The  dynamics of the internal politics in Jammu and Kashmir  is  changing.  Hollow slogans  are  back in the  political discourse, with each player  throwing a new ball in the court with the expectations that it would never return to their court. This is not the politics.  With their  dreary eyes, the political leaders of  this trouble-stricken   state, are enjoying every moment of their hollow slogans. 
Three major players of the  game  have been forced to rethink their strategies  in the wake of the separatists  making a  common cause with the  people on the issue of basic necessities, like water, power and   education. Three  major parties, National Conference, Congress and  Peoples Democratic Party, despite their lip service that let Hurriyat Conference ( now how many of them are there is anyone’s guess)  contest polls, they were very happy seeing separatists  giving a poll boycott call or  turning themselves away from the   ballots and booths.. If they were so serious about involving  separatists in talks and the electoral battle- which the separatists are not new to,  Mirwaiz Umar Farooq’s party fought 1983 and 1987 elections  under the banner of National Conference, Syed Ali Shah  Geelani  was also an honourable member of the state legislative Assembly – they could have opened the channels  of communication with their fellow Kashmiris – and set up a table to discuss agenda of Kashmir’s peace and solution. 
If separatists were wary of any such move, the mainstream leaders were worse. All the time, be it National Conference or PDP, were suggesting  New Delhi to open talks with them  and sort out the issue.  Those who know that why August 2, 2000 Government of  India and  Hizb-ul-Mujahadeen  talks did not see the next round  would tell that the  talks were  sabotaged from within. Twelve years down the line, things have changed a lot, but the mindset of keeping the pot boiling is persisting.  Separatists, though fragmented, are intelligent enough to read the mindset of the mainstream parties, their  successes and failures, and it  is not without a reason that they have  joined the chorus against the power outages in Kashmir. Here, while it is their plus that they have  started talking about the day to day difficulties of the people in Kashmir, their blinkered vision  doesn’t allow them to see how the  peoples in other parts of the state are suffering. They have reduced themselves, like the mainstream parties, to the  mohalla level politics, devoid of vision. The mainstream parties, too have lost their vision, if they  ever had  one. 
For the  past 65  years- of  course PDP  is only  going to be 13 next month-  no  mainstream party, not even the Awami National Conference, which  would sing a duet with Congress in 1984-1986, “ Sov saal pehle muje tum se payar tha, aaj bhi hai or kal bhee rahega” ( I loved you yesterday, love you today and will continue to love for ever). But that love  did not see second week of March of 1986. This was just a  glimpse of   the ways  vows were broken and absence of vision  was confined to few resolutions and murky debates, leaving the commoners puzzled. 
With existing players, National Conference’s Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah  and Sheikh Nazir and Sheikh Mustafa Kamal, and PDP with father-daughter duo comparing their records in service of the state ( this service  comes only when they are in power, and when they  play role of opposition,  the service gets reduced to hollow slogans).  But now there is no  clear dividing line. It all is blurred. At times, it is not known as to which party is playing whose role.  Now Congress has come to the fore, without setting its own house in order, it is breast beating over the lack of development,  inordinate delay in transferring the  powers to the  panchayats. Those who  are speaking and saying that peace is imperative for  development and economy-  a self introspection would reveal it to them that they were the ones who  destroyed peace in Kashmir. It is time for them to listen to commoners and reach out to  separatists, without involving Rs. 15 lakh  per month interlocutors, to devise a vision that would encompass all the problems and deliver a solution as well. Today electricity  is not be seen  and it is evoking protests - the 1987 protests also had started   against the power shortage. The rest is history.

Lastupdate on : Mon, 25 Jun 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Mon, 25 Jun 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Tue, 26 Jun 2012 00:00:00 IST