Kashmir | News & Discussions.

[Areesh]

It's all bluster, SS will never carry out such a suicidal act.

He'll need PA cover, and that won't be forthcoming as it'll draw us into 'facilitation of cross-border terrorism' or a similar charge from India.

Of course, he's not Rambo that he can go on an individual heroic mission no matter how romantic it sounds. He'll need well armed companions who also won't be able to cross over without our cover.

Then we need to look at SS's age and ability to carry out guerrilla operations. He could do so back in the day, but is more of a figurehead now. His fighting days are long gone, and he needs to be use the pen as a weapon if he wants to make a difference.

Armed operations he has tried, and results have been negligible. Let India and the separatists deal with the current crisis and see where we get to.

As poor as GoI have been in responding, some moves and meetings are scheduled. Geelani has stepped back from his protest sit-in at Army barracks, so let's wait until the all-party meet and what positivity (if any) that brings.

Anything else you want to say.

 

[mjnaushad]

bump bump

Why is this thread getting absolutely zero attention ?

You should have read the whole thing, you might have read something that you couldn't take out of context:

WHEREAS the future status of the State of Jammu and Kashmir is yet to be determined in accordance with the freely expressed will of the people of the State through the democratic method of free and fair plebiscite under the auspices of the United Nations as envisaged in the UNCIP Resolutions adopted from time to time;

bump bump

Why is this thread getting absolutely zero attention ? AFter the above post of kakgeta

 

[Areesh]

You guys can carry on the discussion, but just so that we dont get misled on numbers, attaching for your reference

And you were providing the same chart on some other thread also. I think giving it once was enough for your self satisfaction.

 

[DGMO]

I sometimes wish we can have more mature people like you who don't hesitate to talk sense then just puking national jingoism....I am in total agreement with you bolded part and this is the biggest irritant that i have for GOI when it comes to Kashmir.....Our policy makers have a tendency to mistake temporary lull in kashmir as peace for good...

Appreciate the positive words bro, don't worry, there are many like me, just hope more made a splash on this forum. Too many patriotic (or idiotic, whichever way you look at it!) people get clouded in their sentiments.

If you approach an angle as take take take, refusing to look at the situation from the opposing perspective, then how can one expect progress? My experience tells me that those Pakistani's that are living abroad, are more passionate about this issue than the common man back in Pakistan!

Yet you speak to these people like I do in the UK, and they know nothing about the dynamics of Kashmir, the different stakeholders, the views from India's perspective, who Syed Salahuddin is, who Geelani is, what article 370 is, what autonomy means, the history, our failings etc etc. It's constant 'Kashmir banega Pakistan'.

If you're going to be blinded by your patriotism, and blind hatred of India, then you need to be educated about this complex matter we have on our hands - and start to accept reality.

Reality is that we can find a solution, place our hatred behind us and prosper not in isolation, but together. Unfortunately, Pakistani's do allow their emotions to get the better of them, and that leads to poor decision making.

We care more about the Palestinians for example than the Arabs themselves. Why? It seems we needs a bogeyman to blame and to act as an outlet for our own frustrations, whether it's India or Israel. It never ceases to amaze me.

As patriotic as I am, and I love my country to bits, there is no reason why we as neighbours (whether it is in the sub-continent, or here in the UK) can't get along. If Bopanna and Qureshi are setting the benchmark, then we need to follow in that direction. Believe me, it can be done.

 

[DGMO]

Anything else you want to say.

Yes, just read my previous post. Might help you take a more rational stance when addressing the issue of Kashmir, and India in general. Well I hope so anyway.

 

[deckingraj]

all wars have casualties; it's a sad reality. That is one reason (of many) for opting for the F-16s with the sniper targetting pods. That is why we needed retro-fit & MLU for some of the aging Cobras.

despite our superiority over the (non-uniformed, easily blending in) militants; the way we win the war is ON THE GROUND; and most importantly ---

NOT just MILITARILY....

Cannot agree more on this...

we are at war with militants....are you at war with the occupied Kashmiris? Perhaps you are, maybe you can shed more light on it.

