KASHMIR: THE PAST TEN YEARS

Introduction

It has been said that only chemists have solutions. This article has no tailor-made answers to the Kashmir problem as a whole, nor to the violence of the last ten years in particular. It seems much more useful to offer some observations as to the nature of the problem. As with all conflicts Kashmir suffers from a surfeit of myths, created and sustained by interested parties to the violence to bolster their particular interpretation of events. If this piece has an aim it is to break down some of those easy myths and leave you with a sense of how complex the problem has become. It will also emphasise that the problem of political violence in Kashmir is mainly a Valley problem, not a state-wide phenomena. And finally, it will attach some of the blame for the current situation to Kashmiri leaders themselves.

Jammu & Kashmir (henceforth Kashmir) is today divided between India and Pakistan, with India controlling most of the people and Pakistan most of the territory. This division came about in 1947-48, as India and Pakistan fought over the future of Kashmir, which had been up to then a Princely state. Three wars have been fought between India and Pakistan involving Kashmir; in 1947-8, 1965, 1971. Fighting continues on the so-called cease-fire line today, with small arms and artillery exchanges during September 1998 in four major sectors of that line.

Politically the Kashmir Valley is the dominant unit in the state, with a population of some 3.5 million, 95% of which is Sunni Muslim. The Jammu region plays less of a role, despite hosting the state government for six months of every year. It has a population of about 3 million (65% Hindus, 30% Muslim), while Ladakh, the third region has a mere 150,000 inhabitants, roughly 50:50 Buddhist and (mainly Shia) Muslim.

The Indian section has seen an erosion of the autonomy it once had in the 1950s, and has suffered a series of corrupt administrations. There has always been a strong strand of self-determination in Kashmiri politics, balanced by Kashmiri leaders who have come to agreement with New Delhi. One particular leader, Sheikh Abdullah, who ruled in the 1950s and late 1970s, managed to pacify both segments of Kashmiri society (but was imprisoned for a long period in-between when he angered New Delhi). His son and successor, Dr Farooq Abdullah, in power for much of the 1980s and now since 1996, has not been so successful.

The 1980s saw an increased level of central intervention by New Delhi in Kashmir affairs. Authoritarian governors rule was declared several times (1984, 1986) as elected state governments were removed on central authority. This reflected a wider pattern of central government intervention in India as a whole, as Congress (I) sought to retain political control of individual states, but it left many Kashmiris doubting the ability of democracy to produce representative administrations that would be respected by New Delhi.

The Kashmiri Diaspora was also becoming more politically visible, and from the 1960s onwards groups emerged that campaigned for Kashmiri independence from both India and Pakistan. Occasionally this growing political activism turned violent. In February 1984 for example Ravindra Mahtre, an Indian diplomat stationed in the UK, was kidnapped and subsequently murdered by an organisation called the Kashmir Liberation Army.

Within India the legacy of secularism had begun to unwind, with disturbances in the Punjab and the 1984 Delhi riots. In Kashmir the 1980s had seen a strong growth in the number of madrassahs (religious schools) and the writings of Islamists such as Syed ala Mawdudi and Sayyid Qutb were widely circulated in pamphlet form. On a wider plane, the apparently unshakeable Soviet Empire was getting bogged down in the Afghan War. Wide media coverage of both prompted Kashmiris to consider their position, and encouraged radical action. It didn’t take a perceptive Kashmiri mind to perceive that now was the time for potential change.

The 1987 State Assembly elections held in the Indian controlled sector were widely regarded as fraudulent, as a coalition of opposition parties, the Muslim United Front (MUF), was cheated of many seats. Although it is unlikely that the MUF would have won an absolute majority, they would have become a major political force, pushing state politics in a more pluralist direction. Former MUF activists would later form the nucleus of the armed insurgency. Fed up with electoral politics, they would seek alternative means to translate political demands into Indian government concessions.

With a better educated, more politically mobilised elite along with greater Islamist influences from Pakistan and Iran, political violence was on the horizon. The current insurgency still came as somewhat of a surprise: a surprise to the Indian and Pakistani governments, and indeed, to some Kashmiris themselves. Just before the 1965 war the Pakistani government had infiltrated forces into the Indian zone to promote insurgency; the response from locals was both direct and negative - no uprising took place. This time the violence was initiated by Kashmiris themselves, though not without external assistance from Pakistan.

