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What next in J&K?

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Jammu and Kashmir policies have been torn asunder by six weeks of communally charged street warfare. Several lives have been lost in police firing and the economic blockade has made a difficult situation spin out of control. Other than issuing periodic appeals for dialogue, the central government has been clueless about what to do. Prime Minister Singh’s evident confusion is perhaps understandable, for the crisis is the outcome of policies long advertised as a great success. New Delhi’s well-meaning but ill-executed engagement with secessionists propelled the growth of religious reaction in Kashmir. The counter-balancing moves intended to placate Hindu sentiment in Jammu backfired. Politicians on both sides used communalism to harden group boundaries, in the belief that it would strengthen their bargaining position in final-status negotiations on the State’s future. In May, the United Progressive Alliance government failed to respond to concerns — voiced, among others, by India’s intelligence services — that Governor S.K. Sinha’s pursuit of land for the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board was being used by Islamists to precipitate a crisis. The intra-government feuding between the People’s Democratic Party and the Congress ensured that the extremist campaign was given a free ride. Later, after a crisis erupted in Kashmir, New Delhi threw its weight behind revoking the grant of land to the Shrine Board. Now, faced with a backlash in Jammu and elsewhere in the country, the government appears paralysed.

There are suggestions that the central government should postpone elections scheduled for October and initiate a dialogue involving Islamist secessionists and Hindutva groups. No course of action will be more ill-advised: democracy alone, not back-room deals, can dam the rising tide of hate. One reason why the violence has proved so durable is that politicians in both Kashmir and Jammu are riding the chauvinist currents in the State for electoral gain. In Jammu, the forces spearheading the Shrine Board movement have the support of major formations like the Congress and Panthers Party — not just the Bharatiya Janata Party. In the Kashmir valley, no major political leader other than former Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah — who has taken a courageously secular stand — has been willing to oppose the extremist mobilisation. Until Assembly elections are out of the way, regional politicians are unlikely to moderate their polemics and divisive activities. The Prime Minister and Governor N.N. Vohra need to make it clear that an elected government will be in office in Srinagar come October — after which politicians in the State have no choice but to carry the burden of governance.

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