Militants becoming role models of youth !
By Raja Muzaffar Bhat
The ostrich buries its head in the sand whenever it faces threats especially during a sandstorm. The poor bird is so stupid that it thinks that if it can’t see the problem it will be safe. A person who “acts like an ostrich” is in denial, pretending their problems aren’t there, or trying to avoid dealing with the problem hoping it will just go away on its own. New Delhi too has been acting like an ostrich from last many decades in its dealings with Kashmir. When 120 people died during the 2010 Kashmir agitation an All Party delegation consisting of veteran Indian parliamentarians visited Srinagar in September 2010. Pertinently the then Home Minister P Chidambaram headed that delegation. Senior Hurriyat leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who was spearheading the 2010 agitation had , rejected the invitation on the grounds the delegation wanted to treat Kashmir as India’s internal problem. Moderate pro-freedom leaders Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik had also turned down the invitations, but they sent a joint memorandum to the delegation reiterating their demands for restoration of normalcy and the initiation of dialogue.Their demands included “demilitarization” along with the release of detainees and the “withdrawal of the draconian laws.
A section of the delegation, however, later called on Geelani and Mirwaiz at their residences, where both the leaders reiterated their position and conditions for restoration of normalcy and settlement of the long-pending dispute of Kashmir. Neither did New Delhi initiate the demilitarization process nor were the draconian laws revoked in-spite of the fact that militancy had almost declined for more than a year or so post the 2010 agitation
Appointment of Interlocutors :
Govt of India appointed Interlocutors on October 13, 2010. The Group which consisted of senior journalist Dileep Padgaonkar ,academician Radha Kumar and former Information Commissioner M M Ansari submitted a report to the Home Ministry around March 2012. The interlocutors had recommended several measures to be taken for addressing the Kashmir issue. These recommendations included setting up of Constitutional Committee (CC) to review all the Central Acts that have been extended to J&K since 1952. The Committee was supposed to come out with its findings within six months. In addition, the report had recommended several other things which included appointment of Governor on the recommendation of J&K Government , non extension of central laws, strengthening of article 370, separate Regional Councils for Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh.
There were other recommendations also to address social, cultural and economic aspects of state. After submitting the report, the Manmohan Singh led UPA Government had more than two years to implement the same, but it was never done. After submission of this report the Govt of India felt that peace had returned to Kashmir and they felt it was useless to go ahead with the recommendations. The Congress leadership thought that discussing and implementing the Interlocutors Report and recommendations would lead to their defeat in 2014 general elections. Congress still lost these elections miserably in-spite of the fact that they even had hanged Afzal Guroo.
Kashmir continues to simmer in the aftermath of the death of a 22 year old Kashmiri militant commander Burhan Wani. For the ongoing crises , New Delhi cannot blame Pakistan because Burhan and his associates are neither Pakistani insurgents nor have been trained inside the terror camps in Pakistan. All this is being authenticated by all the security agencies working in J&K. The militant group headed by Burhan Wani never went to Pakistan for arms training; instead they snatched large number of weapons from police and security officials. The group has been active on social media and because of this they attracted large number of youth to become their supporters. We must acknowledge the fact that Pakistan is not sending stones to Kashmir which are thrown on police personnel by young protestors for whom Burhan was like a Robinhood.
Most Kashmiri youth don’t find their role models within Bollywood, Lollywood or Hollywood. Because of conflict, political uncertainty, the gun toting young militants like Burhan have become role models of Kashmir’s younger generation and this is a very dangerous trend . If some political measures are not taken immediately by New Delhi, the situation will further worsen and very soon Kashmir will become another Waziristan or Syria . As Kashmiri’s political discourse hasn’t been addressed through democratic means by respecting the wishes of people, we have now reached to such a situation that Kashmiris are targeting fellow Kashmiris. On one side Kashmiri policemen are forced to target angry protestors and on other side these young protestors are attacking their own policemen. In nutshell Kashmiris are at the receiving end and New Delhi is watching this whole game as a mute spectator.
Dr Raja MuzaffarBhat is a Social activist & Columnist based in Srinagar .
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