Kuldip Nayar
... The idea of peace is yet to seep in the minds of militants and those who are sustaining them. If the press reports are correct, the Hurriyat too has discussed peace as one of the pre-requisites for holding talks ... Some intellectuals from Pakistan have also supported the move that all guns, direct or indirect, open or secret, should stop firing for creating an atmosphere of peace.
... New Delhi ... is still stuck at a solution within the Constitution ... When (Advani) said in Parliament that his government was prepared for a solution within the parameters of the Constitution, he more or less accepted Article 370 and the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.
To break the ice, Advani could have gone further and said that any settlement within the Indian territory will be acceptable even if it is outside the Constitution ... How to clear the decks for talks is the problem. Just as the government of India has to get out of the South Block -made status quo syndrome, the Hurriyat too has to face the reality. The reality is that the situation in the state has got communalised as well as regionalised. The success of the talks will depend on the extent to which the Hurriyat is willing to repair the situation.
"If you want to save J&K as an entity, you should revive Kashmiriyat, the state's secular ethos". This was my advice to Yasin Malik. He seemed to agree with me.
However, Hurriyat chief Gilani has (spoken of) dividing the state into three parts: Jammu, the Ladakh and the Valley ... His thinking is not shared by many Hurriyat leaders. But ... it is being taken that the present stand of the Hurriyat is in line with what Gilani has said.
... (Pakistan's) foreign office spokesman said the other day that Pakistan would accept whatever the solution was reached between the solution was reached between the government of India and the Hurriyat. The statement has in any way obviated the insistence by the Hurriyat to have the presence of Islamabad during the talks on the settlement ... The Hurriyat ... has very few supporters in the country. In fact, it still has more contacts with foreign missions than with the Indian parliamentarians ...
... The Hurriyat ... must ask itself: "Does it want to represent the state or a part of it, the Valley?" So far the Hurriyat is linked with the Valley. But if it wants to expand its horizon, it has to fight against communal or regional elements. It should unequivocally stand on the side of secularism ... It is neither practical nor politic to touch the three points at the same time. New Delhi,
Islamabad and Srinagar. A beginning between New Delhi and Srinagar is easier and more tractable. And Srinagar does not mean the Hurriyat alone. Farooq Abdullah's National Conference. Shabir Ahmad Shah's People's Democratic Freedom Party and Mehbooba Mufti's People's Democratic Party have to be associated with the talks at some stage. The purpose is to break the imbroglio and this requires everyone's cooperation. (Source: The Radiance Viewsweekly, 28 May - 3 June, 2000)
Prem Shankar Jha
. Advani is trapped by the precondition he stipulated and does not know how to get out of the fix he is in ...
The impasse in which the Government finds itself underlines the alarming extent to which ten years of isolation has eroded the Home Ministry's feel for the evolving political situation in Kashmir. This is hardly surprising ...
The analyst or decision-maker's first hand knowledge, which is the key ingredient for assembling varied inputs into a coherent narrative of the state of insurgency in Kashmir, is therefore totally absent.
Advani's precondition reflects New Delhi's insensitivity admirably ... Any agreement that Hurriyat brokers will only acquire legitimacy if the people believe that its leaders went into the talks with all options open and concluded on their own that accepting something less than full independence was in the best interest of Kashmir ...
Advani's precondition is therefore self defeating, but what is worse, it is also superfluous ... The plain, unpalatable fact is that based on their experience over five decades, Kashmiris have come to regard anyone who is willing to give such an ex-ante assurance as someone willing to become New Delhi's puppet. Had New Delhi not lost its feel for Kashmir, its decision-makers would have realised long ago that the softening of the pro-independence militants' stand was only partly the result of the military success of the security forces. The main cause was growing pressure on them from a population that was weary of unending violence and a steady descent into poverty, and their growing demoralisation ... that they could expect no help from Pakistan.
These feelings were most pronounced in the period between 1996 and 1999, but indecisive and bumbling governments in Delhi, unduly influenced by Farooq Abdullah, allowed the opportunity to slip away. New Delhi has another opportunity now. The sharp rise in ... s attacks on the security forces after Kargil, and the resulting rise in atrocities on civilians by security forces desperate to show results, has plunged Kashmiris back into the nightmare from which they had emerged only in 1996.
... Advani's precondition, which has made the desired end result of the negotiations its starting point, has become a stumbling block that grows bigger every day. (Source; The Hindustan Times, 2 June, 2000)
