Job Contract for Inflicting Pain on People?

Punchline

Dissent and “Job Contracts.”

Z. G. Muhammad

 Saying ‘all is not well in Jammu and Kashmir’ is not simply an aphorism, but it is a statement that has serious connotations of far-reaching consequences. The State has been flagrantly pursuing policy of gagging   the voices of dissent   in Kashmir province, Chenab Valley and  Pir Panjal.  Silencing the voices of the dissent through cheap political machinations of baton has not worked in the past, it is not going to work in the future. Historically denial of the political dissent in the state has always been like a tinderbox just a matchstick away to explode with a bang generating a chaotic situation that drifts away apparently “powerful” like driftwood down the stream.

Since 2010, ailing, octogenarian Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah has been virtually latched inside his home. Not only has his personal liberty been curtailed but for all these years he been denied religious freedom. The press notes issued by his organization suggest that he has not been allowed to offer obligatory congregational prayers for almost three hundred Fridays and a couple of Eids.  Majority of   other leaders not in agreement with the politics of the ruling coalitions are continuously denied space to articulate their point of view on contentious issues, either by restricting them to their homes or putting them in police lock or jails. Not only political leadership is denied the right to travel to different districts of the state intriguingly the civil society on this side of Pir Panjal is not also allowed to interact with people on the other side. The banning of book release functions in a world of information explosion, the internet, and YouTube may sound ludicrous, but it speaks volumes about the nervousness of the governments in power. Shabnam Qayoom was prevented from releasing his book on history in a local hotel so was Hassan Zaingaree was stopped from releasing his book.    This policy of strangulating the voices of dissent in Kashmir had not gone well with India’s new-found ‘strategic-partner’ United States. At the cost of repetition let me reiterate how the US State Department in   ‘Executive Summary’ of ‘India 2013 Human Report’ ‘had critiqued the status of democracy, freedom of expression and right to travel in Jammu and Kashmir.  Highlighting double standards in practice in the state it caustically had stated, ‘The law provides for freedom of assembly.  Authorities normally required permits and notification before parades or demonstrations, and local governments respected the right to protest peacefully, except in Jammu and Kashmir.  In this state the local government denies permits to “separatist,” parties for public gatherings and security forces detain and assault separatists engaged in peaceful protests.  During periods of civil tension, authorities used the criminal procedure code to ban public assemblies or impose a curfew.’ Three years, later when there has been a change of guard in the state two times, nothing has changed- the report holds as good today as it was then when Omar Abdullah was in the saddle. Denying space to the voices of dissent is not that simple as it seems to be. To understand, why all in the “collaborative power politics” tribe despite nursing hatred against each other are one in strangulating the voices of dissent, one needs to fillip through the pages of history.

Since 1947, it has been in the very grain of the “collaborative power politics” in the state to create alternative narratives and conjure new discourses for frustrating and defeating the political aspirations and urges of the people. For staying in power for some years,   the ‘collaborative politicians’ have always signed Faustian Agreements with New Delhi for bartering away the political and economic interests of the overwhelming majority in the State. In this column, it needs not to be reiterated how Sheikh, Bakshi, Sadiq and others traded the political aspirations of the people for donning the mantle of chief executives to be kicked out humiliatingly after some years. The year 2015, did not have a different start than that of 1947, 1953, 1965, 1975 or 1996 it also started with a rash of devious and ‘dominant discourses’ to count a few, these include   the abrogation of Article 370, the abrogation of Article 35- A law protecting the 1929 State Subject Laws, granting permanent residence to “four lakh” refugees from West Pakistan, issuing state subjects certificates  in violation of laid down norms and in the name of pilgrim tourism changing the very complexion and character  of the state. India’s new Prime Minister, Narendra Modi for fixing task for the persona for the new gubernatorial position of chief executive, took a leaf from Nehru’s Bible on Kashmir.  In 1953 Nehru had given ten years job contract to Abdullah’s Man Friday Bakshi for getting the “Instrument of Accession” ratified by the “Constituent Assembly” in violation of the UN Resolutions of 1948 and 1949. To bring the State under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of India and to subvert the state services by introducing All India Service, I. A. S, I.P.S, I.F.S and others ervices in the state, Having done the job, he was shown the door, a commission was appointed against him and was also jailed.   Some months before his death Nehru gave another  ‘job contract’ to Sadiq on similar lines doing away with the symbols of semi-sovereignty,  the offices of Sadar-e-Riyasat and Wazir-e-Azam and bringing the state with the ambit of “the Central Laws” the Comptroller and Auditor-General and the Election Commission of India. In 1996, Farooq Abdullah was brought back according to energy experts for trading water resources of the state to the N.H.P. C. for his six-year job contract. Had not then leadership succumbed to the carrot and stick policy of New Delhi, neither Bakshi nor Sadiq would have mustered courage to go against the wishes of the overwhelming majority.  Looking at the agenda of the new coalition government  that has come to the fore during past few months including, the construction of shelters for “homeless”,  Sainik  colonies, ghettos for Kashmiri Pandits, new Industrial Policy and changing script of Kashmiri language, is not different from the agenda followed  by the earlier “collaborative politicians.” In fact, this agenda has more serious dimensions than the one pursued by Bakshi, Sadiq and others for subverting the right of self decision accrued to the people of the State.

Published in Greater Kashmir on 20-6-16