Restoring Statehood to Jammu & Kashmir

 

 

 

 

 

Restoring Statehood to Jammu & Kashmir

The people of Jammu and Kashmir have suffered unimaginable suffering for the past two years, following the abrogation of Article 370 that conferred special status to the state; abolition of the constitution of the state; revocation of the Article 35A that protected the state’s land from being encroached upon by the people from other parts of India; and downgrading the State by dividing it into two Union Territories- all the decisions unilaterally taken  on  August 5 , 2019, without consulting the people and the State Assembly.

The main stream political leaders in the state, including the three former Chief Ministers, hundreds of political activists and innocent people were arrested and imprisoned. The state was put under the control of security forces, with total lockdown and shutting down of the internet for the longest period ever in the world. All this led to alienation of the people and the political leaders; loss of business worth Rs.50,000 crore and 4 lack jobs and huge unemployment. The state is administered by a Lt. Governor- picked by the Centre- with iron hand, with  basic human rights violated, dissent crushed and  critics silenced and press muzzled, terrorizing the people to submission, by invoking the draconian UAPA and PSA even against ordinary people and students. The silence of the people, secured through coercion and intimidation, is construed as approval of the government’s actions and a sign of the state returning to normalcy.

Narendra Modi called a meeting of the main stream political parties of J&K on June 24 to gauge the mood of the leaders. The meeting was attending by some 14 leaders, including the four former Chief Ministers. It was a positive step, in that the leaders were allowed to speak freely without any bitterness, particularly after what Amit Shah said about the Gupkar Alliance on November 17, 2020: “The Congress and the Gupkar Gang want to take J&K back to the era of terror and turmoil. The Gupkar Gang is going global. They want foreign forces to intervene in Jammu and Kashmir.” Modi said that he wanted to bridge both Dil Ki Doori and Dilli se Doori-the distance of hearts and the distance from Delhi. He sought their cooperation in carrying out the delimitation process smoothly, followed by election. Amit Shah reiterated what he assured the Parliament the restoration of statehood at an ‘appropriate time.’

After the meeting Mehbooba Mufti told the media:"The people of Jammu and Kashmir are in a lot of difficulties…They are angry, upset and emotionally shattered. They feel humiliated. I told the Prime Minster that the people of J&K don’t accept the manner in which Article 370 was abrogated unconstitutionally, illegally and immorally…this is a question of our identity. We didn’t get it from Pakistan; it was given by Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhai Patel. It assures us rights on land and jobs. There will be no compromise on this.”  She said on India Today TV that the state is an “open prison” and that there is urgent need to reach out to the people as they had lost everything, livelihood and jobs and are living with fear and insecurity. They need a healing touch. And Omar Abdullah said: “We told the Prime Minster that there has been a breach of trust between the state and Centre. It is the Centre’s duty to restore it...We said delimitation was not needed. When the rest of the country will have delimitation in 2026 why is Jammu and Kashmir being treated differently? If the purpose of August 5(2019) decisions was to integrate Jammu and Kashmir with the Union, then a separate delimitation for J&K defeats the whole aim of those decisions.”

Modi and Shah are not known to change their minds, going by their response to the protests against the CAA and the farm laws.  The intention of the Centre in calling the meeting is to seek cooperation of the leaders, marginalized and pushed to the fringe, in expediting the delimitation process so as to hold election as early as possible and to show- case to the world that it restored democracy in the State. And conducting election, after the delimitation, is a political agenda; and it is likely to strain further the relation between the Centre and the State. The Centre hopes the delimitation would result in the  Jammu region getting more assembly constituencies, where the Hindus are a majority and the ruling party is dominant, thereby neutralizing the Muslim majorly Kashmir valley in the process, creating schism between the Hindus and the Muslims.  Otherwise one doesn’t understand the need for delimitation at this stage, while withholding the restoration of the statehood.  And what if the delimitation does not result in creating more seats in Jammu and subsequent election result doesn’t favor the ruling dispensation at the Centre!

Gulam Nabi Azad, who attended the meeting, insisted that the restoration of statehood should precede the election. Since the constitutional validity of abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A are being challenged in the Supreme Court, and the Court is yet to hear a large number of petitions, the restoration of statehood, and creation of conductive atmosphere in the state- by releasing all detainees and lifting the crackdown on the people- is the most viable option for the Centre to win over the people, bruised so badly. Farooq Abdullah rightly said that “there is a loss of trust which needs to be restored immediately and for that, to begin with the Centre should work for restoration of complete statehood to Jammu and Kashmir.” So restoring the statehood should be the first priority of the Centre to ease the situation.

The Centre should realize that it had not only abrogated the J&K its constitutional special status, but also taken away its statehood- too much to pocket the humiliation by any self-respecting people. To assume that the people of the state fallen in line and accepted the Centre’s arbitrary and undemocratic actions is to play with the people’s hurt feelings and sentiments. The PDP and NC leaders- Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah- have vowed not to contest elections as long as the state remained a Union Territory. As Radha Kumar, who was a government appointed interlocutor for J&K, says, “a clear commitment to statehood followed by elections might begin a process of confidence building. A Union territory assembly will not.”

And what Chief Justice of India N.V.Ramana said, while delivering the 17^th P D Desai Memorial Lecture on June 30 is very apt:"Mere right to change the ruler by itself need not be a guarantee against tyranny. The idea that people are the ultimate sovereign is also to be found in notions of human dignity and autonomy. A public discourse, that is both reasoned and reasonable, is to be seen as an inherent aspect of human dignity and, hence, essential to a properly functioning democracy.”  Democracy is not just elections and rule by incorrigible majority.