Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC.

The Political Outlook in Kashmir Post-Elections with Firdous Syed

July 11, 2003

Firdous Syed was the founder and first chief commander of the Muslim
Janbaz Force,
which in 1990 emerged as the second largest militant group operating
in the state of
Jammu and Kashmir. He joined the militant movement in 1989, and
received training and
coordinated logistics with Pakistan's military establishment. He was
imprisoned in India,
and after his release rejoined the militant movement. He laid down
arms and renounced
violence in 1996, and founded the Forum for the Permanent Resolution
of Kashmir in
1996. He served as a Member of the Legislative Council of Jammu and
Kashmir as a
member of the National Conference from 1997-2001, and is the founder
and president of
the Kashmir Foundation of Peace and Developmental Studies based in
Srinagar.
Mr. Syed began his talk by mentioning the promise that Prime
Minister Vajpayee made
to the Kashmiri people in 2001 about ensuring them free and fair
elections. This, he
argued, was significant because it acknowledged that elections had
not been fair in the
past; it was a genuine attempt to rectify the mistakes of the past;
and it indicated that the
Indian government wanted dialogue with elected representatives of
the Kashmiris.
Overall the statement evoked a good response, even though the state
government of
Farooq Abdullah criticized the measure because it undermined its
electoral legitimacy.
The All Parties Hurriyet Conference (APHC) also rejected the
statement and the elections
on the ground that elections cannot replace the UN Resolutions. It
argued that free and
fair elections cannot be a substitute for the "Issue". It believes
that governance,
employment and other day-to-day issues are corollaries, and that
first the "Issue" –the
settlement of the Kashmir question – must be resolved. Moreover, the
APHC is
motivated by personal considerations – it sees itself as the
legitimate representative of the
Kashmiri people. Similarly, other parties such a Shabir Shah, also
had reservations about
the election process, and called for additional criteria. Their
conditional support for the
election results was contingent on the following criteria:
• The presence of international observers
• The need for confidence building measures
• An end to the government of Farooq Abdullah
Both the APHC and Shabir Shah's group ended up rejecting the
elections.
Mr. Syed argued that it would be difficult to have a solution to the
Kashmir problem in
accordance with the U.N resolutions of 1947. The politics,
processes, and ideas
surrounding the conflict have progressively evolved along different
paths in the different
regions of the state. The destructive and continuing war and
uncertainty have affected
the psyche of the populace in that they are not willing to just
embrace a cause without
knowing the end game scenario. Thus there needs to be a fresh start
and if not that, then
an approach that is different from the status quo, to break the
spiraling deterioration in
Kashmir and South Asia.
He went on to explore the notion of self-determination, by asking
who is calling for self-
determination? The people of Ladakh and Jammu do not want self-
determination. Nor do
the non-Muslim minorities in the Kashmir Valley. They want to remain
part of India, and
not be ruled from Srinagar. Nor do the people of Pakistan-
administered Kashmir – they
are content in Pakistan. This leaves the Kashmiri Muslims. If it is
only the Kashmiri
Muslims, then the right to self-determination is being asked for
along solely religious
lines. Mr. Syed argued that this implies that the Kashmir movement
has evolved into a
more narrowly conceived religious movement which does not bode well
for the future of
Kashmir, as its natural outcome will be more partitions on the basis
of religion.
Moreover, this is not the goal that the movement started out with in
1989, when it was
based on an inclusive concept of Kashmiri nationalism and rallied
around a demand for
democratic representation.
Mr. Syed said that the Kashmir issue has been viewed through the
lenses of international
diplomacy and political contingency – the social costs of the
movement have been
overlooked. The election results are a reflection of the need to
focus on these social and
economic issues. People braved enormous odds to come and vote under
the threat and
presence of violence. But the Election Commission ensured that
elections were held
under mostly normal conditions in Jammu and Ladakh. In the 45
constituencies in
Kashmir, the turnout and election process was normal in 30-35 of
them. There is an
underlying message in this response for political actors:
• Day to day issues are extremely important to the population,
contradicting the
APHC stand that only the big "Issue" matters. People responded to
the PDP's
"human touch" campaign. The Mufti Syed government is now trying to
follow
through on its election promises and has made some progress.
• Religious considerations are not the main driving force for common
people, and
this was evident from the rejection by the electorate of the hard-
line BJP and other
fundamentalist candidates like the Jammu state Morcha.
Some of the positive results of the elections: The elections gave
Kashmiris a sense of
empowerment, as it was the first time in the state's history that
peoples' vote brought real
change. Mr. Syed argued that this signifies an underlying change in
philosophy from
advocating a militant stance to a political one. He argued that
given the real possibility of
achieving a peaceful settlement to the Kashmir issue through
democratic means versus
the gun, most Kashmiris would choose the former. He argued that all
the ten or so main
players who started the militant movement in 1989, such as Yasin
Malik, have renounced
violence as a means. Today, the militancy in the state is not of an
indigenous nature, it is
from outside. Syed said that they do not grow guns in Kashmir, and
without directly
naming Pakistan, made it clear that it was the mainstay of the
militancy today.
Mr. Syed said that there have been many sources of disenchantment in
the movement
thus far. He argued that there needs to be a properly formulated
idea behind a gun, and
that the militant movement's leaders had not provided that idea in
any concrete way.
People cannot give up their lives without knowing what they were
fighting for, but no
one had thought through the political endgame in a comprehensive
way. There is little
effort to build consensus and have a dialogue between the various
players within Jammu
and Kashmir. The political leadership too had failed, as had the
APHC. There exist two
extreme views in the populace about the nature of the Kashmir
problem, but the middle
ground needs to be explored.
Mr. Syed went on to talk about some of the measures that the state
government has
introduced – the disbanding of the Special Operation Groups (SOG)
which were hugely
unpopular; reducing the duration of power outages in the Valley; and
releasing one batch
of political prisoners. He said that Mufti Mohammed Syed sees his
political role as that of
a facilitator/interlocuter in bringing people together for dialogue,
and that his task will
require a fine balancing act. He intends to focus on "human touch"
issues such as civil
liberties and governance. We have to let the process evolve and make
every effort to
ensure its success.
He said that the elections have raised the expectations of people
very high, and that while
this is a good thing, it can also be very problematic if their
expectations are not met. He
also said that the Hill Development Council in Leh has been
empowered, and the
government has promised to establish one in Kargil as well, giving
Ladakh greater
autonomy. He concluded by saying that elections are not the end of
the road, but they can
be a good beginning. Kashmir needs a steady and incremental process
towards internal
normalization.