You are right sir when you say you are at war with Millitants, however are you saying that we are not at war with Millitants??? Kashmir has insurgency and we are at war with that insurgency, now unfortunately the collateral trickels down to populace which makes the situation a time bomb....This is one problem that sooner or later(and i hope you don't) will be faced by you as well....Collateral in dealing with millitants will keep on rising and development will keep on evading popoulace...This will give more and more recruits to the millitants and sooner there will be a vicious circle ...

This is where GOI finds herself today....They need to arm their soldiers with some special powers so that they can deal with insurgents....However this special powers do get misused there by increasing the cost of collateral and making the situation worse then what it was...However removing those special powers will mean making your soldier less potent and thereby making the situation worse....so you see, it is very complicated and difficult situation to resolve....you don't want to do operation like Sri Lanka and neither you want make your soldiers less potent to deliver job effectively...no???

I would be stupid to say thay there Kashmiri's are not at revolt against GOI...There are many factions who are however i will be equally stupid to say that situation is not fabricated from across the border....Years of insurgency backed by GOP and years of neglect by GOI is taking its toll....However who is the sufferer apart from Kashmiri's themselves???


GOI needs to wake up and need to win the hearts of Kashmiri's or else GOI will keep counting the number of Officers we have lost and Kashmiri's their siblings......Just pathetic...

 

[Areesh]

Yes, just read my previous post. Might help you take a more rational stance when addressing the issue of Kashmir, and India in general. Well I hope so anyway.

No I don't want a rational stance based on flawed reality checks and irrational rational posts. I would go with my own research rather than depending on some non intellectual posing as intellectuals giving their so called reality checks.

Thanks anyway.

 

[DGMO]

No I don't want a rational stance based on flawed reality checks and irrational rational posts. I would go with my own research rather than depending on some non intellectual posing as intellectuals giving their so called reality checks.

Thanks anyway.

Bit of a tongue twister from you, I'm not sure I quite follow, but interesting multiple use of 'reality' and 'rational'.

Well then continue to live in cloud cuckoo land, and let me know how much progress you make on this issue. Won't be much that's for sure.

 

[TextMiner]

loving it


it does look so good there. The same people celebrated August 14 a little over a month ago

There was another part of the same country that got Independence on August 14, 1947 and had the same Flag ; Unfortunately now that country celebrates its Independence day on March 26 now, and has a Red Sun (metaphorically the Colour of its people's blood spilt) against a Dark Green Background.

I wonder what flag colour are these guys going to have when they celebrate their Indpependence day.

 

[GUNNER]

SRINAGAR, India, Sept 17, 2010 (AFP) - India deployed soldiers on some streets of protest-hit Kashmir on Friday to restore order, as three more people were shot dead by security forces during violent demonstrations.

Troops were spotted on a key road in the main city of Srinagar that leads to the high-security airport, an AFP reporter said, while residents also reported seeing soldiers in central Budgam and northern Baramulla villages.

The army was last mobilised to assist the police and paramilitary forces in July and the latest measure has angered separatists who resent any moves heightening the sense of occupation in the disputed Himalayan region.

"All repressive measures are being used to quell and crush the resistance movement and intimidate people for daring to raise their voice," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a senior separatist and leading cleric, told AFP.

The step was believed to be part of a new strategy drafted by police, paramilitary and army forces to restore order.

A total of 97 people have died since the protests erupted in June, according to an AFP tally, with 17 killed on Monday in the worst violence in the disputed Muslim-majority region in years.

Police said at least three people had been killed and 23 injured on Friday after security forces opened fire in six places as crowds defied a curfew to pelt troops with stones and set fire to government buildings and vehicles.

Police said protesters had injured at least 20 security force personnel in stone-throwing incidents instigated by separatists.

Pakistan accused India of "brutality" over its crackdown on demonstrators who have staged three months of protests clamouring for an end to New Delhi's rule in Kashmir, a territory claimed by both nuclear-armed neighbours.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi, who held tense talks with his Indian counterpart S.M. Krishna in July to try to build trust between the estranged neighbours, condemned India's actions.

