On September 11, Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh spelled out a plan of engagement in Jammu & Kashmir premised on the hope that a solution could emerge given changes on the ground. A permanent solution to the conflict could be based on five Cs, he said, defining them as: “Compassion, communication, coexistence, confidence-building and consistency.” He seemed to be serious about making political progress, which is a position that he had taken as far back as a year ago.
In 2016, at the height of the summer uprising after Burhan Wani’s killing, Rajnath Singh had tried to reach out to the separatist camp in J&K but his moves were aborted by the Bharatiya Janata Party or BJP-led government in Delhi, which had taken a hardline approach to Kashmir. At that time, Singh had found himself isolated by a strong lobby that advocates and pursues a security-oriented approach in Kashmir instead of the one he espoused.
This is not the first time that Singh has talked about a permanent solution—though he has failed to specify its exact shape and nature. Last month he delineated its contours by spelling out the five Cs. It is an exciting combination, provided it is followed in letter and spirit. But so far there seems to be no movement forward.
Instead, we are prompted to ask our own questions about the 5 Cs: Why, where, when, who and whom.
The experience of the three years under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government suggests that nothing has been done to follow any of these 5 Cs that his home minister is talking about. The only effort that has been made has been to delegitimize the political context of the agitation in Kashmir that has been centered on the cry for a resolution of the problem.
Take C for Compassion. By its own admission, the Central Reserve Police Force has fired 1.3 million pellets at people in just the course of a few months in 2016. These pellets have blinded and maimed scores of young Kashmiris. No compensation has been offered for their loss. Compassion would have meant owning the Kashmiri people and striking a chord with them. Instead, the use of brute force was justified.
Take Communication. This too has been missing. It has only taken place with those who do not challenge India’s rule in Kashmir. By getting pro-India political parties again and again to talk about the Kashmir problem, the government has been defeating the idea of communication with its people. Shutting the door on those who have been spearheading the resistance against the state has not been helpful in the past and this will continue in the present and the future.
By ignoring political dialogue with forces such as the Hurriyat, the Government of India is also giving them space. Communicating and putting their ability to the test will also help people assess the capacities of this leadership. But this will not happen without some form of communication without any preconditions.
Coexistence does not exist on the ground either. In the last few years in particular an effort has been made to isolate the community. If Jammu & Kashmir is an “integral part of India”, this idea has been defeated by Delhi itself on the ground because it has not shown any respect to the idea of coexistence. The use of indiscriminate military power against the civilian population, putting them under curfew for 54 days in a row and protecting those who commit human rights violations are some of facts that simply say these people have a different existence. People have challenged the state at every nook and corner; the youth has expressed their loathing; the craving for a political solution is visible. What coexistence should we refer to?
Confidence-building has been another casualty. Pumping more and more force into the valley doesn’t build confidence—it dents the very essence of it. Confidence comes from measures that are aimed at addressing concerns directly linked to the existence of people, their daily life and their rights. In fact, people have lost confidence in the government which undercuts any process of reconciliation. When institutions fail to deliver justice there can be no hope of confidence-building. Treating people as the Other, just shunts confidence further away. The finest example of confidence-building, however, came from former Prime Minister AB Vajpayee who took a giant step by extending to Pakistan the hand of friendship from Srinagar on April 18, 2003. The roads between the divided Jammu and Kashmir were opened and cross-Line of Control (LoC) trade began, allowing people on the borders to live peacefully. The same was accentuated during Manmohan Singh’s government. But those CBMs are on life support now. Nothing has been done to strengthen them; so confidence-building is just an empty slogan.
Consistency is the only requirement for dealing with an issue like the Kashmir conflict. No matter what happens, foreign policy has to be consistent. But here too, the flip-flopping is evident. The only consistency we see is in the hard-line approach that squeezes out any possibility for dealing with the issue politically. The home minister’s plan should not be rejected wholesale but there has be the realisation that for his plan to work some pragmatic consistency is needed.
Singh is not the only one who has taken this position. BJP’s point man on Jammu & Kashmir Ram Madhav also spoke of dialogue. On September 21 he said in Srinagar: “We have said from the beginning and we have maintained that our doors are open to all the stakeholders in the state, they are welcome to come and have a dialogue with the state government as well as whoever wants to talk to the central government, we are open to a dialogue.” The statement is encouraging. But the moot question is who is moving in this direction?
Pre-conditions should apply to both sides. It is the responsibility of the state to start this process of talks even though it is challenged on the ground. Madhav is also the architect of the Agenda of Alliance (AoA) that helped to stitch together the “unnatural” coalition of the BJP and Mufti Mehbooba’s Peoples Democratic Party. Sustained engagement with both Pakistan and the Hurriyat is very much a part of AoA.
And so, while there has been much talk of talks, nothing has been done practically. This is why one is compelled to put forward five Ws in answer to Singh’s five Cs.
