many years in Indian jails and
who is now leader of the Democratic Freedom Party) to
the United Nations Observers office in Srinagar on
February 11 was poorly attended. The march was to demand
that India be made to return the mortal remains of
Maqbool Butt, the founder of the Jammu and Kashmir
Liberation Front who was hanged in 1985 for the
assassination of an Indian diplomat, to Kashmir. Other
than DFP members, nobody else participated, except for a
few children who tagged along shouting slogans. In the
past, marches to mark anniversaries were major flash
points with separatists clashing with security forces
and civilians being caught in the crossfire.
Popular support for the militants that has waned
since the mid-1990s when the militancy lost direction
and became increasingly criminalized, continues to
diminish. A distinct weariness with violence is
discernable today. That nothing positive has come out of
the Kashmiris opting for armed struggle is the near
unanimous view, even in areas in downtown Srinagar like
Batamaloo and Nowhatta, from where many youngsters
joined the militant ranks. They feel that the militants
used the guns to settle personal scores and to loot the
people.
However, this weariness with the
militants does not mean that support for the Indian
security forces is increasing. The people continue to
see them as a force that has repressed them. But while
they fear both the militants and the security forces, so
great is their terror of the militants that they are
reluctant to talk of militant violence. When the
security forces kill a family member, they condemn the
forces, even referring to the regiment he belongs to.
However, when a militant does so, they refrain from
naming a group or even pointing to militants and instead
blame "unidentified gunmen".
Their weariness
with violence has undoubtedly pushed the Kashmiris to
cling to the hope that the brave new world promised by
the mufti government will happen some day. So far,
despite his average performance, they are willing to
stand by him. But how long will they do so?
It
is likely that the militants will step up violence if
only to overturn the mufti’s healing touch approach, as
this has significantly dented support for militancy.
Should militant attacks increase, the chief minister
will have to deal firmly with the militants. This will
mean a return to search and cordon operations and
crackdowns that have reduced in recent months. This
could result in diminishing support for the government
and in erosion of faith in elections as a viable option
of bringing change.
As important as the security
situation in determining the fate of the government is
the way it handles the main issue of concern to the
people – unemployment. "Employment generating schemes
will not only keep our boys engaged and away from the
militants but also give the people a stake in the
system," points out the sister of a slain militant.
Almost every person this correspondent spoke to
in Srinagar listed employment as the issue to which the
the government should give top priority. Issues of
survival are of top concern. Issues such as dialogue
with Delhi and whether or not the Hurriyat or Pakistan
should be involved in the dialogue, or what role the UN
or the US should play figure low among the concerns of
the common people Clearly, neither the government of
India nor that of Pakistan, nor even the international
community, appears to be in tune with the thinking of
the Kashmiri people.
(©2003 Asia Times Online
Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com
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