Raj Chengappa
The Modi government radically resets the political status quo in Kashmir. Can it pull it off?The sprawling Dal Lake, surrounded by emerald green mountains, is both the heart and the soul of Kashmir. Every August, the lake is full of life, with tourists thronging its banks, taking selfies; dozens of shikaras, weighed down with sightseers, gliding on its waters; and vendors selling roasted bhutta (corn on the cob) and mutton tikkas doing brisk business. Not this August though.
It's a bright Saturday morning, and 19 days since the Modi government's momentous decision on August 5 to overturn Article 370 of the Constitution, ending the special status that Jammu and Kashmir enjoyed for 70 years. The lake and its surroundings are deserted. Empty shikaras float tethered together near the pier with no boatmen in sight. A couple of anglers sit at the edge of the lake, casting their lines in the hope of catching some fish. A Kashmiri couple on a shikara does the same, the woman paddling and the man lowering a net into the water. Stray joggers pound the paved pathway girding the lake as gun-toting guards keep watch on the lakefront from behind sandbag bunkers.
The calm is deceptive. With a total shutdown of telecommunications (except for government officials handling the situation) and restrictions on movement for ordinary citizens, it is difficult to gauge the mood of the Valley's 6.9 million citizens from anecdotal accounts. Behind shuttered shopfronts, owners conduct businesses furtively. Like the bakery doing brisk business through the side door where customers are lined up to buy freshly baked bread and cakes. Residents in private cars stop by stray vegetable sellers, who have set up temporary shops, to stock up on groceries.
By the end of the evening, Rohit Kansal, principal secretary and spokesperson of the J&K government, seems relieved that there have been no incidents of violence during the day. In fact, he adds significantly, there has been no report of major injuries or deaths because of the central government's decision to revoke J&K's special status. He acknowledges there have been 131 incidents of street protests of various kinds, but specifies that a hundred of these were in Srinagar-whose population of 1.18 million accounts for only 17 per cent of the Valley's inhabitants-and that much of rural Kashmir has been free of incident.
CONCERTINA DISCONCERT: An elderly Kashmiri Muslim asks for passage for Friday prayer at a temporary checkpoint in Srinagar (Photo: Dar Yasin/AP)
Meanwhile, more than half the police stations in the Valley have relaxed curbs on day-time movement. People have withdrawn over Rs 800 crore from ATMs over the past fortnight, indicating that "the wheels of the economy continue to grind" for the common man, as Kansal puts it. He and other key officials in the state regard all these factors as clear indicators that the Modi government's epochal decision to end J&K special status is proceeding according to plan.
Yet the big questions remain. What is the Modi government's gameplan for Kashmir's future? Why did it decide to go ahead with it at this juncture? What will be the impact in the Valley once the curbs are lifted? What are the big challenges ahead? india today spoke to key decision-makers in the Valley and in Delhi as well as independent experts. Their assessments are revealing.
The Kashmir Gameplan
The Modi government's audacious decision to rescind Article 370 radically alters the status quo and begins an entirely new narrative on how to deal with an issue that has bedevilled India's relations with Pakistan since Partition. It is, undoubtedly, the most important act by any central government on Jammu and Kashmir since the one headed by Jawaharlal Nehru gave the state its special status through a presidential order in 1949. Simply put, Article 370 permitted J&K to have its own constitution, its own flag and full autonomy in its internal administration, except for defence, foreign policy and communications, which were left for the Union government to control.
By overturning Article 370 early in his second term, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has fulfilled a key demand of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its ideological flagship, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), to have "one nation, one Constitution". By getting Parliament's stamp of approval after ensuring the passage of the bill in the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP does not have a majority, Modi could claim to have achieved a political consensus of sorts and effectively shut the door on all those fighting for the Valley to merge with Pakistan or demanding azadi, particularly a section of All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) leaders.
