The debate on leadership is going on for quite sometime now. In my view, it is irrelevant and vague. The issue is all about acceptability. Every now and then we discuss the efficacy of our leadership. When people themselves are not coherent in their thought, how do they expect leaders to be coherent? The problem is not with the leadership but with the perception we carry about them. We have failed to accept the leaders because of our own lineages, interests and disagreements regarding various issues .Why do we always question their intentions and credibility? Why don’t we raise same questions about the so-called mainstream politicians? The people of Kashmir have at no point been homogenous in their thought process. Unless there is homogeneity, everything would be futile. But leaders can’t work on same lines. Although they should have same goals but they need not be necessarily homogeneous in their approach.
In any movement, different individuals have different opinions about a single subject. For example, when Ali brothers-Showkat Ali and Muhammad Ali launched the Khilafat movement against the dismemberment of Turkish caliphate by Britain and other European powers, the movement was supported by Gandhi and many other congressmen. Many historians believe Gandhi was wrong in trying to bring Hindu-Muslim unity by supporting the cause of Kilafat. Leaders like Jinnah, Annie Besant and Tilak opposed the movement, as they held that such unity was based on ‘shifting stands’ and that turned out to be the case.
Now that Gandhi had perceived something that was frivolous, doesn’t reflect on his overall leadership quality. When any leader or a party enters into the public scene; they carry certain fundamental principles and ideologies. It is natural on their part to work as per some norms or as they say the core agenda. First we need to localize our conflict and then nationalize it. That can be achieved only with the intellectual class –educationists, political analysts, social activists etc. Hitler in Mein Kemp states, “The question of ‘nationalizing’ a people is first and foremost one of establishing healthy social conditions which will furnish the grounds that are necessary for the education of the individual. For only when family upbringing and school education have inculcated in the individual a knowledge of the cultural and economic and, above all, the political greatness of his own country – then, and then only, will it be possible for him to feel proud of being a citizen of such a country. I can fight only for something that I love. I can love only what I respect. And in order to respect a thing I must at least have some knowledge of it”.
We haven’t been able to produce a lawyer of international repute. Have any of our lawyers been able to take any of our cases to International court of justice? We have a very poor or weak Diaspora’s .so whatever we have to accomplish the effort has to come from within. Dafur was recognized by international community only when cases of war crimes were bought to ICJ. We are the people who agitated in thousands during the Amaranth land row and we are the same people who voted overwhelmingly immediately after that. We have to change our attitude, vision and our work culture. The society as a whole has to rise and only then can they achieve their aspirations.
The only question that remains is : Did the founders foresee the effects of their work in the form which those effects have shown themselves today, or were the founders themselves the victims of an error? To my mind both alternatives were possible.

(Harris Ahmad is a student of journalism at University of Kashmir)

Lastupdate on : Fri, 18 Dec 2009 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 19 Dec 2009 00:00:00 IST