The Myths that are being sold to India on Kashmir

Two days after the parliamentary coup in Kashmir, I laid a bet with a Delhi taxi driver.  A year from now, he said, Kashmir would be ‘normal’, without the need for any troops. If there are still forces in Kashmir, however, he will throw a party for me in Mahipalpur. The ordinary citizen of India has been sold a myth by the RSS and the BJP, a myth which is as old as history – that colonization is primarily for the benefit of those being colonized.

 When Prime Minister Modi addressed the nation on August 8 on Article 370, he started off saying this historic step was taken to benefit Kashmiris who had been deprived of rights. “Now every citizen in India has the same rights and duties”, he said. In the Lok Sabha, Amit Shah began by reeling off figures on the state’s development.  However, every one of the claims that Shah and Modi have made on how the decimation of Article 370 and its accompanying changes will benefit the people of Jammu and Kashmir fail to stand the barest scrutiny.

First, we are told that Kashmiris will benefit since laws like RTI will now be extended to them. This is touching especially since the RTI is being weakened for the rest of India. Reservation for nomadic tribes and SCs and the extension of the forest rights act (FRA) to Gujjars would be a great thing, if only the BJP was not weakening the concept of reservation for SCs and STs in the rest of the country by diluting it with provisions for economically weaker sections (EWS).  BJP concerns for J& K SC/ST would also have been more convincing if BJP leaders had not defended the rapists of the little Gujjar girl in Kathua.

Second, abolishing 370, it is claimed, will help in Kashmir’s development since industry will now invest there. With investment declining in the rest of India, how wonderful to believe private companies will now start investing in Kashmir. One also wonders which BPO firm will invest in Kashmir when all communication can be so easily cut off there.

If Article 370 was responsible for the lack of employment and development in Kashmir, what explains the fact that, as economist Jean Dreze has pointed out, Kashmir’s human development indicators are way ahead of Gujarat’s? J&K’s per capita income is below the national average but it is above that of Madhya Pradesh, which the BJP ruled for fifteen years. Despite Article 370, there are tens of thousands of labourers from Bihar and UP working in Kashmir, and no Kashmiri labour flocking to that beacon of Hindutva development, Uttar Pradesh. Let us ignore the inconvenient fact that it was because of the state’s special status that Sheikh Abdullah was able to implement land reforms in Kashmir, which raised the economic status of the average Kashmiri. Of course Kashmiris need jobs but the root cause of their unhappiness is not economic but political.

Third, we are told that thanks to the BJP’s bold move, the three dynasties who controlled Kashmir and cornered all the benefits will now give way.  Never mind if dynastic politics continues to flourish in the BJP itself.

Fourth, the government claims that by taking away Article 35 A and making land available to non-state subjects, they are not only enabling higher prices for locals, but striking a major feminist blow for Kashmiri women. However, in 2002, a full bench of the J & K High Court had already ruled that Kashmiri women who married non-residents would not lose their rights, so the BJP was flogging a dead horse there, as with the criminalization of triple talaq, which was already illegal as a form of divorce. All these actions taken ostensibly to show the BJP’s commitment to Muslim women are really aimed at mobilizing Hindu men. It is hardly the case that Muslim women or Kashmiri women do not feel the same anxiety or anger that men in their community feel when Muslims are demonized or lynched, or when their state is taken over. Moreover, when BJP MLAs talk with glee of marrying fair skinned Kashmiri women – a thinly veiled threat of conquest through sexual predation  - Kashmiri women are most unlikely to celebrate this so-called integration into a universe of rights.

The Shiv Sena has agitated for jobs in Mumbai to be restricted to Maharastrians, Himachal and Uttarakhand have laws against the sale of agricultural land to outsiders, and North east states like Nagaland continue to be governed under special constitutional clauses. One wonders why the Centre cares less about the development of all these states, than it does about Kashmir being ostensibly held back by its special laws.

Fifth, we are told that terrorism will come down. We have, of course, heard that one before, when we were assured that demonetisation had monetarily starved terrorists and insurgents of all hues. But attacks have continued, including Pulwama, under President’s Rule. 

All the reasons Kashmiris felt alienated will remain. The human rights abuses – killings, pellet blindings, detention and torture – which the UN High Commissioner recently reported on will not become a mere footnote in people’s memory as they delight in the newfound joys of living in a Union Territory. Those who feel that they must react with guns will continue to cross over to Pakistan for weapons and training – removal of Article 370 does not remove the physical border.  The sheer density of troops may help the state keep a lid on militancy, but this is hardly a winning of hearts and minds. Already massive protests are being reported despite the total shut down.

The ease with which big media and politicians across parties have accepted the Emergency in Kashmir, and the utter silencing of its people when it comes to decisions affecting their life, shows that they never really considered Kashmiris equal citizens of India. It also shows that they never really believed in the Constitution.  When you take over control over an area without asking its people and with force, it is usually called occupation or annexation, not the extension of democracy.