In late July 1988 the pro-independence Jammu Kashmir Liberation Force (JKLF) bombed the Central Telegraph Office in Srinagar. The very next day the Srinagar Club was also bombed. These attacks, though not lethal, marked the beginning of the current militancy in the Kashmir Valley, a mere 84 miles long and 25 miles deep. Sporadic shootings, bombings and kidnappings continued thereafter. While the insurgents were in the main young, ill-trained and had a profoundly short-term perspective (there was a wide belief that liberation could be gained in a matter of months) the symbolic significance of the violence was immense. For Šumit Ganguly, 1988 saw a real change in how political violence manifested itself in the state. ‘The violence went from being spasmodic to orchestrated and deliberate’ he writes.

In 1989 dramatic changes were taking place, not only in Kashmir but across the world. Empires were falling and various nationalities blinked in disbelief as statehood was theirs for the taking. Two particular instances influenced Kashmir; Romania and Afghanistan. Romania was important because televised images of the people-power that seemed to topple Caucescu were beamed into many a Kashmiri home. Afghanistan mattered because the impression in Kashmir was that the mujahadeen had defeated the massed forces of the Soviet Union. (As it would later emerge, neither interpretation was strictly accurate.)

Domestic factors were just as crucial. Farooq Abdullah faced mounting criticism for perceived high levels of corruption, and grumbles continued about the erratic supply and high prices of electricity in the Valley. Militant actions were growing only now senior officials were being murdered. One particular JKLF action carried a great symbolic force. This was the kidnap of Rubaiya Sayeed, daughter of the Union Home Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed, on 8th December 1989. As a leading Islamist Shakeel Bakshi told me, ‘people loved it!’ The Union government caved in to the kidnappers demands, releasing five militants, and in the process uncaged the constraints that had so far kept the militancy small-scale. As Tavleen Singh noted, it sent a message that militancy could succeed in political terms - another misconception that would cost Kashmir dear in the years to come.

Yet almost as soon as the insurgency had begun one of its central weaknesses was underlined: division. In 1989 the JKLF split into Al Umer and the JKLF, while a new militant group called Hizbul Mujahadeen (HM) began a campaign. HM was the military wing of Jamaat-i-Islami in the Valley, and gained powerful backing from Pakistan because it was unambiguously for the complete union of Kashmir with Pakistan. It soon displaced the JKLF in military terms, and remains a dominant player even today. A plethora of smaller groups also came into being. A strong cultural component of the militancy also developed as groups like Allah Tigers forced cinemas, beauty shops and liquor stores to close down.

On 22nd November 1989 an attempt was made to hold elections in Kashmir for the Indian parliament, the Lok Sabha. These elections saw a negligible turnout of around 5% in the Valley (with a mere 2% in some constituencies). It underlined the collapse of Indian authority and of democratic politics in the state, which partly followed from the flawed nature of the 1987 state assembly election.

Following these dramatic events at home and abroad there was a massive popular mobilisation in favour of self-determination during early 1990, accompanied with continuing violent attacks. At the end of February an estimated crowd of 400,000 converged on the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) office in Srinagar to demand the implementation of UN resolutions on Kashmir. Years of frustration with a series of inept and corrupt state governments along with highly interventionist administrations in New Delhi exploded onto the streets. Many young Kashmiri Muslims, enthused by this popular movement, swelled the numbers of those slipping across the line of control to seek training and weapons in Azad Kashmir ("Free") Kashmir, the Pakistani-controlled Western part of Jammu & Kashmir, or Pakistan. Azad Kashmir, while populated by many who cannot speak Kashmiri, is full of people who morally (and sometimes materially) support the insurgency in the Indian-controlled part of the state.

