Jammu and Kashmir needs to come out of bad news syndrome. There have been plenty of bad news headlines in the last few weeks. A number of terror attacks have taken place after the new government took over on October 16. Some quarters were quick to blame the new government for the return of the calamity of the terror attacks on the soil of Kashmir.
Some quarters were confusing the Omar Abdullah government with a full-fledged government of the times in which he last held a decade had ago, unaware of the fact that in the current status of J&K as Union Territory was different from the last time when it was a special status and the elected government had all the powers to govern. That government had control over police, law and order, and the administration in its entirety was accountable to the political government.
There are others who are deliberately tweaking balance of powers between the elected government and the office of the Lieutenant Governor. It is LG’s office that has more powers than the elected government in this hybrid system. It is unprecedented phenomenon in the history of this state reduced to a UT where the elected government is virtually a powerless entity despite having mandate of millions of people.
This has created a lot of confusion, result of which is that no one knows whom to hold accountable for the recurring terror attacks and their fall out on the ground and psyche of the masses. But the larger problem is that attempts to clear the confusion are attributed to the motives. And the benefit of this confusion is being taken by the vested interests to communalise the situation. The work has already started in defaming the elected government accusing it of working at the behest of Pakistan, disturbing peace and advocating cause of the terrorists.
This is absurd. Why should a newly elected government do all this? Let’s assume that National Conference which BJP dubs as a party of dynasts is indulging in such bewildering exercise, what benefit it gets out of it. In that case, it spoils chances of the next generation from taking over. It is only peace and progress of the place that can enamour it to voters, not otherwise. Now when it is amply clear that neither boycott-election calls are going to mark the political scene and the government is also up against the narrative of peace having dawned in J&K after the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019. Can anything be gained if the peace or normalcy gained so far is squandered?
Resurfacing of troubles in J&K with soldiers and civilians falling prey to the terror attacks is bad for the whole country. Worse still it gives a shield to the real enemies of peace a shield to hide behind this tussle between the narrators busy in attributing unfounded and unsubstantiated charges against the elected government and those who think that the UT was better off without the elected government. There are many fringe elements who have decried elections as an unwanted and anti-India exercise. They are boasting that their foreboding has turned out to be true.
The Indian leadership has a unique responsibility in Jammu and Kashmir. It has to maintain and sustain peace as that is the national responsibility and necessity no matter who rules over there. The leadership had taken this onus on itself after it did away with the Article 370 which it blamed for all the ills plaguing Kashmir.
Through its single-lens anti-terrorism policy, it indeed pulled levers of peace to the centre-stage in the place and offered an atmosphere in which fear started disappearing and a new era of peace started taking over. It cannot blame an elected government for playing spoilsport especially when the UT government with political mandate has no powers on law and order and security.
Terrorism is a national problem, in fact international one. If J&K continues to witness terror attacks, it will reappear on the global map as a disturbed place. Terrorism in Kashmir is seen and interpreted in more than one way. The Indian viewpoint that this is a result of cross-border terrorism is acknowledged and appreciated by the influential countries across the world – some believe that it is a real factor and others who see India as a strong market and emerging superpower nod in a bid to keep Delhi in good humour. But there are few others, in particular Pakistan and China that take it as a manifestation of anger among the locals against the system. This can be dismissed as an old rhetoric of these countries Violence has a bad habit of making it to alarming headlines than peace. This is a global phenomenon.
At this point in time, Delhi has not only to retain and sustain peace but also add stakeholders to it. Delhi has hailed the vote in Kashmir as a genuine expression of aspirations of the people, now it cannot deny the same very people whom the voters elected as the ones who don’t have the right to speak and do what they deem as what their mandate demanded of them. The need is to foster a good Centre-Srinagar relation, and it is also incumbent upon the elected government to be careful about its spoken words. They cannot turn their back from the peace-making efforts.
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