Why India needs to go to Kashmir VALLEY

Why India needs to go to Kashmir Daily Pioneer.com A question that intermittently itches my mind is whether India's presence in Kashmir is strong enough to counter the separatists. And this question haunts me because of my long association with the Valley — I have visited remote corners of the Valley as I used to enjoy the hospitality of many of my family friends there. My reactions to Kashmir's problems have a great deal to do with my job as a police officer though I was never posted there. My observations on Kashmir are based on a nationalistic feeling which finds a strong place in my mind due to my handling of Left Wing extremism problems in Maoist-dominated districts in Odisha. After the death of Burhan Wani, we saw the oasis of peace witnessing Pakistan-centric honorifics resulting in violence. After Masrat Alam's chanting rancor against India, we saw the ethno-nationalist aspiration rearing its ugly head again. Masrat's ‘Meri Jaan Pakistan' slogan had numbed the country and now the Wani factor is adding numbers to Pakistan-sponsored rabble-rousers. Here I begin my argument with why India needs to go to Kashmir. The Article 370 of the Constitution has made the Valley gasp for ‘Indianised breath'. India must recognise the hard reality as to why feeling of one-India was waning gradually in Valley thus giving elements ample platforms to leave Kashmir amidst detritus of insurgency. A plethora of debate has come to the fore pertaining to dilution of Article 370. Invoking this has cocooned the valley. Infrastructure growth as it has been seen in other parts of the country has taken a back seat due to Article 370. Private hospitals, malls and industries cannot come up there if the Article 370 is not diluted. The local Government has taken a firm stance after the Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir extolling the Centre and saying “Abhi nahi toh kabhi nahi”. We have a strong Government at the Centre and the optimism shown by the Jammu & Kashmir Government is enough to infer that separatist elements will soon be shown the door. The State has three parts: Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. Kashmir Valley has 95 per cent Muslims and four per cent Hindus, while Jammu has 60 per cent Hindus and 40 per cent Muslims, and Ladakh has around 50 per cent Muslims and same Buddhists and others. So, the State has got a predominant Muslim population. Kashmir region is strategically located, and India can not afford to lose the grip on this region since on one side, the hills of Kashmir extend up to Pakistan and China and on other side, they slope into crucial region of Punjab. The region carries the Indus water that is extremely crucial for both northern India and Pakistan. Historically, Kashmir was part of the Harappan civilization and then Mauryan Empire. It was the Emperor Ashoka who founded Srinagar. It was part of Kanishka's Empire and it was during 12 century AD Muslim incursion started in Kashmir. It became part of Mughal Empire and in 1846 AD, the British restored Hindu rule in India. At the time of partition, in Jammu and Kashmir, there were 50 per cent Hindu and 50 per cent Muslim. In 1957, the Article 370 came in vogue. During this time valley of Kashmir changed completely and now there are more than 95 per cent Muslims and a minuscule numbers of Hindus. However, India continued to grapple with the problem because its continued reliance on Article 370, which should not have been a permanent feature. The ground reality, it seems, that the unrest in the Valley is contributed by frustrated Kashmiri youths, who get swayed by separatists only because there is an absence of alternative to re-direct these youths to use their spunk and mettle for positive causes. Are they some groups earning sustenance on sustained hate campaigns? Or are they a separate group, which neither likes separatists nor India? These people are unemployed youths, who, from the beginning, are brought up in anti-India milieu. Most of the people who have become doctors, engineers, and bankers in the valley are living an alienated life, who do not participate in stone-pelting but at the same time they don't exercise their franchise just to show their indifference and antipathy towards the Indian system. During election, whatever voting takes place in the valley, it is exercised mostly by most of unemployed youths, party workers who go for voting under some or other enticements. This is the uniqueness of the valley. Education doesn't help increase the voting percentage in family nor does it reduce anti-pathy towards India in any way. The reason for it is that while Jagmohan was the Governor of Jammu & Kashmir, he banned all those Jamaat schools which were feeding the anti-India sentiments in the valley. But the subsequent Governments employed these teachers in Government schools only and these teachers continued to feed that feeling. However, I strongly believe that there are still ample possibilities that instead of letting a stone pelting boy grow into Burhan Wani, he can be nurtured with care and transformed into a civilian who can think of an Indian mainstream life. And this is possible when India goes to Kashmir. We have been taking short-term measures by boosting the local police by supplying the latest crowd controlling equipments, supporting the Mehbooba Mufti government in its attempt to curb the crisis, taking support of local media and building the international opinion against Pakistan. All these attempts have not given the desired results. Now I think all that we need is getting tough with Hurriyat leaders. We should try to expose Hurriyat leaders on how they splurge on luxury living. Media should be doing the job of exposing the nefarious activities of separatists rather than becoming an activist and glorifying the militancy. Working on the unemployment of youths in Kashmir by recruiting more Kashmiri youth in para military armed forces and enhanced reservation of Kashmiris in different colleges of India can help in building a permanent solution. There should be a continuous dialogue between Centre and State. The governments should take frequent attempts to dole out "Package" to Kashmir which is generally pillaged by the same anti-Indian elements. We should try to establish mega institutions in Kashmir like IIT, IIM and AIIMS. There should be focus upon establishing big apple food processing industries. An attempt should be made to establish big factories there. There should be attempt to build mega tourist hubs. Corporate giants should be encouraged to establish big hospitals. Initially, this industrialisation may be a difficult job to do in the core of the valley. But, this drive may be started from Jammu, Poonch and Rajouri region and Ladakh area and may be forwarded to the core of the valley gradually. Simultaneously, however, it is also significant that lumpen elements such as the Masrat Alams, the Engineer Rasheeds and the SA Geelanis who incense anti-India feelings be reined in. People who are engaged in anti-national activities should be made to face the music. We hear that Geelani is still able to get his people into jobs through his letters to government officers. This is tendentious and it should be curbed. We have to understand at the end that we can no more live with the tenebrous fact that Kashmir can't change. I have a firm belief that simultaneously, Central and State Government have to work in tandem for dilution of Article 370 of the Constitution without making much delay as it is for one of the rarest times now that the nationalistic fervour of the Centre is also percolating to the State Government of the valley and also due to the fact that it is just five per cent of Kashmir which wants ‘azadi’. I also strongly believe, chanting of Meri Jaan Hindustan will rent Valley if we are able to envision setting up of many mini-Indias there. (The writer is Additional Director General of UIDAI)