The reaction of the National Conference state government was ineffective and no obvious policy emerged, and Farooq Abdullah soon threw in the towel, resigning as New Delhi appointed Malhotra Jagmohan once more as the Governor of Jammu & Kashmir on 19th January 1990. Electoral politics would now vanish from the state for six long years. Jagmohan, who had made his name as an able administrator during a previous period as Governor in the mid-1980s, insisted on a firm hand in ‘asserting vigorously the authority of the state’. State authority was indeed asserted on the night of his appointment as a massive cordon and search operation led to the arrest of 300 people. Crowds gathered the next day in Srinagar to protest about the search and were fired upon by paramilitary troops. This characterised the next few months, which saw crackdowns by the security forces translate into violence against demonstrators, many of whom were also violent. Jagmohan’s forceful rhetoric led to human rights abuses as security forces liberally interpreted his speeches, and these excesses in turn only encouraged more Kashmiris to support the militancy. His tenure in general was one of repression; in the words of Ajit Bhattarcharjea, he treated ‘the entire valley as hostile.’ Jagmohan was finally dismissed on 25th May 1990, shortly after security force shooting during the funeral of a popular religious leader, Maulvi Farooq. For one security official, incidents like the shooting at Maulvi’s funeral summed up the military response to militancy when ‘operations were mounted without consideration of the political cost’.

Further, crucial mistakes were also made. Jagmohan did not trust the state police force, comprised as it was of Kashmiris, many of whom were Muslim. He removed the Jammu & Kashmir Police from the counter-insurgency, and in 1990 confined them to the task of collecting dead bodies. This developed the impression, easily exploited by militant sympathisers, that the Indian state could not trust a Kashmiri even if he was a member of the security forces. It is perhaps worth wondering whether the alarming police revolt in April 1993 would have taken place had local security forces been more involved. It also deprived Kashmiri civilians of the prime organisation that could mediate between security needs and individual rights - thereby allowing many abuses to take place. Although Jagmohan’s 1990 tenure was brief the damage he did ensured that the violence developed deeper roots than it otherwise would have done.

That spring thousands of Kashmiri Pandits, the small Hindu minority within the Valley, fled to Jammu or India proper. Although not directly targeted by the militants the murders of prominent Pandits in the state administration left the Pandit community in a state of fear. Only a few thousand from a community of some 140,000 remain today.

The violence gathered pace from 1990 as militant numbers grew to around 5,000, and my brief visit in 1992, my first visit to Kashmir, left me with the powerful impression of a state under siege. I resolved to return the following summer to explore what was going on in more detail.

In June 1993 I returned to the Valley. I spent nearly three months pottering around. Starting off in a houseboat, I soon moved to the University campus at the invitation of some students I met. I also travelled around the Valley, and agreed with Arthur Neve’s advice that one should spend a good period exploring outside Srinagar. The situation in 1993 was not good. Almost every night there would be shooting and distant explosions. Frequent demonstrations and strikes would paralyse the towns, and the high levels of tension were evident on the faces of troops and civilians alike.

In 1993 I was young, naive and rather taken in by what I saw as the ‘Kashmiri side’ to the story. My lack of good sense soon became apparent as I was going to the town of Sopore by bus to attend a wedding. As the bus drew near Sopore, the town looked deserted. Only the odd soldier could be seen on the streets, and all the shutters were down (indicating a strike). The bus growled its way across the bridge over the Jhelum, and suddenly all hell broke loose. There was gunfire at close range and the bus passengers began screaming. I was sitting by the window and could see soldiers pointing their guns in our direction and shooting away. At this point I thought that screaming wasn’t a bad option at all, selected a suitable four letter word and began repeating it. I flung up my sleeping bag against the window to deflect, or so I foolishly hoped, any bullets that might come my way. The bus sped up and we tore along the road until finally the shooting grew more distant.

There were several times when the Indian security forces seemed somewhat surprised to see me. While trying to see as much of the Valley as possible I was detained several times, in Sopore, Handwara and Kupwara, and denied access to various northern parts of the Valley. While always treated politely it reflected the unease Indian policymakers felt about the situation. Full access was the offical line; considerable limitations on movement remained the reality.

Some detentions were more comical. Travelling by bus around Wular Lake I was stopped from continuing by a Border Security Force patrol while the bus was sent on its way. The officer in charge provided some tea and I sat uneasily with him as he inspected my police-issued pass. He then asked if I read the Bible. I responded in a warm but non-committed fashion and before I knew it he was reading me a passage of St.Luke’s Gospel. He told me he was a born-again Christian and that he had converted two of his men. His men, stretched out along the roadside, seemed more preoccupied with scanning the countryside. He soon allowed me to proceed by flagging down another bus, but not without exchanging addresses and getting me to promise that I’d take another look at the New Testament.

