30 April 2014, 05:11 PM IST
Early snowfall in Kashmir had turned the weather unusually frosty in November 2008. The wounds of Amarnath agitation were still fresh as the Valley mourned the dozens killed in shootings of unarmed demonstrators protesting transfer of forestland to the shrine in violation of the laws. Consequently, the November-December assembly elections that year were written off as flop show even before the first vote was polled due to greater resonance of the boycott calls.
But naysayers were stunned as people turned out in numbers to vote in with the first phase of the staggered polling. By the end of the phased voting in December 2008, around 70% people had voted. The National Conference (NC)'s strategy of delinking elections from the larger Kashmir problem and making it purely a 'bijli, sadak, pani' issue worked and brought people in record numbers to polling booths. This tipped the scales in the NC's favour and brought it back to power under young chief minister Omar Abdullah's leadership.
For many the new CM represented hope. He had grabbed headlines with his thundering speech in the parliament a few months earlier during a debate on the Amarnath land row. Omar had convincingly eclipsed his main regional rival, Mehbooba Mufti, in the house as she could utter just 'mai kya bolu yaar' during the debate, something the NC has now raked up to corner her. But more importantly his emphasis on 'bijli, sadak and pani' as the main issues of the election, which he insisted would have no bearing on the larger Kashmir issue, worked in his favour. Elections have long been seen as an endorsement to Jammu & Kashmir's political status quo and to dismiss the need for carrying out the promised plebiscite to ascertain the state's political future under the UN resolutions.
The NC's strategy was very clever in this backdrop. But the state has since come full circle, as reflected in low voter turnout in the ongoing parliamentary elections. Balloting has neither brought the promised development nor dignity that the draconian laws that trample over day in and day out in Kashmir. The state government's repeated pleas of revoking the laws have fallen on deaf ears and undermined its credibility even as the militant violence had been negligible consistently over the last several years. No such legislations are applicable in areas facing Maoist insurgency, which the PM Manmohan Singh has declared the biggest threat to India's national security.
The manner in which Afzal Guru's execution was carried out for his indirect role in the Parliament attack and how executions in similar cases were prevented after that highlighted double standards vis-à-vis Kashmir. The Army's move last year to close the Pathribal case, involving extrajudicial killing of five innocent civilians and mutilation of their bodies in 2001, further underlined institutional difficulties in ensuring justice to the Kashmiris despite compelling evidence due to widespread impunity.
Unarmed protesters, who have been talking to the streets to protest this impunity as a consequence of the draconian laws, have been mercilessly gunned down on the streets of Kashmir. This has included women and children. In 2010 alone, over 120 people were killed in firings on unarmed protesters. The so-called non-lethal crowd control methods used since have blinded and maimed many. Hundreds of young men have been scarred for life in torture chambers. These pressing issues have also undermined the credibility of the elected state government and have been one of the reasons explaining the lack of interest in voting. This along with disappearances, custodial killings and other forms of abuse in the last two decades has left Kashmiri wounds to fester. Democracy has turned out to be no balm as more people – over 300 -- have been killed in firings on unarmed protesters than in militant violence since 2008.
NC has taken much of the blame for being in the government for the longest period of time. But its regional alternative, the People's Democratic Party (PDP), has not inspired much hope. People do remember its 'effective' governance from 2002 to 2005. But structurally it is impossible for any government to go slow on using coercive arms of the state. This was evident when the PDP headed the state government during that period. PDP's critics say it cannot be absolved of its role in the Amarnath land row as it was part of then Congress-led state government in 2008. The despicable and colonial practice of firing at unarmed protesters – a usual occurrence in the 1990s – restarted in Kashmir during the row. PDP's opponents say more people died in custody or were subjected to administrative detention during its rule. Its ambivalence towards the BJP and its prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, has further undermined its standing lately even as it hopes to make the most of the anti-incumbency that its arch foe, the NC, faces.
The NC government could not control the practice of firings on unarmed protesters during its first two years in office. It crossed all limits in 2010. Since then the government has trampled over civil liberties – shut mobile services, intimidated media besides resorting to lockdowns and mass arrests to prevent protests. Its broken promises on the development front have left people further disillusioned along with its inability to keep the pledge to revoke the much hated Armed Forces Special Powers Act that violates the fundamental right to life in a damning indictment of how democracy works in Kashmir.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Wounds fester in Kashmir, democracy has proved no balm
Dengan url
http://osteoporosista.blogspot.com/2014/04/wounds-fester-in-kashmir-democracy-has.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Wounds fester in Kashmir, democracy has proved no balm
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Wounds fester in Kashmir, democracy has proved no balm
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar