The founder of the Ziraat Times, Arjimand Hussain Talib in arecent post on the Facebook while highlighting the problems faced by the tradein Kashmir has observed, “Kashmir’s economy is dying silently, withfar-reaching long term negative impacts. It is high time regional politicalparties, business groups and civil society initiated a coordinated andeffective action. Strikes will only inflict self-harm. A collective responsehas to be politically sophisticated and result oriented too”. But the moot pointis why is Kashmir economy dying? Because it has been slowly made to bleed todeath! The bleeding started immediately after Kashmir’s first Prime MinisterSheikh Mohammad Abdullah was unceremoniously removed and imprisoned in 1953 toenable Kashmir’s total merger and integration. The subsidy culture of fiftiesintroduced by Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad was the first wound given to the localself-sufficient economy at least in food related items.
There are no two opinions that the agriculture has alwaysbeen the real backbone of Kashmiris economy for centuries. Even at present the80% of the population consists of cultivators. Unfortunately, over the yearsinstead of progressing this sector has been rather dwindling and we are at ajuncture when we depend on imports for most of our agriculture based products!While on one hand most of the agricultural products and the people engaged inproducing these have been declining over a period of time, on the other theonly thing which has grown geometrically are the government employees! Asizeable chunk of the State budget goes into the salaries of these employees.Unfortunately, over a period of time we have depleted slowly the dignity ofmanual labour and created a mind-set of white collar jobs among our youth.According to some estimates almost a million youth are educated but unemployed.Most are waiting for the white-collar government jobs even at the lowest level.This is the greatest disservice that has been done to our society by our rulersfor last 70 years or so! This mentality has to change.
The other unproductive expenditure specially incurred byNRIs (Non-resident Kashmiris) is the construction boom in bungalows and villas.Over past few years a hundred thousand posh houses worth thousands of croresmust have been constructed by our Non-resident fellow Kashmiris spread all overthe world in the entire valley with Srinagar topping the list. This is totallydead investment. Those people hardly use these villas and houses. May be theyuse these at the most for a month or so when they visit Kashmir if it ispeaceful. Almost eleven months in a year these are occupied by watchmen lookingafter these! The same money could have been invested in various localenterprises especially in agriculture based industries.
Tourism has been wrongly propagated as the backbone of theeconomy even though it forms not more than 7% of the GDP! Yes, if things werepeaceful and Kashmir had year round direct international air access, Kashmirwould have become another Switzerland. Again the massive investment in thissector has become dead investment due to uncertain and disturbed situationwhich does not appear to improve in the near future. Moreover, because of totaldependence on imports regarding various inputs in the sector, Tourism does nothave a multiplier effect in Kashmir. It is estimated that the multiplier effectin Indian conditions is about 3.5 which means a single rupee invested inTourism is equivalent to 3.5 rupees invested in other sectors. But this doesnot hold in Kashmir as most of the inputs in this sector are imported fromoutside the state which makes tourism earnings to have a quick exit providingonly seasonal jobs to the locals.
Another sheepish mentality is construction of shoppingcomplexes everywhere. Instead of investing money in making goods which could belocally used and could lessen imports of these, people have virtually gonecrazy in making shopping complexes to sell goods from all over the world.Totally consumer based economy without any attempt to produce these goodsespecially in the food chain locally.
Above everything else, the local economy faces anotherserious handicap and that is the most undependable highway which incidentallyis the only exit for the valley, the main historical one through Jhelum ValleyRoad having been blocked since 1947. If the state economy is to stabilise andgrow, two things are most essential. First is the return to agriculture basedeconomy for which the Ziraat Times has taken an initiative and the other is adependable access to the valley from the outside world. The State Governmentsof all the political parties are least interested in creating an independenteconomy. They have mostly been busy in improving their own and their family’seconomic well-being at the cost of the common people. If the economy is tosurvive and progress then a private and enterprising initiative taken by ZiraatTimes has to be encouraged and multiplied manifold. The civil society has towake up and take an initiative in this regard. Let us hope and pray thishappens soon. In the alternative, Kashmir’s economy is destined to bleed todeath!