Such patrols had earned a bad reputation. There were many human rights abuses by Indian forces, although probably motivated as much by the parallel pressures of boredom and stress as by direct intent. Indian troops served long periods in Kashmir, rarely accompanied by their families. But abuses remain unforgivable. For example, in August 1993 I witnessed a crackdown in a village near Handwara where men were being savagely beaten by troops as they sat separated from the woman and children. On another occasion a good friend at the University was arrested during a demonstration in Srinagar one day. The next day he returned to campus having been released from a detention centre, and showed me marks on his fingers and genitals where he claimed electric wires had been attached and current applied during questioning. Finally, and most sad of all, was the case of the fellow student who was arrested by the police in Anantnag. Turned over to the Army he then vanished from official records. His body however, reappeared, dumped nearby the following day.

At the same time, militants were by no means good liberals. Militant groups extorted money from local businesses. Militants murdered state officials. And most of the indiscriminate bombings or grenade attacks claimed Kashmiri lives. And as even pro-militant newspapers like Greater Kashmir sometimes noted, press freedom in the Valley meant the freedom to print militant statements - or else.

Militants also displayed that particular Kashmiri aptitude for business. While interviewing the leader of Jehad Force in a safehouse in 1993, we got onto the subject of kidnapping. He’d heard of hijacking insurance, and enquired as to whether it was possible to get kidnapping insurance. Quite possible, I murmured. Well, he replied, you and I could do a deal. Next time I could keep you here and you could eventually collect the money and we can split it 50:50. (This was a joke.)  I chuckled, all the while remembering I had to stay the night with this group before returning to Srinagar. Such humour was still possible at that time, for the serious kidnaps of Westerners would begin in 1994.

A painful awareness emerged in militant ranks that their early amateurism was costing them dear. As one senior militant stated when interviewed in September 1993, the move to "cell structure" and "good security" was already in hand. By that time many of the first generation of leaders had been killed or arrested. The initial belief that militancy would lead to tangible political results in months had been replaced by a greater political realism; one that acknowledged that military force alone would not dislodge India. Arms and tactics grew more sophisticated. And the militancy expanded geographically; first to Doda/Kishtwar and Poonch/Rajouri (south of the Valley) and then in urban bombings in New Delhi. At the same time the Hurriyat Conference, a political umbrella group representing different militant and political groups, began to develop a coherence of its own.

But all this was taking place as India was also changing tack. By 1993/4 the Indian security forces were adopting a more political approach to the counter-insurgency, with a certain amount of hearts-and-minds work (free medical services from army camps, free film-shows, human rights training). Intelligence began to improve, in marked contrast with the early 1990s when sources told me huge bribes were required to extract morsels of information. And some former Kashmiri militant leaders were released in 1994. But not all was well. For while the army was cleaning up its act, the Indian paramilitaries were dumbing down theirs.

The raising of local militias to combat insurgents is an established counter-insurgency tactic, developed mainly by the British in their colonial wars. In Kashmir, it began in early 1994 and consisted of either former militants or new recruits working on behalf of the Indian state. They often openly operated with the security forces, engaging in a range of activities from intelligence gathering to extortion, as well as some fighting. The impact of these groups was huge: their terror swept militancy from certain towns but it did not endear them to the local population.

The insurgents had allies too. The first reports of ‘guest militants’ (a.k.a. mercenaries) in the Valley local press began to appear in 1993. Many were and are Islamists, operating in groups like Harkat-ul-Ansar and Lashkar-e-Toiba. Better trained and better equiped, they have improved the military capacity of the insurgents. A summary of foreign militants killed from 1991 - 1997 from the Indian Army indicates a steady rise from 2 in 1991 to 215 in 1997 of dead foreign militants. Apart from Pakistanis and Kashmiris there were Afghans followed by small numbers from Sudan, Bahrain, Iran, Turkey, Chechenya and Egypt. Although numbers of guest militants continue to increase, it remains true that most militants have been Kashmiri from the Valley itself (even if some had been trained in Pakistani territory). But the militancy is increasingly not a Kashmiri war, and in the longer term this may be the beginning of the end of armed Kashmiri resistance to India.

