POLITICS-INDIA: Kashmir Autonomy Debate Gets Serious

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Jun 27 2000 (IPS) - Lawmakers in Jammu and Kashmir have voted for a radical measure of autonomy for the state, giving rise to fears among some that this could lead to the eventual separation of India’s troubled province.

Defying Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s alliance to which it belongs, state Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah’s National Conference (NC) party Monday got legislative approval for its demand to revert the province to its pre-1953 status when New Delhi had control over just foreign affairs, defence and communications.

The state assembly has now asked New Delhi to act on the former’s resolution accepting the report of a special panel set up to suggest an appropriate measure of autonomy for the state. The panel had backed the NC’s demand for pre-1953 status.

The federal government was due to discuss the issue on Vajpayee’s return from western Europe. Minority Hindu and Buddhist communities in the state have opposed Abdullah’s autonomy move which they see as leading to secession.

While Vajpayee’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) slammed the legislative endorsement of the autonomy demand, opposition parties reacted cautiously, advising Vajpayee to start a national debate on how much autonomy was suitable for Kashmir.

“The (Vajpayee) government is committed to the federal structure and decentralisation of power but how can there be autonomy (for a state) in a sovereign country?” asked BJP spokesperson Venkaiah Naidu.

However, the main opposition Congress and Left parties said this was an opportunity for the federal government to look afresh at the state’s long-standing demand for greater autonomy.

The BJP and its political foes are sharply divided over unique constitutional guarantees for Jammu and Kashmir that compensate for the scrapping by New Delhi in 1953 of the special status enjoyed by the province after its then Hindu ruler joined India in 1947.

While the BJP has long campaigned to scrap Article 370 of the Constitution that makes Jammu and Kashmir different from other states of India, its rivals, specially the Left parties feel that the state has been denied its due.

Left leaders said that the BJP’s “hawkish” stand on autonomy for the state was responsible for alienating the people of the state which has been reeling under a violent separatist insurgency for over a decade.

Political analysts noted that Abdullah ignored a last minute appeal by Vajpayee to tone down the autonomy demand in order to regain losing popularity in the state.

Abdullah said that his party was keeping its pledge to voters. The NC took office after elections held in 1996 following seven years of federal rule in the state.

“The people of J&K are unhappy with Farooq Abdullah’s performance over the past four years. There has hardly been any development and joblessness, collapsed health and educational infrastructure remain huge problems,” commented the leading Times of India daily Tuesday.

“This is the only way in which Farooq Abdullah feels he can woo back the disenchanted people. But will this really solve the state’s problems? The real issues are still unemployment and lack of development and autonomy does not automatically guarantee solutions,” it added.

However, Abdullah has insisted that these problems cannot be solved without autonomy. “We did not promise them (the people) employment or anything, just the restoration of autonomy…we are bound to fulfil that promise,” he told the assembly before the autonomy vote.

Abdullah said he did not believe that autonomy for his state would lead to the break up of India. On the contrary, he asserted, it would start a serious debate in the country on the question of a truly federal structure for India.

This is also a demand of regional parties that have played a key role in forming four Indian governments, including Vajpayee’s, in the last four years.

“Autonomy must not be viewed as a dirty word and an autonomous Kashmir could become a model of cooperative federalism,” said political analyst and Kashmir expert Amitabh Mattoo of the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University.

Former Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral too said that after half-a- century of independence from British colonial rule, it was time for India to adopt the principle of cooperative federalism.

However, as India’s only Muslim-majority state that is disputed by Pakistan, Jammu and Kashmir is seen to be different from other states. Since 1989, armed Kashmiri militants have been demanding separation from India, with some advocating a merger with Pakistan.

Abdullah’s demand for autonomy is also seen to have been prompted by a move by the federal government to free jailed Kashmiri separatist leaders and bring them to the negotiating table.

India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir since the subcontinent’s partition into Muslim-majority Pakistan and Hindu- majority India by departing colonial rulers. Pakistan controls a third of Kashmir that is divided by a 1972 ceasefire line.

A year ago, the two sides fought an undeclared war that was ended when U.S. President Bill Clinton urged Islamabad to order back Pakistani irregulars who had crossed the ceasefire line.