Following low turnout in last month’s by-election in Kashmir Ankur Datta calls for new frames of reference through which to interpret the conflict in Kashmir today. He writes that analysing the insurgency as an unfinished agenda of the Indian partition overlooks new categories and formations that have emerged since the 1990s

Datta, Ankur

LSE Research Online

2017-5-19In search of a contemporary narrative for Kashmirblogs.lse.ac.uk /southasia/2017/05/19/in-a-search-of-a-contemporary-narrative-for-kashmir/Following low turnout in last month’s by-election in Kashmir Ankur Datta calls for new frames of referencethrough which to interpret the conflict in Kashmir today. He writes that analysing the insurgency asan unfinished agenda of the Indian partition overlooks new categories and formations that haveemerged since the 1990s.On 9 April 2017, a by-election was held in the Kashmir valley in Indian administered Jammu andKashmir. By-elections are often unremarkable events in democratic nation states. However thisparticular election was particularly unusual when reports started to filter in of low voter participation.By the next day it was reported that only 7% of the registered electorate had voted and that numerous clashesbetween protesters and security forces had taken place. While the current conflict over Kashmiri independence isalmost three decades old, one of the Indian state’s claims to legitimacy has been the state and Indian parliamentaryelections which have seen reasonable levels of participation, at least for the past 15 years, enabling the survival of‘mainstream’ political parties such as the National Conference (NC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) whichcurrently forms a coalition state government with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).However the by-election must be situated in a context of upheaval in the Kashmir in the past year. The situation hasbeen particularly tense following the killing of Burhan Wani, a young Kashmiri militant, by Indian security forces inJuly 2016. His death was mourned widely across the valley and resulted in fierce mass protests. The state’sresponse to control the crowds seemed even more heavy-handed than usual, with the use of pellet guns resulting inthe killing and injuring of scores of Kashmiris including both active protestors and bystanders. In this light, the by-election appears to indicate the diminishing legitimacy of the Indian state for Kashmiris. Social media entries fromKashmiris  at the time highlighted the lack of participation with jokes shared about bored officials manning emptybooths. These perspectives are only accessible whenever there is no official ban on social media in Kashmir.Image: Election boycott graffiti in Srinigar, April 2016. Credit: Adam Jones CC BY-SA 2.0The Kashmir conflict is often explained as an unfinished agenda of the Indian partition. During what became the firstwar between India and Pakistan, the Maharajah of Jammu and Kashmir had signed the accession of the Kingdom ofJammu and Kashmir to India. Nevertheless, there is also a need to acknowledge that there had there had been a1/3movement for independence in Kashmir since the 1930s. The period after 1947 and the incorporation of Jammu andKashmir into India has also been extensively discussed with writers pointing out that the relationship betweenKashmiris and Indian state remained fraught, marked by the maintenance of control at the expense of democraticaspirations. In hindsight the demand for independence or azaadi seems inevitable. Nevertheless since the start ofconflict in 1989-90, the older narratives now appear dated. While they explain the path towards insurgency, how dothey help us understand contemporary Kashmir?It is worth considering that the current conflict began as liberal economic reforms where introduced and hasunfolded against a backdrop of significant changes in the Indian political economy and ways of understandingcitizenship and personhood in India. In other words new categories and formations have emerged which I shall nowdiscuss below.The question of youthOne of the most striking features of the recent protests have been masses of young people openly assembling tochant slogans and hurl stones at any symbol of the Indian state. The figure of the ‘stone pelter’ first emerged in thesummer of 2008 when protests took place following a land dispute after a period of relative peace. The stone peltersneither fit into the framework of political groups such as the Hurriyet, nor are they militants, which makes them bothfascinating and a concern for the Indian state.What we are seeing is the coming of age of a generation whose past, present and future are defined by the conflict.Whether these youth are seen as radical, misguided or progressive depending on one’s political view is irrelevant.Based on my readings and limited experiences, youth in contemporary Kashmir have a strong engagement with theidea of azaadi (freedom) and with state and revolutionary violence. They draw on a global vocabulary that echoesstruggles in places like Palestine. It is also interesting to note that the question of Kashmiri youth parallelsdiscussions of Indian youth, especially in studies that talk of youth as distinctive economic and politicalconstituencies.Re-visiting the Indian stateFollowing his appointment earlier this year, the new Indian Army Chief, General Rawat declared that Kashmiricivilians who hinder counter insurgency operations would be deemed as ‘anti-national’. This statement was madefollowing reports of local Kashmiris protesting against Indian army units during operations. The General’s commentsare representative of a similar hardening of the Indian state’s position towards Kashmir. The tenure of the BJP since2014 has been marked by a polarisation across India, with any criticism of the current government as ‘anti-national’.Previous regimes in the past have presided over a process of militirisation of everyday life in Kashmir, but this wasaccompanied to some extent by a limited dialogue with Kashmiris. The current regime lacks this, as evident in formsof crowd control with the use of alleged ‘non-lethal weapons’ and by granting greater impunity to security forces.During protests against the by-elections, a photograph circulated of a civilian tied to a military vehicle as a humanshield for the army. What made the image more tragic is that the person tied to the jeep had actually cast a vote.Outside Kashmir, the ascendancy of a Hindu nationalist politics is being witnessed across India with reports of theharassment of Kashmiri students and to even the establishment of a group in northern India who have apparentlyorganised to fight stone pelters in Kashmir. This is not the same state that presided over the accession or the earlydays of the conflict even if the escalation of violence and protests suggest parallels with the 1990s. Whatcomplicates matters further is the ascendancy of the BJP in the region. Jammu and Kashmir is a patchwork statewhich draws together Kashmir, Jammu and Ladakh. While the movement for azaadi is centred in Kashmir, theJammu region has always been opposed to  Kashmiri demands for independence, situating the region instead aspart of India. When I conducted research in Jammu, I was struck to see how the region was aligned with the Indianmainstream and opposed to Kashmiri politics, which the BJP was able to build upon, becoming an important playerin the state.2/3Political life in Kashmir is never still. As I write this piece, there are reports of protests by students, with youngwomen now involved following clashes between college students and soldiers.  A young Kashmiri Indian army officerwas murdered. A militant who had threatened members of the Huriyet was roundly condemned by Kashmiris. A towncalled Shopian is shut down. The present overwhelms. What we are witnessing is the emergence of a determinedpopulation facing a state that is as determined to enforce its power. It is from this clash that a new narrative onKashmir is emerging.This post gives the views of the author, and not the position of the South Asia @ LSE blog, nor of the London Schoolof Economics. Please read our comments policy before posting.About the AuthorAnkur Datta is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the South Asian University, New Delhi, India.He completed his PhD in Anthropology at the LSE in 2011. He has conducted ethnographicfieldwork among displaced Kashmiri Hindus in Jammu and Kashmir. He is the author of OnUncertain Ground: Displaced Kashmiri Pandits in Jammu and Kashmir, published by OxfordUniversity Press, New Delhi.  He has also published his research in journals such as Contributionsto Indian Sociology and has a forthcoming paper on return migration in Jammu and Kashmir inModern Asian Studies.Copyright © 2016 London School of Economics3/3

In search of a contemporary narrative for Kashmir

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

LSE Research Online