Perhaps one of the more disturbing memories from the ongoing troubled situation, beside the tragic killings of 14 civilians is the way some sections of establishment in New Delhi and the media have chosen to talk about the situation. There has been a sustained effort to defend paramilitary forces against protesters and to project the security personnel as victims in the unfolding crisis in the state.  This, while it can be understood as a legitimate approach of any country towards its security forces, has in the absence of a lack of concern for the youth, who have lost their lives, generated a wave of disgust in Valley. This is something no country does to the people it claims to be its own.

It almost seems that the people being talked about are from some hostile country, who are unworthy of any compassion and need justifiably to be dealt with an iron hand. Positions on the side of the security agencies are taken so absolutely that there is no room for an incidental word of regret for the deaths, even that of a 9 year old boy who Union Home Secretary G K Pillai insisted was 17 year old.  But why blame New Delhi alone, no great show of concern has been in evidence from across the border too.

This only goes on to prove that in Indo-Pak parlance Kashmir has become a coveted geographical construct that exists independent of its people. Perhaps this explains in part as to why it is always only Kashmir - and not Kashmiris - which is said to be ''an integral part'' of one and the ''jugular vein'' of another country.

Pillai's outright rationalization of the killings in Valley as warranted by the prevailing situation came as a big let down. One would have expected him to also exhibit a degree of sensitivity, speaking as he was talking about an extraordinary situation that has resulted in the death of 14 civilians.

According to him, CRPF acts justifiably against mobs that are ''unruly'' and of course ''not innocent''. This would mean that the mobs in other parts of the world or for that matter in other parts of the country are actually innocent and not unruly. And that protests of this intensity and scale are an exclusive Kashmiri innovation. Just last year Telengana in Andhra Pradesh sizzled with protests of similar nature on a much wider scale, so did Nandigram in West Bengal a year earlier. There were no such killings in Telengana and in Nandigram when after a long sustained protest spanning months eleven persons were killed, the entire political set up of the country rose in condemnation and poured opprobrium on Budhadev government. Mumbai has similarly gone through its own frequent convulsions which despite their extreme provocation of pitting Maharashtrians against the rest of India have been dealt with extreme caution. Condemnations and TV tirades in these cases are reserved for the governments, political actors and police, never against the people which is what the mobs basically are, ordinary folks with a grievance.

But without falling into trap of the sense of victimhood, much of New Delhi's recent discourse on prevailing Kashmir situation has blamed ordinary people for the killings. Pillai took this anti-people discourse to a new level by being very direct about it. He almost suggested that the people ask for these deaths. The phrases like "just one death'', "I wouldn't call them (protesters) civilians'' had enough shock value to go round and round in the public discourse for a long period to come.  Home Minister Chidambaram who is always very circumspect with his words also left a lot to desire. His explanation that LeT was behind the prevailing situation altered the very context under which killings took place. What is more, he too eschewed any expression of regret.

Kashmir, under the circumstances, could very well  have done without such utter lack of empathy if New Delhi desired to mitigate the ever-deepening sense of alienation. The stakes in Kashmir are really high. The situation, in many ways, seems to be worst in three years. The cycle of killings has created an extraordinary situation - albeit not atypical of Valley - that challenges comprehension. These are the protests that were not triggered by any controversial event like Amarnath land transfer in 2008 or mysterious deaths of two women in Shopian in 2009. Here is an unusual case of routine protests steadily growing into a Valley wide ferment after a teenager Tufail Ahmad Mattoo fell to police fire three weeks ago. The scale of protests has commensurately grown with the rise in toll - 14 at the last count.

The TV tittle tattle, on the other hand, vaguely put the protests  down to the anger among the youth.  Similarly, the frequent stone pelting has been discussed as an elaborately organized show of the miscreants. There has been little explanation of these sweeping descriptions which in any case will not serve the purpose of the talking heads proffering them. The truth is that source of this anger does run deep, rooted into the violent conflict that has roiled this place for the past two decades. The truth is also that while money can buy politicians the audience for their rallies, and at times even buy an odd stage-managed street disturbance, it doesn't manufacture passionate, sustained and defiant protests where youth are not only willing but ready to die. This is why when people like G K Pillai, seek to obfuscate the things and justify the killings, Kashmir appears forlornly lonely in this hour of mourning. All of us here in Valley can't help but feel a surge of feeling for the killed teenagers - not all of them part of the stone pelting crowd - who find such little concern in New Delhi which otherwise so zealously holds that these youth are Indians.

Coming to the stone pelting in Valley, even if we agree for a moment that it is a violent means of protest, there is no gainsaying the fact that stones don't kill. How many security personnel have been killed in the stone throwing in the past three years? But yes, guns and grenades, on the other hand, do kill. Even the superficial acknowledgement of this basic reality would render the ongoing cycle of killings in the Valley as extremely unfortunate and a blatant neglect of the government’s duty to protect its people.

Lastupdate on : Wed, 7 Jul 2010 21:30:00 Mecca time
Lastupdate on : Wed, 7 Jul 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Thu, 8 Jul 2010 00:00:00 IST