DEOBAND Kashmir Conference has attracted a good response in Kashmir, and understandably so. Though the contents of the Conference are much the same as have flown out from other such meetings and workshops about Kashmir, but coming from Deoband has a particular meaning. 

 It’ll be a crusted cynicism if Kashmir doesn’t acknowledge the response that it invoked within Indian civil society during these months. What happened in Kashmir resonated in India at multiple points. Indian media and the civil society groups did break the silence speaking with a sense of sympathy towards the victimized Kashmir. It’ll be ungrateful on our part if we don’t acknowledge that.

 What turns out to be the undoing of all this talk is that it barely moves beyond sympathy, and more pointedly that the nice talk becomes an alternative fine politics. That is where it serves the purpose exactly the opposite of what it appears to be doing. In case of Deoband it becomes even more problematic.

 Whenever a conflict zone flares up and becomes the news of the day, it attracts loads of attention from quarters of its concern. The amount of victimization usually corresponds to the level of attention. It happened, and happens, with African countries, Caucasus, Mid East, Balkans, Central Asia and Latin America. If Kashmir is being talked about profusely in the media and the civil society groups it does educate people in India about what is happening in Kashmir. It also spreads an alternative idea about the place that is otherwise only being projected as a terrain of terrorism and radicalism. But it brings along a misgiving; a deception that is harmful in many ways. Deoband has needlessly becomes a part of that misgiving and deception.

 From the sporadic statements of some political parties in the beginning to the chain of meetings and conference on Kashmir afterwards, none has come clear on why Kashmir is a problem and where actually rests the solution. Everyone stays well within the boundaries that Kashmir, in all these months, has been questioning. Withdrawing the Armed Forces Special Powers Act,   removing the barricades and bunkers, releasing the prisoners or conducting probe into the hundred plus killings – all this is fine. Anyone who has to do anything with Kashmir knows this almost by default. If Deoband reiterates it, it only underlines the obvious. If the Conference at Deoband has openly talked about these things it’s absolutely fine. This much has been duly acknowledged by even the Resistance leadership in Kashmir. In no niggardly way everyone has thanked Deoband for the concern it has displayed.

 As is with the majority of such exercises Deoband has made Indian Constitution a reference point. How ironic that a former Prime Minister of India, one who belonged to the rightwing part of Indian politics displays the courage to make ‘Insaniyat Ka Dayia’ as the reference point, knowing well what it meant, but those who stay in the centre and the left are more than circumspect on this. What is happening in Kashmir these days must find a stop. Killings should end, torture and arrests should go. Curfews and restrictions should vanish. Of course this endless strike is not something that shouldn’t go. But none of it can happen if the fundamental changes do not materialize in the collective mind of India. By only talking in generalities, and limiting the resolutions and conclusions of the conferences to AFSPA, enquiry Commission and removal of bunkers, the truth is silently shown the door. 

 If a serious thinking about Kashmir has to take roots in India it should not begin from what is happening in Kashmir these day. It should take off from why it is happening in Kashmir. What made the Home Minister of India, P Chidambaram confess in the Parliament  that Kashmir is a unique case as it has acceded to India under unique circumstances is far more important than all the detailed talk about Kashmir in conferences like the one at Deoband. Who wrote it for Omar Abdullah and for what reasons did he speak so, but the contents of his speech in the Legislative Assembly of J&K are more important for the sake of argument than a thousand page document suggesting ways to restore ‘peace’ in Kashmir. 

 The point that emerges is that when Kashmir is talked about at detail and still the core is missing it means that Kashmir is not talked about at all. It’s actually detalked about. Deoband would have done well by skipping the subject, because they can’t afford to touch that core. They can only confuse things for themselves as well as Kashmir by falling into the trap, willingly or otherwise, that is being laid out for them by the powers in India. In Kashmir Resistance politics has shown good amount of wisdom by not getting the Indian Muslim into this ring. Deoband should learn from that. Saying that “we don’t consider interests of the Kashmiri people to be separate from the interests of Indian Muslims” is politically way off the mark. The political problems and the context to those problems in case of Kashmir are absolutely different than those of Indian Muslims. Being from the same religious denomination, and at one level sharing same memories and aspiration, Muslims all across the globe have a connect to bind them. Having said that, the context and the positioning of Muslims world across is not the same. That is why it makes sagacious politics if things are not confusingly mixed up.

 Indian Muslims would do better by being silent till they are in a position to speak the truth. Likewise civil society groups would be more effective if they touch upon the core questions about Kashmir. if the mind in India changes on Kashmir its reflection will be seen in better human condition in Kashmir; all by itself.

 Tailpiece: It is better for the Muslims in India to address their own problems. When they deal with Kashmir, rather are made to deal with Kashmir, it ends up with some Wajahat Habibullah doing the honours to some Mume Kanna.

{Feedback at mrvaid@greaterkashmir.com}

Lastupdate on : Wed, 13 Oct 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Wed, 13 Oct 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Thu, 14 Oct 2010 00:00:00 IST