There was increasing terrorism in the early 1990s as bombings spread into Indian towns, and as militant groups operating in Kashmir kidnapped Westerners (two incidents in 1994, one in 1995 which ended in murder). Much of this can be connected to the rise of ‘guest militants’. Such events attracted considerable international attention, not least because one of the 1994 cases involved a British kidnapper (an ex-LSE student, no less). According to Indian sources a rapid improvement in Indo-Western security co-operation followed. In August 1998 various militants were arrested in New Delhi, and in September another foreign tourist was shot by militants in Kashmir, again reflecting the increasingly non-Kashmiri element to the militancy. None of the kidnappers in the 1994 cases, for example, could even speak Kashmiri.

In 1996 electoral politics returned to the state after a long absence. In May elections took place for Lok Sabha seats while elections to the State Assembly were held in September. The May elections were a farce. With considerable evidence of voter intimidation and ballot-stuffing along with a boycott by both National Conference and the Hurriyat Conference, the results were based on a low turnout and were ultimately irrelevant. The September elections, however, marked a departure from the past. Despite a continuing Hurriyat boycott, the National Conference agreed to participate and campaigned on a ‘maximum autonomy’ ticket. These elections were more like elections and a National Conference state government was elected with Farooq Abdullah as Chief Minister. This is not to suggest that these elections were without problems. There was considerable violence and Hurriyat figures were harassed and beaten as they tried to take their boycott call to the people. Turnout remained low in the Valley (although curiously official figures rose dramatically as the polling came to a close).

So 1996 saw a civilian administration. A Kashmiri government. But it soon became agonising clear that Farooq Abdullah’s state government couldn’t deliver the goods. ‘Maximum autonomy’, a persuasive election slogan, was a non-starter given opposition from New Delhi. Even the more realistic aim of reorganising the regional relationship between Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh has petered out in endless committee meetings.

Nor was the state government going to have a significant say in matters of internal security. Ali Mohd Sagar (the NC Minister initially responsible for law and order) effectively had a non-existent brief. It was also soon painfully apparent that the NC government would not be able to deliver on a range of subsidiary issues. Economic development plans along with the promise of new jobs foundered due to a lack of central government subsidy. And according to one critic writing in the Kashmir Times on 2nd October 1998, newly created government posts have been distributed in a very familiar National Conference fashion sometimes better known as nepotism.

The two high-profile development projects that have been initiated; the Uri hydro-electric project and the Jammu-Udhampur railway extension, are longer-term infrastructure projects and also have Indian strategic interests involved (power for the National Grid, a further easing of access to Kashmir). Neither have gone down well in the Valley.

In 1997 I returned to Kashmir after nearly four years. This time I approached slowly, lingering first in Delhi and then in Jammu before taking the plunge into the Valley once more. I flew in on a cold, dull March afternoon and at once was struck by how some things had changed. Helicopters now decorated Srinagar airport. While being driven at high speed into Srinagar itself the reduction in tension was visible. Fewer soldiers appeared to be on the streets, but where they were in evidence they seemed permanently dug in.

Returning to Dal Lake I sought out the houseboat where I had stayed for part of my 1993 visit. Houseboat ‘New Moon’ had seen few visitors during my absence. I soon settled down for my first night back in the Valley, but was unnerved by the silence. A while later it occurred to me: no shooting. Evidently things had changed, if only in Srinagar itself.

Over the next few days I sought out familiar faces at the University and elsewhere. Most were subdued, and even the firebrand Jamaat supporting students I had known during 1993 were more pensive about the future. A great deal of anger at India still remained. Most echoed the Hurriyat Conference line: continuing defiance in the face of massive Indian occupation. Yet some were less convinced that the militant violence itself should continue, arguing that the militancy was increasingly corrupt and/or led by foreigners, and that it was time to consider new ways of fighting for freedom.

Everywhere I went round Srinagar the situation was calmer: although the security forces were in evidence people were going about their everyday business. I was told that in rural areas higher levels of violence continued, but was dissuaded from paying a visit to one of the villages I had visited in 1993 on the grounds that it might not be safe.