For mainstream parties such as the National Conference (NC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which hoped they could squeeze out more autonomy from the Indian state, the Modi government has reduced J&K's status to that of a Union territory directly controlled by the central government. Once these leaders emerge from the silence of arrest, they may be reduced to pleading for the restoration of statehood at the earliest, which the central government has said it will consider. Meanwhile, the Centre will use this opportunity to conduct a delimitation exercise as well, correcting the imbalance that gave the Valley the dominant representation in the assembly. And, by making it a Union territory it eliminates any chance of state legislative action against it. Significantly, Modi has signalled that he will render the current lot of political leaders irrelevant in the state by handing over the reins of the new Union territory to a new crop of grassroots leaders to build a 'Naya Kashmir'. The Modi government has also shrunk the size of the erstwhile state by pulling out Ladakh and making it a separate Union territory-a move that was widely welcomed by the people in Leh, if not in Kargil.
Imran Khan addressing his people on national television. (Photo: Asif Hassan/Getty Images)
To Pakistan, which has waged three wars with India over Kashmir, Modi has made it clear that the unfinished business of Partition is no more about Jammu and Kashmir but Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), as the Union minister for defence Rajnath Singh recently emphasised. India has also specified that any future attempt by Pakistan to engage with India on the status of Jammu & Kashmir (which Islamabad has maintained remains a core issue) would be rebuffed as the state's integration with the Indian Union was irrevocable. International leaders, including US President Donald Trump, were told firmly by Modi that Kashmir's status is India's internal matter, that its relations with Pakistan on the subject were a bilateral issue and that it would not entertain any international mediation.
So, did Modi make sufficient preparation to ensure that his government would be able to see through its Kashmir gameplan, successfully overcoming all possible hurdles, including internal strife in the state and terror strikes engineered from across the border, apart from withstanding legal scrutiny in the Supreme Court? The answer to this question has as much to do with how the plan evolved and the groundwork that was laid as with what the Modi government will do in the days and months ahead.
The Making of the Plan
The BJP and the RSS have for decades made their intention clear on the abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A (according to which non-permanent residents of J&K could not purchase or own land in the state). But the gameplan to achieve this was set in motion only in the final year of the first term of the Modi government.
To his credit, Modi did initially make a sincere effort to follow in the footsteps of Atal Bihari Vajpayee by working with political parties in J&K and engaging with Pakistan. He gave his consent for the BJP to ally with the PDP, perceived as a soft separatist party, and form a coalition government in the state when the assembly election in December 2014 threw up a fractured mandate. The two parties drew up an agenda for alliance and PDP's Mufti Mohammed Sayeed was sworn in as chief minister in March 2015. On his visit to Srinagar later that year, Modi announced a special package of Rs 80,000 crore for the development of the state. In a public address, the prime minister said that he was guided by Vajpayee's vision of Kashmiriyat, Jamhooriyat aur Insaniyat (Kashmiri culture, democracy and humanity) for the state and added, "Kashmiriyat ke bina Hindustan adhoora hai (India is incomplete without Kashmiriyat)." Modi had also extended a hand of friendship to the then Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif by inviting him for his swearing-in ceremony in May 2014 and then making an impromptu visit to Lahore in December 2015 to attend Sharif's grand-daughter's wedding.
As it happened, both these initiatives, much to Modi's frustration and disappointment, came to naught. Midway through the state government's tenure, the differences between the PDP and BJP became irreconcilable over several key issues, including the holding of panchayat elections and the leniency with which the PDP dealt with militants and separatists. The PDP also dragged its feet over a solution to the problem of West Pakistan refugees. Close to 55,000 families, mostly Hindus, had not been granted citizenship despite settling down in the state after Partition and were unable to own land or apply for government jobs. Worse, when Burhan Wani, a poster boy of militancy, was killed by security forces in July 2016, the government failed to control the protests that broke out. The ensuing violence resulted in the deaths of more than 96 people, with thousands being injured and the state remaining paralysed for months. The BJP was inclined to pull out then but didn't want Mehbooba to appear as a martyr.
Meanwhile, relations with Pakistan broke down after a terrorist attack in Uri in September 2016 saw 19 Indian soldiers killed. Modi stunned the Pakistan establishment by sanctioning a surgical strike by the Indian army against terror camps located on the Pakistani side of the Line of Control.
