NEW DELHI: A former head of India’s external
spy agency RAW believes that the situation in India-held Kashmir was never
scarier, not even in the 1990s when armed resistance was at its peak, the Indian
Express reported on Wednesday.
Asked in an interview by the paper if the
ongoing unarmed uprising was going from bad to worse under the current
government, former Research and Analysis Wing chief A.S. Dulat said yes.
“Yes, the situation is turning worse. Is it
worse than in 1990? My answer is yes and no. It is worse in terms of
atmospherics. Because of alienation and the anger of youth, young Kashmiri
minds have gone out of control.
“There is a sense of hopelessness. They aren’t
afraid to die. Villagers, students and even
girls are coming out on the streets. This has never happened in the past,” he
said.
A.S. Dulat says today
they [Kashmiris] are proud of being stone-pelters
Mr Dulat served in Srinagar in the 1980s as a
special director of the Intelligence Bureau when he supervised the intelligence
network there, the paper said. In the PM’s Office during the Vajpayee
government, he was adviser on Kashmir, work that formed the basis of his book
“Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years”.
Mr Dulat said the armed militancy and the
intensity of violence witnessed in 1990 was not there now. “There were more
guns then… Actual militancy was more then but today the situation is scarier.
When stone-pelting is done by youths, and girls, it’s abnormal… Today, they are
proud of being stone-pelters. They are no longer hiding. Schoolgirls and women
are coming out to throw stones. The Kashmir situation has never been so bad,”
Mr Dulat said.
What does the future hold for Kashmir in the
short term?
“It doesn’t look good…. The sad part,
frightening part and really scary part of Kashmir is that these boys and girls
with stones in their hands don’t seem to care what their parents feel. There is
so much distrust in Kashmiri families that a father doesn’t know what his son
is doing and the son doesn’t care anymore what his father thinks.”
Mr Dulat said it was a puzzle why India was
hesitant to discuss Kashmir with Pakistan.
“I have never understood why India is afraid to
talk about Kashmir with Pakistan? They have more explaining to do. I agree
(Prime Minister Narendra) Modiji started well. He surprised all of us by going
to Pakistan. The snag here is what happened after it. The crux of the whole
thing is that Pakistan is not an easy state to engage with.”
India’s present stance that talk and terror
can’t go together was also meaningless vis-à-vis Pakistan. “Here things happen
at many layers. We have to talk, disregarding incidents here and there. Surely,
we need explanations for Uri, Gurdaspur and Pathankot. But I am told the NSAs
of both sides are talking even now… Dialogue must happen between the foreign
secretaries and PMs. Modiji is a master of theatre, so he can make it happen.
Nawaz Sharif is also a karigar. In a sense, it’s an even scale… I am sorry to
say but it’s easier to talk to Pakistan than to Kashmiris.”
The uprising after the killing of Burhan Wani surprised Pakistan. “They returned
with a vengeance…In the last five years, Pakistan tried its best to unite all
factions of Hurriyat. They failed but now they have got together because this
Indian government doesn’t even look at them.”
The Indian government failed to anticipate the
consequences from the killing of Wani. “Yes, absolutely. Let me say that we
have invited Pakistan back into the Valley. By October things had climbed down.
Kashmiris hibernate in winter wearing firan and with their kangadsi. That’s the
best time to engage Kashmiris. We didn’t.”
Last winter we didn’t exploit the relative
calm. Now children are out on the streets. Modiji had an edge when he came to
power. But talks didn’t happen.”
Published in Dawn, May 4th, 2017
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