Kashmir- Who is Afraid of Autonomy?

Dr K L Chowdhury  

A new wave was raging in the State of Jammu &   Kashmir in the aftermath of Parliamentary and on the eve of the Assembly elections. It was the Autonomy wave. Not only was there a lot of hue and cry about the expressions 'Maximum autonomy, greater autonomy' etc but the issue of Autonomy had also emerged as the main campaign- plank for a large number of political parties partaking in the elections Earlier, autonomy remained the prerogative mainly of the National Conference but now the State units of national parties also find themselves afflicted with the 'autonomy syndrome, which also generated a stream of defections from these parties to National Conference.

 

What does the common citizen of the State of J & K understand by Autonomy? How do the politicians who swear by Autonomy themselves perceive it? What are the contours and what will be the fallout of autonomy-maximum, meaningful. undiluted, dignified and whatever? And who desires and who benefits from Autonomy to the State of J&K? These and other questions remain unanswered. They have been deliberately left in the realm of the esoteric, to once again betray the credulous and innocent denizens of the State, whose sensibilities have received a battering and bashing at the hands of those who ruled the State since 1947.

 

Going strictly by the definition, Autonomy means the power or right of self-government. All the States of the Republic of India enjoy this power by virtue of independent State legislatures to which the people of each State send their elected representatives through a democratic franchise every five years. The triumvirate of the legislature, executive and judiciary in each State is responsible for an effective governance and a just and equitable dispensation to the citizens irrespective of religion, caste, creed and colour The State of J & K is further empowered with Article 370 of the Constitution by virtue of which it enjoys a greater degree of self rule as the laws enacted by the Indian Parliament which automatically become effective in other States can became so in J&K only if ratified and accepted by the State Legislature. Besides, the State of J & K has a separate constitution which can be amended by a two-third majority of the legislature.

 

Then what are all the proponents of Autonomy clamouring for, when on the one hand they swear by the Indian constitution and on the other they are hawking "maximum" autonomy to the gullible voter, except to make use of Autonomy as a catchy expression. They are only cashing on the sentiments of Kashmiris who having suffered a major disillusionment with another trendy expression of the last decade, namely, Azadi, need very sorely a palliative to come to terms with the reality that Kashmir has to stay a part and parcel of India for all times to come. It may serve to pull the Kashmiris out of the frustrations and trauma of the last decade only to push them into another make believe world. It is a handy tool with the ingenious politicians to hold people under a magic spell for a further stretch of time. It is also a face-saving device for those politicians and leaders who, in their miscalculations, overtly or covertly supported the secessionist wave during the height of its tide but craftily and cleverly managed to stay aloof when it swept and swallowed others in its all consuming fury. Some of these die- hard speculators are now in the vanguard of the political process and in the thick of the election fray. having readily filled the vacuum created by the fading away of "Mujahids'' from the scene. To restore their lost image in the eyes of the common man they have taken resort to the clever ploy of Autonomy, promising an alternate Version of "Azadi" to the gullible Kashmiris.

 

While it is the Valley Sites who are most taken in by the Autonomy rhetoric, it is in fact they who are most afraid of it. They have already tasted the bitter harvest of Article 370 which created and sustained a feudal hierarchy, a select bank of the ruling elite from the Valley who indulged in untold opportunism. nepotism, corruption and unconstitutional methods and terror to subjugate opposition to their misrule while doping the common man with the opium of ambiguities, planting suspicions in their minds about accession to India, pronouncing J & K as a disputed State, giving new definitions to "Kashmiriyat", treating article 370 as a family legacy, presaging threats to Kashmiri identity and so on and so forth, whenever it suited their design.

 

So far as Jammu and Ladakh Provinces are concerned, they account for more than half the population of J & K and more than eighty percent of its geographical area and the people have repeatedly demonstrated their unflinching desire for full integration with the rest of India. Now that the Dewe Gowda Govt. is keen to dish out Autonomy to the State and most political parties came out with manifestoes which inter alia, promise regional autonomy to the three regions of J & K, these two regions also seem to have fallen in line with the autonomy rhetoric with the result that there has been a large scale switching over of loyalties from one party to another and new pre poll and post-poll arrangements and alignments in Jammu & Ladakh which suffered neglect through the last five decades during which they watched helplessly the concentration of political power in the hands of the Valley Sites and the diversion of their developmental funds to the valley Now a feeling is gaining ground that Jammu & Ladakh have everything to gain under the new regional dispensation which promises regional autonomy, and nothing to lose except their subservience to the overlordship of Kashmins. They are hopeful of an equitable distribution of political and economic power and a full share in the speedy development of the State. The home minister might have miscued but inadvertently he dropped a hint about trifurcation of the State as an alternative solution to the regional aspirations of the three regions of the State.

 

And what about the people from the valley who have been uprooted from their homes and are living in exile for the last 7 years? Unfortunately these Kashmiri Hindus have not only been the worst to suffer in post-independence Kashmir but also the most ill-understood. Autonomy in whatever form or fashion does not really matter to the Kashmiri pandits themselves and if they have voiced their concern from time to time it is in the larger interest of the country which, they feel, will be threatened with balkanization and disintegration if the nation. succumbs to the secessionist and separatist aspirations of people from different areas. For this community cannot suffer worse under any new dispensation than it has already suffered and the words holocaust, genocide and ethnic cleansing fall wayside when one described their plight. In fact, there may be a silver lining for them too in autonomy as it gives them a reason to fight for their genuine rights, their claim to their share in the valley and their struggle for the retrieval of their Homeland. For no body can claim normalcy and peace to have returned to the valley unless and until the Kashmir Pandits return from their forced exile. Their reverse exodus can, however, become possible only when they are rehabilitated with full honour and dignity and provided security against persecution and terror together with religious, economic and constitutional guarantees as also safeguards against future exodus:

 

There is increasing evidence of intellectual as well as ordinary men and women from the Kashmir valley having second thoughts about Autonomy & Azadi. For once these people are seriously self- introspection, flinging hard sentiments aside and taking recourse to common sense and logic. They feel that Autonomy is a hoax, an eye wash. They understand its regional as well as global implications and the potential it has to embroil Kashmir in a new conflagration. They realise the merits of full merger with India. They also fear the fallout of greater autonomy and in its turn regional autonomy to the three provinces which will deprive the valley of Kashmir its unquestioned supremacy and hegemony over the whole of the State of J & K and deplete it of the lion's share of central aid which it managed to syphon off as also of political power which it wielded at the cost of Jammu and Ladakh Worse, they fear autonomy will arm the ruling elite with unbridled power to tamper with the constitution, to perpetuate misrule, to curtail personal freedom and to suppress healthy and democratic dissent, and that there may be nowhere to turn to for appeal, no Supreme Court against injustice, no Election Commission against electoral malpractices, no Comptroller and Auditor General against financial frauds and no CBI against scams. These are the people who are most afraid of Autonomy. They talk in whispers and discuss behind closed doors. But they are the real well wishers of Kashmiris and they will soon come out and speak

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Courtesy:- Dr K L Chowdhury and 1996 November Koshur Samachar