While on a shikara out to a houseboat one afternoon I heard shooting and dived for the floor. My shikara wallah cackled at this unseemly display of Western courage, and pointing to his right explained that the army had set up a shooting range just by this stretch of water. I had good reason to be cautious, however, as events later that week would prove. Strikes still closed down the Valley and newspapers indicated that fighting continued around the edges of the Valley. I had planned to leave by road, taking the bus back to Jammu so as to see a little more. But conditions were poor and mudslides had closed down the main road. I opted to fly, forsaking the bus that I was promised would run that morning. I got back to Jammu and was changing in my hotel room when I heard an almighty bang. After a decent interval I walked out to investigate, and found a large bomb had ripped through the bus terminal near the hotel, leaving it unrecognisable.

The next morning I picked up some local papers before leaving for Delhi. The headline in the Daily Excelsior was "14 Killed: 70 Injured". It was only then that I realised my decision to fly had been an important one for the bomb had gone off around the time when the bus from Srinagar would have arrived in Jammu. It was a sobering end to my visit to the Indian sector of Jammu & Kashmir, and a timely reminder that the situation on the ground is still insecure, whatever the spin-doctors claim.

The information war over Kashmir continues apace in 1998. The Kashmiri conflict is proliferating on-line, as Pandit groups, militants and security forces all vie for international customers. Only a matter of weeks ago the Indian Army launched an internet web-site which provides daily situation reports and various statistics. It also has an on-line guest-book, and one of the entries aptly demonstrates the way the Kashmir conflict is going. Shakeel Bakshi, a Hurriyat Conference leader, has left a message contesting the military version of events and providing a more radical summary of his own. Various militant groups also have web-sites of their own.

A glance at the more traditional world of the press gives a clear picture of continuing attempts by India-friendly commentators to assert that normalisation has arrived in Kashmir. In August 1998 the Indian Home Minister L.K.Advani said that Kashmir was ‘rapidly’ moving towards normalcy. And on 26th September Elisa Patnaik described in the Asian Age how ‘no longer under the shadow of militancy, Kashmir is once again a favourite tourist spot’. Such claims are not new; indeed "normalcy" was the constant refrain of state government officials I spoke to in 1997. Yet militant actions continue on a daily basis, as the Kashmir Times (now also on the internet) headlines show. Even army figures indicate that during one week in September 1998 alone 18 militants were killed in army operations across the Valley.

Of course the Pakistanis ‘spin’ too, as they try to promote Kashmir as a victim of Indian aggression. But successive Pakistani governments have manipulated the Kashmir issue for their own ends, not least in securing Pakistani nationalism. And continuing covert Pakistani financial and military support for militancy is a considerable part of the problem.

What have the events of the last ten years demonstrated? In a word, disappointment.

Political violence in Kashmir has not delivered a single concession of substance from New Delhi, left some 35,000 dead, and has ripped apart economy and society in Kashmir. Indian governments have made a number of errors, both deliberate and accidental, which have further alienated much of the local population. Pakistani governments have used Kashmir for domestic ends, to bolster Pakistani nationalism and to get back at India. ‘Guest militants’, like those of Harkat-ul-Ansar, have frequently proven more preoccupied with a transnational agenda than dedicated to a Kashmiri cause. And many of the deeply divided Kashmiri leaders have endorsed a continuation of armed struggle against India, despite the increasingly futile nature of such violence. At the bottom of the heap come Kashmiri civilians of all types, from the Hindu Pandits who fled the Valley in 1990 to the Muslim villagers who continue to bear the brunt of security force actions, all of whom have been betrayed by many of those who claim to represent them.

I paint a bleak picture. But there is something deeply troubling about Kashmir. Kashmiris have always had a soft spot for stories. The insurgency has brought this out in interesting ways. To begin with, considered estimates are never allowed to get in the way of exciting exaggerations. Or as one over-eager Hurriyat Conference spokesperson put it, the Valley is occupied by 700,000 security forces. The Indian equivalent is the assertion in October 1993 by the head of the Border Security Force that there were over 2,300 foreign mercenaries in Kashmir. Another favourite, and a story I found particularly unconvincing, was the claim that not only was the US CIA funding the militancy but that they had hired an IRA terrorist to provide training. Of course the point about all these stories is not as to whether they are actually true or not, but what people believe. The real truths, as Karl Kraus pointed out, are those that can be invented.

