With the appointment of a new 'interlocutor' by the Union Government in February, the wayward'peace process' in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) appears to be limping into a new phase. N.N. Vohra has, in thepast, served as Home Secretary and Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, and is eminently qualified forhis new assignment.
As in the past, however, apart from the persuasive credentials of the designated interlocutor,there is little by way of clarity of mandate, purpose or strategy beyond the generally vague counsel to 'talkto everybody' in order to 'restore peace' in J&K. To this extent, the new process appearsindistinguishable - with the exception of the identity of the interlocutor - from its manifestly unsuccessfulpredecessors.
In April 2001, K.C. Pant, Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, had been appointed as interlocutor, buthad little to show for his 'mission' beyond a few desultory rounds of discussions with some fringe separatistgroups. The All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC), at that time the primary target of the 'peace mission',rejected dialogue with Pant, demanding recognition as the 'only representative body' of the Kashmiri people,and inclusion of Pakistan in the negotiations.
In a more dilatory approach to a negotiated peace, the Union Government appointed the Union Law Minister, ArunJaitley, as the negotiator for talks on devolution of powers/autonomy for J&K, on July 16, 2002. Jaitley'sterms of reference included talks with the J&K government as well as political parties and leaders. Withminimal evidence of activity, it is safe to assume that this process has also been mothballed.
As failures go, Pant and Jaitley are in eminent company in the longand misguided search for peace in J&K. This prominently includes three misconceived Prime Ministerialinitiatives - the bus ride to Lahore in February 1999, the Ramadan cease fire of November 2000, and the AgraSummit of July 2001. It must also include the utterly ludicrous 'solutions' proposed by the Washington based'Kashmir Study Group' under the active patronage of the then US President, Bill Clinton, that sought toappease terrorism with the proposal for a potentially catastrophic dissection of J&K along its communalfaultlines, ignoring the subcontinent's bloody and inconclusive history of Partition.
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Clinton was fond of propounding the 'IRA model' of negotiations with which, he believed, hehad facilitated the return of peace to Northern Ireland. All Clinton actually did was to legitimisefund-raising for the IRA in the US - and consequently, fundraising by a number of other extremist andterrorist organisations across the world - something for which America is now paying the price. All terroristgroupings benefited from the ambiguities that were encouraged by such misguided 'liberal' support to extremistcreeds in the name of the 'struggle for freedom'.
The failures of the past, however, do not bind the future. They are a caution, nevertheless, that, if realsolutions are to be secured, it will be necessary to escape the false - though possibly well-intentioned -paradigms that have only created confusion and added to the prevailing violence and bloodshed in the past.
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The first among these crippling paradigms is the idea that peace is possible through theappeasement of terrorists, and through a process of communal separation, either within the State of J&Kthrough greater autonomy to units defined by their religious majorities, or from India, by any process ofamalgamation of communally defined territories with Pakistan, or the creation of new sovereign orquasi-sovereign entities. Regrettably, most of the formulations of the past, including several that have beenauthored in India, do not appear to go beyond these counterproductive confines.
The most crucial realisation that must inform the peace process is that you cannot find a solution to theKashmir problem in Kashmir, but must look at the world well beyond. The structure of the peace that issought must be defined in terms of the strategic architecture that is emerging, and that India seeks torealize, in Asia over the coming 20 years.
The truth is, Kashmir has now become a peculiar case that is affected more by the developmentsin the international scenario, and particularly in the 'Islamic world', than by developments within India. Itis useful to notice that even the Gujarat riots, despite vigorous efforts to exploit the opportunities theycreated for extremist propaganda, had little, if any impact on the situation in Kashmir.
And, despite a decade and a half of concentrated Pakistani efforts to give Kashmiri militancya pan-Islamist character, and despite the operational alliances and linkages that may have emerged with pan-Islamistorganisations such as al Qaeda and various Pakistani terrorist formations, it is still the case thatnot a single Kashmiri or any other Indian has yet been found to have been involved in a single act ofinternational terrorism anywhere in the world outside India.
The enormity of this fact is little understood. There are close to a hundred and fifty million Muslims inIndia - more than the entire population of Pakistan. And while much smaller communities of Muslims, even inthe 'advanced' Western nations - such as the US, France, UK and Germany - have been significantly radicalisedand have produced volunteers for acts of international terrorism, not a single Indian Muslim has yet beenseduced by this creed of hatred, or by the enormous inducements its practitioners offer.
It must, equally, be understood that the world is changing, and the world of Islam is not immune to suchtransformation. There is evidence, today, of the Organisation of Islamic Countries finally questioningPakistan's role in international terrorism; and questioning, simultaneously, the character of extremist Islamand the ethos of terror that it has produced in many parts of the world. There is, equally, a greaterrealization that these countries need to accept the realities of the outside world, and cannot continue toexist in their self-imposed cocoons of historical isolation.
There is mounting evidence, moreover, of the crippling impact that Pakistan's own misadventures in thisdirection have had on that country's future, and these must not be under-estimated. Pakistan's competitivestrength in the present and protracted competition with India has declined dramatically over the past twoyears, and cannot be revived, or even sustained, within the prevailing global context, despite occasional andgenerous infusions of American aid as a reward for reluctant 'cooperation' in the Global War against Terror.
The difficulty is that Pakistan refuses to change - and its intransigence is rooted in the failure ofdemocracy and the persistence of militarism in that country. Nevertheless, those who are charged with shapingevents in this region - and particularly its areas of conflict, such as Kashmir - must realize clearly thatthe imperatives of the evolving global order will eventually force change, or engineer the destruction ofentities that resist the tide of time.
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Pakistan and the Generals who rule it remain trapped in the strategies of the 'last war' andfail to realize that movements that are not in consonance with the broad contours oftechnologically-determined international transformations are destined to die. The truth is, the irrevocableand irresistible technology-driven impulse towards globalisation cannot coexist with the 'ghettoisation' thatthe Pakistani perspective reflects and seeks to impose.
These are factors that will come to the aid of the new interlocutor in J&K, and he can inscribe a newchapter in the history of the State if he avoids the facile solutions of past negotiations: the effort tosimply purchase the pliable and the corrupt in the State, or to work out deals with terrorists and theirsponsors in the pursuit of a false peace.
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Towards the people of Kashmir - as of other parts of India - all concessions and compromisesare acceptable; but to the terrorists, and those who support and sponsor them, nothing must be conceded. Ourfaith must be invested in India's immense and unparalleled capacity to accommodate and absorb diversity; towithstand and neutralize violence; and, eventually, to assimilate all elements in the larger, pluralisticIndian identity and ethos.
K.P.S. Gill, the 'super cop', is President, Institute for Conflict Management whichruns the South Asia Terrorism Portal and brings out a weekly - South Asia Intelligence Review -courtesy which this piece appears here.