Amonth before the 2019 general election, Modi indicated that his efforts in Kashmir had reached a dead end and that he was planning a radical change for it if he were to be re-elected as prime minister. In an interview to a television channel, he said, "The alliance with the PDP was an experiment. It was working well during Mufti sahab's time. When Mehboobaji came (after Mufti's death in January 2016), we gave her the same support. But when it came to the panchayat election, she kept wanting to delay it, saying it would spark violence in the region. She did not step forward for two-three months, which led to governor's rule in the state." Modi went on to add, "The problem in Kashmir is largely due to 50-odd political families there. They have been milking the issue. They don't want any benefit to be given to ordinary Kashmiris. People want freedom from such political families who have been preying on their emotions for 50 years. The situation in Kashmir is such that people want change, whether it is about Article 35A or 370."
The first step in this direction was taken much before, in June 2018, when the BJP decided to finally end its coalition government with the PDP and impose governor's rule. That laid the groundwork for what was to come on August 5, 2019.
The Groundwork
In August 2018, Satya Pal Malik, an affable Uttar Pradesh politician, was appointed governor of J&K after N.N. Vohra completed his second term. To assist him, B.V.R. Subrahmanyam, known to be a tough, no-nonsense officer, was transferred as chief secretary from Chhattisgarh where he was serving in a similar capacity. K. Vijay Kumar, the retired IPS officer famed for eliminating Veerappan and vastly experienced in handling extremists, was made advisor to the governor on security issues. The task set for Malik and his team was to ensure good governance, crack down on militancy and maintain law and order. Subsequently, four more advisors-K.K. Sharma, Khurshid Ganai, Skandan Krishnan and Farooq Khan-were appointed and assigned different responsibilities.
The new administration was appalled by the deteriorating condition of the state. As an expert, who didn't want to be identified, put it, "It was a corrupt edifice built on patronage-there were scams in recruitment for government posts, separatists were being bankrolled by many of those who had earlier run the government and there were only a few institutions where the rule of law prevailed. It was a sham democracy and the state was on the verge of collapse." There was also deep concern over the growing radicalisation of the Kashmiri youth, especially after mosques and madrassas funded by more extreme sects had doubled in the past 15 years.
Another expert pointed out, "The game in the past decade was an unethical compact between Delhi and the state that allowed the system to flourish as long as each got what they wanted. Delhi's approach was to manage Kashmir and ally with mainstream parties like the NC and PDP to run the government as long as they made the right noises about swearing allegiance to India. Never mind if only a few leaders and their families flourished, to the detriment of the state." Unstated was the fact that the Modi government and the BJP had initially fallen into the same trap when the party allied with the PDP and ran the government for three years.
BEFORE AUGUST: Amit Shah meeting a delegation of sarpanches in Srinagar in June.
Directed by then home minister Rajnath Singh and assisted by national security advisor Ajit Doval, home secretary Rajiv Gauba, army chief Bipin Rawat and with inputs from intelligence agencies, Malik and his team engaged in a five-pronged strategy: speed up development, hold panchayat elections, curb corruption, crack down on militants and prevent infiltration. Among the first tasks that chief secretary Subrahmanyam pushed for was to speedily implement projects sanctioned in 2015 under the PM's special package of Rs 80,000 crore. That included projects for roads and highways, power and energy, infrastructure for tourism as well as flood relief management. State officials then pushed through the panchayat elections in October 2018. Also, unlike in the past, the sarpanches could disburse funds varying fromRs 50 lakh to Rs 1 crore each for local projects. While both the NC and PDP boycotted the elections, voter turnout in the Valley was a decent 40 per cent. What shook these parties after the elections was that people started flocking to the newly elected sarpanches for development assistance, bypassing the local MLAs who had so far held sway.
Meanwhile, the security forces adopted what a top official called "aggressive and pro-active zero tolerance for terror". The army, the CRPF, the Border Security Force and the J&K police combined forces to eliminate top terrorists from the two main groups-the Jaish-e-Mohammad and the Lashkar-e-Taiba. In Srinagar, Lt. Gen. K.J.S. Dhillon, commander of the Indian Army's 15 Corps, which controls most of the LoC in the Valley, said, "In terms of our counter-terrorism operations, the past year saw us move in a consolidated and successful manner to eliminate top terrorist leaders of the Pakistan-based groups that had infiltrated into the Valley. In all, we eliminated close to 250 terrorists last year. On the LoC, we were able to prevent infiltration far more successfully because we upgraded our technological systems, including surveillance on the ground and in the air, apart from more accurate weapons, better fencing and manning systems."
