The policies and political projects being pursued by the BJP-led central government in Jammu and Kashmir post-August 5, 2019 — when the erstwhile State’s seven decades-long special constitutional position came to an end — have put unarmed and innocent civilians in the crosshairs of armed militants in Kashmir like never before.
There is an unprecedented push from New Delhi to achieve BJP’s ideological goal to turn the homogenous complexion of the Valley into a heterogeneous one, a bid to end the long-protected nativism of the people of the Kashmir Valley. For many in the BJP, a cosmopolitan Kashmir may bring a final settlement to the political problem brewing in the region since Partition.
The framing of new liberal and permissive laws is premised on the grant of land, jobs, citizenship, voting rights and industry, and it has been mainly to woo outsiders, including investors from Muslim countries such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
However, the growing violence is an indicator that the civilians have found themselves at the centre of the BJP’s iron-handed efforts to erase the memory of secessionism and create a new memory in favour of a cosmopolitan Kashmir. According to official figures, around 121 civilians, including six Kashmiri Pandits, 16 Hindus and Sikhs have been killed in Jammu and Kashmir since 2019.
Unstoppable killings of migrant workers and members of minority communities in Kashmir should worry the ruling political party in New Delhi more than the security agencies.
Equally worrisome is the inability of the local political players and the civil society to act as a pressure group to arrest this dangerous trend of targeted killings. The inability to do so, however, could be attributed to the Centre’s tough policy to ensure the agency of the local political leadership, whether mainstream or separatists, and deny, since 2019, the same for civil society in Kashmir.
Attacks also came after the three decades that it took to see over 5,500 Pandit families return to the Valley. These efforts were driven by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose engagements with multiple sections of Kashmir and back channel dialogue with Pakistan provided a conducive atmosphere to heal the wounds of Pandits.
The killings of minorities post-2019 have a discernible pattern to it. Satpal Nischal, 62, became the first victim of targeted killing on December 31, 2020. The killing came weeks after Nischal reportedly acquired a domicile certificate in the wake of the nullification of the Permanent Resident Certificate [PRC]. Only residents of Jammu and Kashmir living here for generations were eligible for a PRC. However, the PRC was abolished after 2019 and a domicile certificate was introduced.
Another string of attacks on Pandits and migrant labourers started in October 2021, including the killing of Pandit chemist Makhan Lal Bindroo in Srinagar. The multiple attacks followed the announcement by J&K Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha on September 7, 2021, to set up an online portal for a time-bound redressal of grievances related to Kashmir migrants’ properties and encroached land.
Post-August 5, the Kashmir issue is slipping into a new paradigm of being a Muslim issue. Demography, and not identity, has taken a central stage in Kashmir’s discourse now. Thus, this paradigm shift is fast pushing Kashmir into religious binaries. It’s a dangerous drift that may suit none.
The turn militancy is taking, if not addressed, is likely to change the way that the Kashmir problem is viewed to something more akin to the situation during 1990-2019: a political problem that needs a political solution.
