Tackle
both external and internal threats
According to the Hindutva
Strategic Doctrine, Indian Muslims are often understood as an appendage of
Pakistan. When India’s Pakistan
policy is understood only as “appeasement” of Indian Muslims, one Hindutva
leader thought the best way to reach out to Indian Muslims was to appease
Pakistan. That led to L.K. Advani travelling all the way to Karachi and
praising Mohammad Ali Jinnah in 2005. That move, however, boomeranged.
Modi overturned Vajpayee’s Kashmir policy which
had three components: empower regional mainstream parties, engage the
separatists, and involve Pakistan. Modi shut Pakistan out of the equation;
disengaged with the separatist groups; and has constantly undermined the
mainstream parties in the State, namely the Peoples Democratic Party and the
National Conference, in the last five years.
If Pakistan is projected as representing the
internal and external threats to the nation, Kashmir becomes the location of
Hindu victimhood, an essential component of Hindutva mobilisation. The massive
violence and dispossession faced by the Hindus in the Valley at the hands of
jihadis validates the Hindutva notion that the community is a victim of
appeasement of Muslims.
Kashmir also becomes the site for the
demonstration of the resolve of the ‘New India’ where ‘appeasement’ is replaced
with brute show of strength. The cries for revenge against ‘internal enemies’
is getting louder and shriller. India’s biggest threat comes from its own
invisible internal enemies. There is not only a need to deal with the enemies
across the border but also with the traitors inside.
According to some this level of intolerance and
call for mindless violence, fuelled by religious majoritarianism, and calls to
cleanse the nation of internal enemies are indeed the
language that first shaped but continues to ruin Pakistan. Don’t turn India into a cauldron of strife
like Pakistan.
Best thing to do is start re-populating Kashmir
with millions of poor and homeless from the rest of India. Use the Israeli
formula that succeeded in West Bank, with hundreds of small armed Kibbutzes and
overarching security by the military. India now has the money to pull it off,
and larger international community will understand. Any Kashmiri, who wants to
go to Pakistan should, of course, be allowed to do so. Any Kashmiri who want to
stay in India should have all the rights of any other Indian - including the
right to work, buy a home, practice their religion, etc, anywhere in India. To
ensure this it is important for Modi to win the next election.
P. Chidambaram's advice is to adhere "to
the letter and spirit of Article 370" but it is the Congress that grossly
violated all that in its 65 long years of absolute misrule. It sabotaged
everything just in order to stick to power there. It is the cause of present
day crisis in J&K while Nehru created all the biggest problems India is
facing: Pakistan, China, appeasement politics, economy, dynastic rule etc. Why
could not Congress, which ruled us for nearly six decades, solve the Kashmir
problem? The fact is, Congress under Nehru created the Kashmir problem, then
under Congress rule, hand in glove with the Abdullha's, the problem was
compounded. Now, with a view to spite Modi, every opposition party and the peaceniks
are certainly speaking the language of Pakistan. When 40 of your CRPF personnel
are killed in a brutal terrorist attack, the least you expect is every Indian
to speak in one voice.
While Kashmir continues to be on the boil, with
no lasting solution over 70 years, the resulting jingoism and contrasting
political narratives threatens all of India. Jingoism creates an aggressive
mindset and an "Us vs Them" attitude is dangerous for inland peace.
Many of us support and respect India's
traditions of tolerance but also believe that there is great need for
introspection by India's left-wing elites. They are either silent to Islamist
extremism or end up blaming the victim.
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