"Pakistan strongly condemns the brutality and the blatant use of force by Indian security forces," Qureshi said.

"Gross and systematic abuse of human rights and Indian repression in Kashmir must end," he said, describing killings, arrests and detentions as "unacceptable".

Most clashes have seen masked Kashmiris, some barely teenagers, throw stones at the heavily armed security forces who have retaliated with tear gas, baton charges and live ammunition.

A strict curfew has been in place since Sunday in most parts of Kashmir, leading to complaints of "collective punishment" from locals who have been confined to their homes and are running low on food and medicine.

In Srinagar, thousands of residents chanting "Our nation, we will decide its future!" attended prayers for the cousin of separatist leader Yasin Malik who died on Thursday after being shot last month.

Across the region, Kashmiris are becoming increasingly vocal in their complaints about shortages as the curfew stretches into a sixth day.

All neighbourhoods in Srinagar have been sealed with barbed wire and iron gates as armed security forces with rifles and batons ensure no one crosses them or makes an attempt to defy the curfew.

 

[Areesh]

You are saying hurriyat abandoned protest only because of fear of more civilians getting killed, right??? if yes then my question were they sleeping earlier??? why suddenly they have fear about civilians killing because this is going on from past 2-3 months, no???
.

Well they always condemned violence and their are dozens of their statements where they asked people to refrain from violence. But on the other hand they also continued their struggle of their valley by the foreigners. So they always asked people of IOK to refrain from violence which you didn't read because of your stubbornness to continue your occupation of the land which never belong to you.

Use google for those appeals. Thanks

You seems to be ignorant about Kashmir politics...This CM is right now busy in discussing with new delhi about the mandate of all party delegation going in Kashmir on monday....

No I know about that delegation crap. That was the only decision out of that useless APC. And this delegation thing would be as useless as the APC in which it was decided.

 

[civfanatic]

EID HELD up a harsh spotlight to the political landscape of the Valley last week, highlighting three months of protests, strikes and curfew in Kashmir. Even as lakhs, led by Hurriyat stalwart Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, prayed at the Eidgah grounds, a few thousands went to Hazratbal shrine where Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin addressed them over telephone from Pakistan. They then clashed with police and CRPF forces and set on fire the police barracks inside the shrine. As stark as the sea of protesters was what these two locations — which hold great significance for mainstream Kashmiri polity — did not or could not accommodate. Until 1989, National Conference (NC) leader Farooq Abdullah would pray at Eidgah behind the Mirwaiz’s father. In many senses, this was their joint domain. And Hazratbal was the NC bastion from where party founder Sheikh Abdullah would address big gatherings. But, this Eid, Abdullah’s grandson and Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was not be able to visit Eidgah or even pray at Hazratbal because of security concerns.

After prayers that morning, people marched to Lal Chowk, the business nerve centre of Srinagar. By noon, thousands had reached the clock tower, heart of Lal Chowk, after travelling in buses, cars, trucks, on bikes and on foot, shouting pro-freedom and anti-India slogans. It was under this very clock tower that Sheikh Abdullah of Kashmir recited to Nehru of India a Persian couplet declaring that the two nations had become one. It was here that Nehru promised, in turn, that there would be no “forced marriage” with Kashmir and reiterated its right to choose its future through a referendum.

For decades since that convivial time, the clock tower has remained a political symbol. During protests and rallies that swirled around this symbolic fulcrum, Kashmiris would unfurl resistance flags from atop the tower. In an utterly mechanical effort to stop this, the state reconstructed the tower’s exterior in such a manner that no one could climb it. This Eid, in an example of a determination too strong for brick, mortar and cement latticework, protesters broke in, climbed up and unfurled a cascade of flags on four sides: the JKLF flag, separatist Syed Ali Shah Geelani’s Tehreek-e-Hurriyat party flag, the Hurriyat flag and a Pakistani flag. Finally, two boys broke the wooden ceiling to climb onto the roof to hoist a hitherto unseen flag: a green one with maroon, yellow, black and white stripes; the ‘stone-pelters’ flag. Of the dozens of flags that sprouted that day from the tower or the hundreds that surrounded it, not one belonged to a mainstream party.

