Modi’s Kashmir move is biggest test for Indian democracy – and for the silent liberals

The Print: NEETI NAIR: August 06, 2019

Kashmir is in lockdown. The special status of Jammu and Kashmir has been ‘scrapped’ as though it were a mere doodle, and not the only semblance of legal fiction that continues to tie India to Kashmir.

To be fair to the Bharatiya Janata Party, this had always been on its agenda. Writing in The Illustrated Weekly of India in June 1993, then-BJP vice-president and spokesperson K.R. Malkani had outlined his party’s solution for the Kashmir problem. Article 370 was “temporary and transitional” and “must go. But it can go only when there is a two-thirds majority for it in Parliament. That is going to take some time. And the BJP would avail of this time to convince everybody, and particularly the Kashmiris, that Article 370 is not good for anybody. It has only acted as a cover for corruption and irresponsibility. Once it is gone, Kashmir will have the same rights and responsibilities as Punjab and Bengal.”

Twenty-six years later, the BJP has the majority in Parliament to push through its solution for the Kashmir problem. But it has convinced no one in Kashmir, not even its erstwhile coalition partner, the People’s Democratic Party, whose leader Mehbooba Mufti is under house arrest. In fact, the BJP is so convinced about the lack of support for its move that it has brought in even more numbers of troops to maintain “law and order” and used the inspired device of shutting down the internet and all phone connectivity.

So monumental is the folly of the BJP that even the discredited Mufti has summoned the courage to call a spade a spade. Speaking to the BBC, she noted that this was to “occupy our land”, “reduce us to a minority and disempower us totally.”

Link: https://theprint.in/opinion/modis-kashmir-move-is-biggest-test-for-indian-democracy-and-for-the-silent-liberals/272707/

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