The writer is a senior journalist based in Srinagar (Kashmir) and can be reached at shujaat7867@gmail.com
In 2016, at the height of the summer uprising after Burhan Wani’s killing, Rajnath Singh had tried to reach out to the separatist camp in J&K but his moves were aborted by the Bharatiya Janata Party or BJP-led government in Delhi, which had taken a hardline approach to Kashmir. At that time, Singh had found himself isolated by a strong lobby that advocates and pursues a security-oriented approach in Kashmir instead of the one he espoused.
A permanent solution to the conflict could be based on five Cs, he said, defining them as: "Compassion, communication, coexistence, confidence-building and consistency"
This is not the first time that Singh has talked about a permanent solution—though he has failed to specify its exact shape and nature. Last month he delineated its contours by spelling out the five Cs. It is an exciting combination, provided it is followed in letter and spirit. But so far there seems to be no movement forward.
Instead, we are prompted to ask our own questions about the 5 Cs: Why, where, when, who and whom.
The experience of the three years under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government suggests that nothing has been done to follow any of these 5 Cs that his home minister is talking about. The only effort that has been made has been to delegitimize the political context of the agitation in Kashmir that has been centered on the cry for a resolution of the problem.
Take C for Compassion. By its own admission, the Central Reserve Police Force has fired 1.3 million pellets at people in just the course of a few months in 2016. These pellets have blinded and maimed scores of young Kashmiris. No compensation has been offered for their loss. Compassion would have meant owning the Kashmiri people and striking a chord with them. Instead, the use of brute force was justified.
Take Communication. This too has been missing. It has only taken place with those who do not challenge India’s rule in Kashmir. By getting pro-India political parties again and again to talk about the Kashmir problem, the government has been defeating the idea of communication with its people. Shutting the door on those who have been spearheading the resistance against the state has not been helpful in the past and this will continue in the present and the future.
The experience of the three years under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government suggest that nothing has been done to follow any of these 5 Cs that his home minister is talking about
By ignoring political dialogue with forces such as the Hurriyat, the Government of India is also giving them space. Communicating and putting their ability to the test will also help people assess the capacities of this leadership. But this will not happen without some form of communication without any preconditions.
Coexistence does not exist on the ground either. In the last few years in particular an effort has been made to isolate the community. If Jammu & Kashmir is an “integral part of India”, this idea has been defeated by Delhi itself on the ground because it has not shown any respect to the idea of coexistence. The use of indiscriminate military power against the civilian population, putting them under curfew for 54 days in a row and protecting those who commit human rights violations are some of facts that simply say these people have a different existence. People have challenged the state at every nook and corner; the youth has expressed their loathing; the craving for a political solution is visible. What coexistence should we refer to?
Confidence-building has been another casualty. Pumping more and more force into the valley doesn’t build confidence—it dents the very essence of it. Confidence comes from measures that are aimed at addressing concerns directly linked to the existence of people, their daily life and their rights. In fact, people have lost confidence in the government which undercuts any process of reconciliation. When institutions fail to deliver justice there can be no hope of confidence-building. Treating people as the Other, just shunts confidence further away. The finest example of confidence-building, however, came from former Prime Minister AB Vajpayee who took a giant step by extending to Pakistan the hand of friendship from Srinagar on April 18, 2003. The roads between the divided Jammu and Kashmir were opened and cross-Line of Control (LoC) trade began, allowing people on the borders to live peacefully. The same was accentuated during Manmohan Singh’s government. But those CBMs are on life support now. Nothing has been done to strengthen them; so confidence-building is just an empty slogan.
Consistency is the only requirement for dealing with an issue like the Kashmir conflict. No matter what happens, foreign policy has to be consistent. But here too, the flip-flopping is evident. The only consistency we see is in the hard-line approach that squeezes out any possibility for dealing with the issue politically. The home minister’s plan should not be rejected wholesale but there has be the realisation that for his plan to work some pragmatic consistency is needed.
Singh is not the only one who has taken this position. BJP’s point man on Jammu & Kashmir Ram Madhav also spoke of dialogue. On September 21 he said in Srinagar: “We have said from the beginning and we have maintained that our doors are open to all the stakeholders in the state, they are welcome to come and have a dialogue with the state government as well as whoever wants to talk to the central government, we are open to a dialogue.” The statement is encouraging. But the moot question is who is moving in this direction?
Pre-conditions should apply to both sides. It is the responsibility of the state to start this process of talks even though it is challenged on the ground. Madhav is also the architect of the Agenda of Alliance (AoA) that helped to stitch together the “unnatural” coalition of the BJP and Mufti Mehbooba’s Peoples Democratic Party. Sustained engagement with both Pakistan and the Hurriyat is very much a part of AoA.
And so, while there has been much talk of talks, nothing has been done practically. This is why one is compelled to put forward five Ws in answer to Singh’s five Cs.
The writer is a senior journalist based in Srinagar (Kashmir) and can be reached at shujaat7867@gmail.com