IN KREERI village, 40 km north of Srinagar, Haleema lies on an air mattress, biting her parched lip in pain. A police bullet, one of six that hit her, sits at her spinal cord. A 35-year-old divorcee with a 12-year-old daughter, Haleema will never walk again. She was shot when police opened fire on a gathering that was protesting the killing of a college student from Kreeri. Kreeri falls in Sangrama constituency, where more than 47 percent people voted in the 2008 Assembly poll for People’s Democratic Party (PDP) leader Basharat Bukhari. Kreeri is Bukhari’s village and Haleema’s family has known the Bukharis for decades; they all voted for Bukhari. After Haleema was shot on 31 July, they expected Bukhari to visit them, to reach out — with condolences, if nothing else. He never showed up. “I will push him out of our house if he comes. We will not repeat our mistake of voting for him,” says Haleema’s sister-inlaw, Rafeeqa, tears of rage in her eyes. “He was in the same school as my husband. He promised us development but today we don’t care about development.

We don’t want it,” Rafeeqa says.

From Khrew to Kupwara, people said that their MLAs did not show up even to offer condolences, let alone act to bring any relief to those injured in the firings

As TEHELKA tracked similar stories of death and misery in the city, we found no traces of mainstream politicians. Not only are their symbols absent from flashpoints like the clock tower, the politicians have vanished from the lives of their constituents as well. In a bitter mix of resentment and rage, people complained that their representatives had worried more about roads, schools and water but had not come to visit them to share their grief. Some of the victims vowed that they would lynch the leaders if they dare to come.

This threat to lynch MLAs is echoed in Bandipore, 55 km north of Srinagar. “We don’t want jobs if we have to accept slavery,” say locals. And had PDP MLA Nizamudin Bhat come there? “We would have lynched him,” they cry. Bhat, who says he was there during the first 10 days of protests, trying to reach out to the people, admits that he did stop coming – but only so as to not spark further protests and killings that often follow them.

PDP leader Mehbooba Mufti blames the rulers for this inability of her party to reach out to the people, saying that the government’s actions have shrunk the space for mainstream leadership. “It is impossible to go out and talk to the people,” she says. “What can we approach them with? What can we tell them? People are angry at the continued killings; we have no answer to give them.” Mehbooba says the crisis exists because India wilfully fooled itself into believing the 2008 election was a referendum in its favour. “Here, the dominant discourse is freedom; we have to address this aspiration to the maximum,” she says.

Though it has 28 MLAs in the 87-member Assembly, the NC has shown a similar, conspicuous absence. From Khrew, where several people were killed in the protests, to Kupwara, where protests defied the presence of the Indian army, people said that their MLAs did not show up even to offer condolences, let alone act to bring any relief.

Kupwara, Handwara and Rajwar in North Kashmir are garrison towns where the army is perched atop house, shop and pavement. “Go India, Go Back,” screams graffiti scrawled on asphalt. TEHELKA spoke to two brothers who run a cell phone shop in Kupwara. “The army closes the gate which leads to our village at 6 pm; we can’t do anything about this. The protests were never as intense as they are now and they will continue. We will not accept this as our life,” they say. They both bled in the recent protests; they had both voted in 2008. “I would not have said this to you earlier but now I think we don’t want to live with India. Indians think of us as subjects. It’s humiliating,” they say. People in Handwara say that the army rules their life; they expected their MLA, Mir Saifullah, to give them some respite but it didn’t happen.

“Even India does not treat Kashmiris as Indians,” echoes Ali Mohammad Sagar, the NC MLA of Khanyar, in downtown Srinagar, while admitting he has had little contact with his constituency. “Khanyar is ‘Little Pakistan’; if you go there, you will think it has already seceded. However, I have visited it four or five times, even though it is very difficult.”