The turning point came when a CRPF convoy on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway was attacked by a suicide-bomber near Pulwama on February 14 this year, killing 44 personnel. India carried out a counter-strike using IAF jets to bomb a Jaish militant camp in Balakot in Pakistan. This indicated a paradigm shift in the way India would deal with cross-border terror attacks in the future. Soon after, the central government banned the Jamaat-e-Islami J&K for five years under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act for allegedly supporting extremism and militancy in the state. Over 200 of its cadre were taken into custody. Meanwhile, the National Investigation Agency and the Enforcement Directorate intensified their investigations into terror financing, slapping cases on leaders of the AHPC and other separatist organisations already behind bars, like Yasin Malik, Asiya Andrabi, Shabir Shah and Masarat Alam. It also went after prominent Kashmiri businessman Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali and attached his property for allegedly being involved in terror financing and money-laundering for Hurriyat leaders.
The Timing
The Kashmir gameplan took off only after the results of the May 2019 general election saw Modi and the BJP win a historic 303 seats and, along with the NDA, enjoy a majority of 353 seats in the 545-member Lok Sabha. When Modi rewarded BJP president Amit Shah by appointing him Union home minister, shifting the previous incumbent Rajnath Singh to defence, there was no doubt that Modi 2.0 would see more decisive movement on issues close to the Hindutva heart, be it building the Ram temple at Ayodhya, abrogating Article 370 or implementing a uniform civil code.
Part of the reason for moving quickly on Article 370 soon after assuming power a second time was that assembly election in Kashmir would be due after the Amarnath Yatra, and the Modi government was unsure if it would win a decisive mandate to enforce the radical changes it had in mind. Also, by then, after consulting top constitutional lawyers, including Arun Jaitley, a masterful legal strategy had been worked out in secret to dilute the provisions of Article 370 without having to get the state assembly's consent. While any move to change Article 370 would be cheered wildly by the Hindutva brigade, Modi and his team calculated that after successive terror attacks, the attitude of the Indian public on Kashmir hovered between resignation and irritation and would not explode if the government took drastic steps to alter the status quo. The recent india today Mood of the Nation poll conducted before Article 370 was done away with indicated that most respondents supported it.
U.S. AND THEM: The Modi-Trump camaraderie in France ended talk of 'mediation'. (Photo: Carlos Barria/Reuters)
Other external factors may also have contributed to hasten affairs. Trump was desperate to reach a settlement in Afghanistan to pull out American troops and needed Pakistan's help to do so. India was concerned by the loose statements he was making about wanting to mediate on the Kashmir issue. And if there was an Afghan settlement, it would enable Pakistan to push all the Afghan radicals freed from civil strife towards the Indian border, as in the late '90s when the Taliban captured power in Afghanistan. As Arun Kumar, Akhil Bharatiya Prachar Pramukh of the RSS and an expert on Kashmir, observes, "A constellation of factors decided the timing of the government's decision. The BJP manifesto had advocated it, the government had the numbers, our input indicated that there was a consensus among the public. Trump's dealing with Pakistan confirmed the need for speed."
The only stumbling block was that the BJP still did not have a majority in the Rajya Sabha to push through any major constitutional changes. The first test came when the government tabled a fresh triple talaq bill regulating Muslim divorce in Parliament after it had been deferred in the first term because of a lack of a majority in the upper house. While it sailed through the Lok Sabha, in the Rajya Sabha, Shah and his parliamentary affairs colleagues employed deft political management to play on the differences between Opposition parties on the issue and got the bill adopted by a slender majority. Emboldened, Modi and Shah decided to push ahead with the abrogation of Article 370. The first inkling that a major move was being planned for Kashmir came when the Parliament session was extended by 10 days. It was followed by the decision to cut short the Amarnath Yatra by a week, ostensibly because of security threats but mainly because the government wanted pilgrims out of harm's way when it moved on Article 370.
