Kashmir and fall of Abdullahs

A grand old party has paid for its reactionary politics but the story’s sad part is that PDP and Congress are no different 

THE electoral debacle of National Conference and its subsequent divorce from the J&K chapter of the Congress party merits debate. The results of parliamentary elections have brought into sharper focus the NC’s fast depleting popularity. The current scenario has thrown up a forecast, which suggest that the forthcoming state elections might see this grand old party down and out. 

Its now clearer that the National Conference is under serious threat, which is more evident from the historical defeat of the Congress and a radical shift in the national politics toward the right wing nationalism. This drifting of India’s national politics toward the Hindu nationalism seems to shatter NC’s long held belief in Indian pluralism and secular character. 

For past sixty-seven years of Independent India, Kashmir served as the celebrated mascot of Indian secularism; The NC, by being an unsolicited representative of this mascot,  immensely benefited from it . All these decades the Congress used to lavish praise on National Conference for being the “defender of Indian secularism”. However, such unprecedented support for NC by the Indian National Congress  has ended up fracturing the Kashmir’s socio-political fabric. What does the rise of Modi’s brand of Hindu nationalism mean to National Conference. The Congress has certainly faced a rout, but the NC also seems doomed. For sure, the revival may take many decades.

The NC’s political elite has been so used to winning elections that the party leaders always saw their constituencies as fief bequeathed to them by their grand patriarch Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah. This feudalistic politics is believed to have been the key trigger for the upheaval that Kashmir witnessed in 1989. Ironically, Peoples Democratic Party, J&K Congress and the pro-freedom leadership of the State show similar reactionary tendencies exacerbating political turmoil.

A factor that chronically haunts NC’s standing and future prospects in the State politics has been its signature reactionary politics contributing to its dismal performance. NC, being in-charge of J&K for nearly forty years, had enough time to usher in an era of real development and set off a process of peaceful resolution of Kashmir dispute. On the contrary, the leaders perpetuated policies that proved inhibitory to the development and worsened political situation of the State. They did nothing to dismantle the chronic corruption in the state institutions.

 It’s sad to note that the culture of corruption was encouraged by setting bad precedence over placing politically connected people on the position of power resulting decline in growth. Government institutions and its employees in the face of unaccountability and lack of judicial oversight enjoyed unprecedented freedom to unleash favoritism, nepotism and red tape. Most of the so called developmental projects that NC would boast of had had devastating implications for the State and its fragile environment. It seems that every project conceived during NC rule turned into a disaster. Such is the fate of any developmental project that is conceived to benefit a cronies and executed to pamper a coterie. 

It is no longer a secret that even State judiciary under NC rule lost its authority on judges with questionable character, who exonerated ministers and their lackeys from offenses which are punishable by law. These judges established connections with land mafia debilitating the state’s already stretched land resources. 

The major developmental projects that were introduced to Kashmir valley proved disastrous for the environment. Clogging life-line of Dal by land filling the Nalamar canal, construction of SKIMS hospital in the heart of famous  Anchar lake, sanctioning numerous chaotic constructions around Dal lake, concrete structures within and around the treasured land of Sonmarg, Gulmarg, Pahalgam, Yusmarg, Tangmarg, etc are few starker examples. 

The health and education sectors are even worse. The state funded hospitals, universities, colleges and schools suffer from all sort of problems ranging from shortage of funds, development of infrastructure, worsening of healthcare, lazy work culture, lack of professionalism and corruption and scams in promotions and appointments. The land reforms of 1950s present the lone good example of pro-people agenda one can recall from the NC’s four-decade rule. The approval for new administrative units for the State and successful election of village heads – panchs and sarpanchs- that NC boasts as its biggest achievement, may well only serve as yet another channel for corruption rather than ushering in empowerment and development. 

At the political level, New Delhi has always been squeezing the state. Shifting the control of the state’s premier bank to the financial oversight of RBI, and denial to curtail and regulate the annual Hindu pilgrimage Amarnath Yatra are bigger cases in point. What is worse, the Amarnath Shrine Board has now become a powerful state within the state. On the other hand, the lawlessness and denial of democratic rights is galore. The police and paramilitary forces perpetrate atrocities against unarmed civilians with full impunity.  the political space for dissent is being choked and the religious freedom is restricted, particularly frequent restrictions imposed during Friday prayers have become the hallmark of NC regime. In a lighter vein,  the NC government could not even save Kashmiris from stray dogs. Its hyperbole about the revocation of AFSPA adds insult to the injury.

Author is Assistant Professor of Medicine at Tufts University Medical Center, Boston. Feedback: [email protected] 

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