Tough life Rafeeqa takes care of sister-in-law Haleema, who won’t be able to walk again after taking six police bullets

UNLIKE THE traditional understanding of the Kashmir problem, the recent unrest has shaken two popular myths. Though the number of unemployed youth has risen to six lakh, the protesters are not drawn exclusively from them. Authorities believe that some protesters are educated and empowered youth. A 2008 survey conducted by the police after pro-azadi protests found that a political understanding of the conflict, a youth spent growing up in conflict, peer pressure and the social legitimacy of separatist sentiment were the main reasons people came out to protest. The other myth that lies in ruins is that any unrest in Kashmir is sponsored from across the border. The reason for the mass alienation among Kashmir is more political than economic or administrative. Though the PDP and the NC have come up with autonomy and selfrule proposals, they have failed to capture the imagination of the youth. For them, talks must include discussions on azadi; the “framework of the Indian constitution” is the scaffolding of slavery.

The party most closely aligned with the Constitution, the Congress, has emerged as an important force in state politics. With the PDP and NC at opposite ends, they are coalition kingmakers. The Congress MLA from Kokernaag, Peerzada Mohammad Sayed, calls the protesters miscreants and says that the past three months have seen a takeover by mobs. “I meet my people in Kokernaag and no one protests there. It is miscreants from other places who do,” he claims. Like most Kashmiris these days, holed up as they are in their homes the entire day, Sayed is dressed in his morning clothes at 5 pm, even as he talks to visitors at his heavilyguarded residence. Four days later, 300 protesters defied curfew to attack his house while he was inside.

MLA Abdul Rashid was once forced every day to jump up and down outside an army camp before dawn to prove he was carrying no bombs. He would be frisked, not by hand, but by having long poles poked into his body. Like thousands of people from Kupwara and Handwara, Rashid was made to work as a labourer for the army. “The army forced me to work as a porter. I was also forced to walk ahead of patrol parties scanning roads for IEDs,” says Rashid.

For the stone-pelting youth, talks must include discussions on azadi; the ‘framework of the Indian Constitution’ is the scaffolding of slavery

He remembers the many instances when the army used him and others as human shields. He emerged into prominence when he held protests against forced labour camps across the Mawar belt, eventually compelling the army to abandon the practice. Locals remembered this; when he stood as an independent candidate for the 2008 poll, Rashid won 61.5 percent of the votes. Ever since the protests started, he has been in his constituency and in July, as a mark of protest, he even refused the security detail allotted to him. He is perhaps the only legislator who trusts his people.

“This is a people’s movement. Thus, development will have to be accompanied by movement on people’s aspirations,” says Rashid. People say he is with them when they need him and by giving up his security, he has become even closer to them. “He has come to us and helped us with problems we had with the army and we have thousands of problems. He was with us as an engineer, he remains with us as an MLA,” says Noori, who had voted for Rashid. The MLA agrees that his relevance is because he is pro-people. “If the mainstream leaders behave like Indian agents, they will not be relevant but if they act as people’s representatives, they will be as relevant as Geelani is,” he says.

However, Rashid and leaders like Mehbooba, who are facing the brunt of public ire, are faced with the same conundrum. She remarks wryly that the green of the PDP flag is seen as treacherous in India and, at the same time, is seen in Kashmir as the ‘treacherous’ green of the Indian tricolour. Rashid, too, sums up his life in a couplet:


Hate figure People in Kreeri have vowed to teach their MLA Basharat Bukhari a lesson in the next Assembly election

The infidel looks at me suspiciously because I am a Muslim The narrow-minded Muslim looks down on me as an infidel.

EVERY TIME separatists spearhead an azadi agitation, Kashmir’s mainstream politics and leadership suddenly disappear, waiting for the calm to return. In the past three months of protests, where 70 have died in police and CRPF firing, mainstream politicians responded with complete inaction. Uniformed men have been the only contact between the government and the people. It took Omar more than a month and severe media criticism to pay a customary visit to the injured in a Srinagar hospital. Hardly any mainstream leader has even attempted to meet the families of the deceased. The response from the PDP has also been similar. PDP leaders Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and Mehbooba have restricted themselves to press releases and condemnations. Apart from Rashid, not one elected representative has stayed in their constituencies.