The Execution
Top officials in J&K sensed something big was about to happen but were not sure exactly what. Given the volatile situation in the Valley, they expected trouble. Dilbag Singh, the director-general of police, had been preparing for the past year for such an eventuality. The J&K police had learnt from their mistakes in the way they handled the aftermath of Wani's killing. They had allowed militants to have a free run on social media, failed to map trouble spots where they would have to rush troops to prevent further outbreaks and also had to deal with ambiguous messages coming from top political leaders about how to deal with the situation. Singh said, "All this taught us how to handle any major flare-up. In the past year, we mapped areas that needed more attention and forces, areas that were hard-core zones for stone-pelters and who the biggest trouble-makers were. We also knew a communication lockdown would become necessary, which is why we equipped the entire police force with an alternative wireless system." To criticism of the lockdown, Abhinav Kumar, CRPF IG for Kashmir, responds, "Trying to pre-empt large-scale violence is not immoral; rather, it is the duty of a responsible government. There is inconvenience, but it is better than having body bags pile up if violence breaks out. The restrictions in place are quite sensitive to ground realities. As and when the situation improves, they will be eased."
With Shah deciding to table the Jammu and Kashmir Reservation (Second Amendment) Bill, 2019, and the J&K Reorganisation Bill, 2019, in the Rajya Sabha on August 5, security forces in the state were given orders to be on high alert. All senior leaders of political parties were either put under house arrest or taken into custody and housed in hotels in the Valley or elsewhere in the state. All those listed as potential trouble-makers were also arrested. Meanwhile, the government cut off all telecommunications-landlines, cell phones and internet-ensuring a complete communication blackout. Section 144 of the CrPC, which prohibits the assembly of five or more people in an area and also restricts carrying any sort of weapon, was imposed. As also curfews, wherever necessary. The government claimed it had made provisions to keep hospitals running as well as ensure supply of food and other essentials. Restrictions were also placed on media movement; the government held daily press conferences to control the narrative. To ensure proper coordination among forces, all the heads of various forces in the state and key officials met daily for a couple of hours to assess the situation and initiate necessary action. NSA Doval spent 10 days in the state, chairing meetings on many occasions and also meeting people to fine-tune government strategy.
The Tough Road
Having successfully seized the narrative and kept the peace with no major outbreak of violence in the past three weeks, the government has to start easing the clampdown and restore normalcy in the months ahead. Among the big challenges is to ensure that the upcoming apple-plucking season, which is in September and October, is not disrupted. In Shopian, apple capital of the state, Sandeep Chaudhary, the superintendent of police, said that in his recent meeting with growers, rather than anger over Article 370, the bigger concern was to get the plucking and packing of apples going and have trucks move them out of the district for distribution and sale across the country. Across the state, the administration is gearing up to ensure that the apple trade continues uninterrupted. It will go a long way in making sure that the public is gainfully engaged after the clampdown is eased and has a stake in maintaining the peace.
Policemen stationed in Shopian are also showing the way with their effective dealing of the law and order situation. Chaudhary employed a carrot and stick policy to bring down the number of trouble-makers by half. Hard-core militants in the district were tracked down and either arrested, or killed in their hideouts if they resisted. When dealing with youngsters who had just joined the ranks of stone-pelters, Chaudhary would call community leaders from their villages when they were arrested and get them to sign bonds guaranteeing that they would keep out of trouble. That has seen the people trust the forces more and a noticeable reduction in militancy.
On the development front, the administration has announced that it will hold elections for block development councils in October. Along with panchayat leaders, these elections would throw up another rung of leadership invested in development. Subrahmanyam has also initiated the 'Back to the Village' scheme under which all government officials are required to visit villages and assess people's problems and respond adequately. Employment remains key and an announcement has been made that 50,000 vacancies for government posts will be filled up soon. To woo the vast number of state government employees, Modi, in a speech, said that not only will he ensure their salaries are on par with other states but also that they become eligible for central government benefits such as house rent and education allowance. He also pointed out that Scheduled Tribes, who form 10 per cent of the Valley's population, will become eligible for reservations in government jobs and educational institutions with the state's full integration.