Kashmiri naïveté is a core factor in understanding the current violence. Political and militant leaders have exploited Kashmiris for their own ends, with the habitual refrain being a simple story of Kashmiri betrayed by Indian. This leaves out a vital part of the Kashmir story, the story of Kashmiri leaders themselves. Kashmiris, not only Indians, have rigged elections since 1953. It was the Kashmiri National Conference, not the Indians, who allowed corruption to take root in the Valley. And it was in large part Kashmiris, not Pakistanis, who began fighting India in 1988. Part of the buck must stop here, at the feet of those leaders who misled their people.

Some points about the next few years can be made without breaching my moratorium on predictions.

Firstly the insurgency is likely to lessen over time; but it will become less of a Kashmiri war and more of an Islamist conflict fought by proxy. The sensationalist coverage in the papers on 4th October 1998 claiming Osama Bin Laden is training men for Kashmir is based on fact; the August US missile strikes on Afghanistan did kill militants training for Kashmir. (It also led two militant groups operating in Kashmir to make direct threats against Westerners). Already the levels of violence have fallen (although the comparative lethality of that violence has risen). Many Valley Kashmiris are tiring of the violence; this was reflected in my fieldwork last year and can also be seen in the way the separatist Hurriyet leadership is increasingly divided and is losing credibility in Kashmir itself. This must not be mistaken for political ‘normalisation’, a phrase that often comes from New Delhi spokesmen. Ten years of state repression and fifty-one years of misrule have taken their toll. Alienation runs deep in the Valley and even if the guns fall silent political agitation against Indian rule is likely to continue for some time to come.

Secondly nothing will change in Kashmir without the consent of New Delhi. The Indian government, unless the Indian state itself collapses, has enough political will and coercive power to maintain the status quo for years to come. All this might sound like a pro-Indian position to take, after all, the status quo favours India. But I think it is a realistic appraisal of what is increasingly an unwinnable war from a Kashmiri or Pakistani point of view. I do believe that Kashmiris should have the right to select their own political future free of violent coercion. It is difficult to see how this can happen unless India widens the possible options.

But as suggested at the beginning of this article, the problem in Kashmir is really a problem of the Kashmir Valley, along with various Muslim-majority districts of Jammu. This is where the violence has been. This is where the population have mobilised around the slogan of ‘Azadi’ (freedom). Only here does one find tension as security forces in bunkers regulate a hostile if sullen civilian population. Much of the problem remains the same as it was in the 1980s, although solutions may now be even more difficult. It is still a problem of many parts; of political participation, the ability of young Kashmiris to have a voice and have it heard. One of developing institutions that are representative of the population. And perhaps it is also a symptom of irreconcilable nationalism’s: Indian nationalism cannot survive without Kashmir, while Kashmiri nationalism demands separation.

The prognosis in Kashmir remains pessimistic, and my third observation concerns the mood in the Valley. A fading slogan greets you at the entrance to Id-Gargh, the ‘martyrs cemetary’ of the militant movement in Kashmir, which reads as follows: "Lest you forget: we have given our today for tomorrow of yours". I remember the words of a young friend as we spoke last March in a shady spot near Srinagar. I asked him if this slogan of martyrdom perhaps missed the point, that the emphasis should be on a different tomorrow.

He considered my question for a moment, remaining silent. When I pressed him with ‘has militancy then failed?’ he answered with this. "In my mind," he said, "I know the cost is already too high, and little seems to have been achieved. But in my heart, I support the movement. The fight must go on."

Although saddened by this, it perhaps reinforces the message that needs to be heeded in New Delhi, Islamabad and in Kashmir itself. Even if militancy declines and withers away, the problems of identity, governance, and self-determination that Kashmir poses are unlikely to vanish along with the bombs. Political problems ultimately demand political solutions; applied violence on its own merely makes eventual attempts at resolution more difficult to broker. To date force has not successfully resolved the situation in the Valley, instead it has made it much, much worse.

Source and copyright: Asian Affairs (London) February 1999

THE AUTHOR

Alexander Evans has been a member of the Royal Society for Asian Affairs since 1993.  This article is based on a lecture he gave to the Society in October 1998.

jammukashmir.net editor: Jeffrey Kile

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