From a distance, this approach by the elected leaders seems like political suicide. How can a leader who needs votebanks for survival afford to stay away from his people, especially at a time of crisis? Why would an elected government want the police and the CRPF to be its only public face? Why are mainstream politicians — who don’t spare a single opportunity to brag about the 60 percent voter turnout in the 2008 election — hesitating to face the political challenge thrown at them by the separatists? If an unelected and fugitive separatist like Masrat Aalam can roam around the city by night and address people in mosques, where are the nine elected NC representatives from Srinagar, many of whom hold senior positions in the government? If Bandipore and Sonwar started the trend of mass peoples’ participation in the election, why are the elected representatives from those very constituencies now shying from standing among those very people?

Kashmir may have changed but the sentiment that drives the people out on streets has not. A look at the political landscape since 1947 explains the absence of mainstream leaders and politics whenever separatist sentiment takes centrestage. In a nutshell, the Kashmiri mainstream suffers from perpetual guilt even as it engages in politics.


Burnt Congress MLA Mohammad Sayed’s house was set on fire

This guilt stems from a history of flirtation with Pakistan and the idea of an independent state. Though publicly in favour of secular India, Sheikh Abdullah would preface his public speeches with Quranic verses. His deputy, Afzal Beigh, would often put a lump of rock salt into a green handkerchief held aloft, to silently indicate allegiance to the Pakistani flag. Practices such as these sowed the seeds of this trend of keeping mainstream politics vague and open to multiple interpretations. No democrat himself, the Sheikh threw out every politician who disagreed with him over accession to India, even forcing some of them into exile. However, the Sheikh, then Prime Minister of J&K was unceremoniously arrested and his government felled on 9 August 1953 after New Delhi became convinced he was conniving with the United States to declare an independent state.

This undemocratic move was pivotal in creating a political culture in Kashmir where it became imperative for politicians to keep their electoral rhetoric and agenda a small step below the separatist line while retaining the blessings of New Delhi, so crucial to retaining the seat of power in Srinagar. From 1953 to 1974, while the Sheikh remained incarcerated in Indian jails, the NC, which had monopolised Kashmiri politics became separatist in nature under the banner of the Mahaz-e-Raishumari (Plebiscite Front) banner and was officially banned from any political activity.

Mainstream parties don’t want to fight separatists because they too seek votes on manifestos that promise a renegotiated relationship with India

Separatist sentiments among the NC were so strong that the Sheikh’s oldest son Farooq, then studying medicine in London, flew to ***************** Kashmir and took an oath as a member of the JKLF, an event he was to deny later. The Sheikh was released in 1975 and even after the Kashmir accord (Indira-Abdullah accord of 1975) helped him to return to power, his political posturing didn’t change much. Aware of the sentiment on ground, he positioned himself and his party not only as Kashmir-centric but as one dead set against any moves to integrate Kashmir into the Indian Union. In his new avatar, he put forth autonomy as his slogan, with the restoration of the honour and dignity of Kashmiris and a promise to open borders with Pakistan forming his main political agenda.

The Sheikh may have kept the rhetoric intact but it was clear that he had accepted that the only source of power in Kashmir was New Delhi. Signalling the shift, he called Plebiscite Front politics awaragardi (vagrancy). Thus, even after his return to Kashmiri politics’ centrestage, the Sheikh never pressed his party’s agenda, keeping busy in setting up his still-extant political dynasty.


Pacifier NC MLA Mohammad Sagar has tried to defuse tensions

The New Delhi-managed split between the NC and the Abdullah family after the Sheikh’s death and the subsequent dismissal of an elected government led by Farooq had a serious impact on the politics of the scion of Abdullah family. Farooq has never believed in the power of his people and his nocturnal dismissal in 1984 convinced him that real power continued to flow from the Centre. His belief was reinforced when the Centre helped him to return to power through the massively rigged 1987 election, where he had joined hands with Rajiv Gandhi to set up a NC-Congress alliance.