Meanwhile, for the long term, the government is drawing up massive plans to build tourism infrastructure and develop Kashmir as an international destination that can compete with the best. It also plans to set up sufficient processing and cold storage units for apples, peaches, pears as well as dry fruits to make the state an export hub. The government is also hoping that a major investment summit it is planning in November gets the country's top industrialists to commit to setting up employment-generating projects in the state. As an official said, "J&K has immense potential to develop and we must quickly realise it and deliver the fruits of development to the people."
Another exercise that will be closely watched is what powers the Centre will retain when J&K becomes a Union territory by October 31 and delimitation exercises to carve out assembly constituencies are carried out. The Modi government is keen to bring in a whole new leadership from the grassroots while simultaneously correcting the institutional maladies that have afflicted the state in the past. This means the central government is in no hurry to restore statehood to J&K, and the process may take years. Having discredited the existing state leaders and their parties, the BJP would ideally like J&K to be ruled by a national party like itself rather than a regional satrap.
With the Indian government's Kashmir move catching Pakistan on the back-foot, hampering its ability to drum up international support, Pakistan will now try and do what it has specialised in doing over the years: reinvigorate the terror networks and try and whip up strife in the Valley. Confirming as much, Dhillon says, "After the abrogation of Article 370, all launch pads in PoK are full of terrorists and we have to thwart attempts to infiltrate practically every day. On the conventional front, Pakistan has made certain movement of forces of which we are aware and taking corrective action. If Pakistan indulges in any misadventure, I can assure you, it will get a befitting reply." Till winter sets in and makes crossing the border from the mountains difficult, the Indian armed forces have to be on their guard.
The Pakistan prime minister went on national television, appointing himself as the ambassador of Kashmir's freedom and even warning the world of potential nuclear conflict in the subcontinent if it didn't intervene. He also tried to communalise the issue by accusing the RSS of ensuring its goal of Hindu supremacy in Kashmir by revoking Article 370. Yet, barring its usefulness to the US and Russia in resolving the Afghan crisis-and the hard-core support it has from China-Pakistan has very little going for it. Its economy is in a shambles and Khan's credibility is at an all-time low after army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa was given a three-year extension. If Pakistan instigates a terror strike against India, it will further turn international opinion against it.
Pakistan may also try to approach the International Court of Justice, but it is unlikely to take up its plea as the abrogation of Article 370 is an internal issue for India. Pakistan can hardly complain. It has integrated PoK and the Northern Areas as two provinces leaving them with little independence to operate. Also, as foreign minister S. Jaishankar pointed out to his Chinese counterpart, Article 370 does not change the Line of Actual Control with China or the Line of Control with Pakistan.
The only thing India should watch out for is violation of human rights, particularly if major violence breaks out in the state and the security forces use an iron fist to put it down. That could see Pakistan make a fresh attempt at internationalising the issue. Also, as Ashley J. Tellis, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, says, "The critical issue that worries me is that having gone to the UN, there is now precedent for UNSC discussions on J&K. And depending on what happens within the state in the months ahead, it could create more opportunities for the Pakistanis, Chinese and others to return to the UNSC."
Yet, what the Indian government needs to work on the most is to reassure Kashmiris that they are not in danger of losing their identity because of the end of Article 370. The low level of protests may indicate that either the people haven't spoken against it out of fear or they no longer care about autonomy and are interested only in good governance and speedy delivery of their basic needs. What is needed is the government's intentions conveyed in a transparent manner and to assuage whatever concerns they have and bring to them the dividends of peace. As Vijay Kumar said, "Those opposed to the change will say they will lose their jobs and their land to outsiders. This is where it has to be made clear to them that instead of losing jobs, you will get better training, better qualification and better opportunities."
In Jammu, which has a Hindu majority, there is already concern that those from Punjab will buy up their lands and dominate them. Some now call for restrictions on land ownership as in Himachal. Most importantly, unless the people of the state see a significant improvement in their lives as a result of this decision, they will begin to resent it and express their anger in ways the government could find difficult to control. As a senior official says, "There are no short-cuts to making the gameplan in Kashmir a success-it is going to be a long haul. Our words need to be matched by action. Kashmir has been given a lot of false promises. It deserves a deal."