From 1990 to 1996, after armed militancy erupted in the Valley, mainstream parties vanished from Kashmir. During those tumultuous years, the first voices challenging separatists didn’t come from the NC but from the Congress’ Ghulam Rasool Kar, who would make pro-India speeches via a loudspeaker from inside a bullet-proof Maruti Gypsy, surrounded by hundreds of armed guards.

After the 1996 election brought the NC back to power with a two-thirds majority and though the situation began to settle down, mainstream parties remained limited to a few zones, holding up a threat to their lives from militant outfits as an excuse. Despite having substantial numbers in the Assembly, Farooq delayed action on his promise of greater autonomy until Sayeed left the Congress to create the PDP, to challenge the domination of the NC.

SAYEED, WHO was the Union Home Minister in 1990, had realised that Congress politics wouldn’t fetch him much in Kashmir. He regularly lost elections and was even despised by people for being an integrationist. For all his four decades of political life, he had been against the Sheikh’s brand of politics and had struck hard at armed militancy when he became the Union minister. He brought in Jagmohan as governor of J&K and presided over the Centre’s ‘iron-fist’ approach in tackling Kashmir’s azadi movement. But once Sayeed left the Congress to set up the PDP, he took, as his election symbol, the pen and inkpot of the Muslim United Front (MUF), the party his (then) Congress defeated in the rigged 1987 election. Ironically, the MUF was to become the Hurriyat Conference. The party came up with a new political language that sounded sympathetic to both the militants and the azadi movement.


Target PDP MLA Nizamudin Bhat is also facing threats of lynching

In fact, the NC and the PDP have both measured the distance between Delhi and Srinagar and have placed themselves at the farthest possible distance from the Centre. The NC’s politics and particularly, its rhetoric, revolves around autonomy, a State-Centre relationship which would connect J&K to the Indian Union only through the threads of defence, external affairs, communication and currency. The PDP has gone a step ahead; putting forth a selfrule agenda that proposes suzerainty along with the creation of cross- LOC institutions to bring the two parts of Kashmir together.

Neither party has challenged separatists directly; both have advocated that Delhi must hold a dialogue with separatists; both insist that the 2008 election was only on “bijli, sadak, pani’’ (electricity, roads, water) and would have no implications on the larger conflict. This positioning has a reason: the parties don’t want to directly challenge the separatists because they too seek votes on manifestos that promise a renegotiated relationship with the Indian Union. Thus, whenever people rise up against India and streets fill with protesters seeking azadi, whenever separatists take centrestage, the mainstream withdraws to the secure confines of their homes and offices, waiting for the storm to pass.

Like lemmings urged on by some fatal, silent rhythm, this is what we have seen repeat itself in the past three months. Mainstream politicians know the yawning chasm that separates their populist public positions from the actual ones. And they know that the people know it too. Crippled by guilt and an awareness of their flawed practices, when rage walks the streets, defying bullets, when shouts of azadi rend the air, mainstream politics does not — cannot — reach out to its people. It sinks, instead, into the chasm.

Tehelka - India's Independent Weekly News Magazine

 

[Areesh]

Bit of a tongue twister from you, I'm not sure I quite follow, but interesting multiple use of 'reality' and 'rational'.

Well then continue to live in cloud cuckoo land, and let me know how much progress you make on this issue. Won't be much that's for sure.

Thanks. It is better to live in cuckoo land than posing as wise and intellectual when you aren't one.

 

[somebozo]

Let us safeguard our own human rights first. Two weeks ago two brothers lynched in a medival style brutality. Then a contractor stoned to death with bricks by no other than uploader of law and order ie: the wukala's. Pakistan is heading to self destruction.

 

[majesticpankaj]

i will only participate in discussion, after listening to world opinions (official stand)