{"id":4041,"date":"2019-01-28T20:39:18","date_gmt":"2019-01-28T15:09:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/?p=4041"},"modified":"2019-01-28T20:51:25","modified_gmt":"2019-01-28T15:21:25","slug":"kashmir-electoral-politicians-and-polo-ponies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/editors-take\/kashmir-electoral-politicians-and-polo-ponies\/","title":{"rendered":"Kashmir: ‘Electoral Politicians and Polo Ponies.’"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/fb:like>

 <\/p>\n

Punchline <\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

Kashmir: Electoral Politics and \u2018Polo Ponies\u2019<\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

Z.G. Muhammad<\/span> <\/u><\/strong><\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sometimes meeting an embittered politician, enables one to peep into a domain of politics that otherwise remains obscure. Moreover, on occasions sharing experiences about such meetings helps in analysing the games behind popping up of new characters like mushrooms during rains with alternative narratives for fortifying the \u2018hegemonic discourses\u2019 at the time of elections in the State. \u00a0More it also helps to understand how multiple forces, ostensibly working against each other are in reality working for strengthening the hegemonic discourses.\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/h4>\n

Since student activism days, I might have met many distraught leaders and bitter politicians. Nonetheless, two of the meetings, one, with Mirza Mohammad Afzal Beg, in October 1978, after his expulsion from \u00a0the National Conference and second, with Syed Mir Qasim in 1982, when Mrs Gandhi had humbled him provide an insight into the New Delhi\u2019s bible on Jammu and Kashmir. \u00a0Mrs Gandhi after her return to power in 1980 with thumping majority had humbled \u00a0Mir Qasim; first, convey him that he was not needed and then denied him even a room in the Kashmir House, 5-Prithvi Raj Road. \u00a0Those days it was in the grapevine that Mrs Gandhi had not liked some of Mir Qasim’s private conversations about Sanjay Gandhi- perhaps with M.L. Fotedar. \u00a0In this election, Sanjay Gandhi, despite his dirty role during the emergency had been elected member of the parliament.<\/span><\/h4>\n

In his endeavour to boost personality cult of his leader Sheikh Abdullah among students\u2019 couple of times, I had heard\u00a0 Afzal Beg using a clich\u00e9, \u2018I don\u2019t have an identity of my own, but I have been basking in the reflected glory of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah.\u2019 During this meeting, which was an interview for the Onlooker, Bombay, he had no good word for him, and in every syllable he spoke, he exposed most veiled aspects of his political life. Stating that for safeguarding his material and other interests Abdullah could sacrifice anyone, he tried hard to dissociate himself from the political blunders committed by him and pushing Kashmiris out of frying into the fire. The meeting prompted me to look into life and politics Sheikh Abdullah beyond the \u2018pedestrian discourses\u2019 and hagiographic accounts breastfed to our whole generation born in the fifties and the sixties.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Nonetheless, revealing the harsher historical realities and demolishing the \u2018pedestrian discourses\u2019 and \u2018conjured narratives\u2019 are essential for exposing forces inimical to the aspiration of the people. And those with vested interests engaged in trying to entice young generation by playing upon the \u2018syrupy alternative narratives\u2019, need to be exposed. To that extent meeting with Mirza Beg become relevant in as much as in understanding how the \u2018hegemonic discourses\u2019 can blindfold people and take them from one dark tunnel into another and another with no light at the end. That is not subject of today\u2019s column. But for finding an answer to the much-asked question on this day on the social media, why chasing the dream of democracy has so far been a mirage the meeting with Syed Mir Qasim and revelations made by him are more relevant. The meeting is also is significant for the younger generation to understand the Machiavellian politics that has been in play the state.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Syed Mir Qasim was sharing accommodation with a Member Parliament in Lodhi Estate. My two friends, Sheikh Manzoor, then with the United News of India (UNI), and Abdul Hamid Bhat, later on, a senior police officer knew him, I had never met him before and never met him after. On a Sunday, on our way back from Lodhi Garden, we called on him, he was excited to see three young Kashmiris visiting him and instantaneously opened up his heart to us. Like a chronicler, he filliped one \"Plebiscite<\/a>after another page about his life.\u00a0 \u2018His role in the struggle for the ending feudal autocracy in the state, \u00a0steadfast loyalty to India and the Indian National Congress, in all its avatar. His deep commitment to Nehru, Indira Gandhi, and his role in bringing Sheikh Abdullah back into the \u201cIndian mainstream\u2019. With discontent writ large on his face he narrated story after story how he and many in his tribe of politicians became useless cogs in New Delhi\u2019s scheme of things in Jammu and Kashmir and how they were put into the trashcan of Kashmir politics. He summed it up beautifully in a parable in chaste Kashmiri. To Quote him, \u201cFor New Delhi, we are like Polo Ponies, some picked up early as colts groomed and trained in tricks of the game, some selected after judging their stamina for outsmarting others. The breed does not matter, but it is agility to respond to the command that counts. Even for a single match, they keep several ponies. Once, they feel that the horse \u00a0on the ground is fatigued and is not racing\u00a0 on the programmed track, he is removed from the ground \u00a0and put in the stable and fed for some time then forgotten and \u00a0finally fired.\u201d<\/span><\/h4>\n

Perhaps doubting our knowledge of the contemporary politics, he culled one after another instance from the post-1947 electoral politics of the state and explained to us how New Delhi has been living up to adage diamond cuts diamond in the State and using one politician against another. \u2018Right at the time of installation of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah none but first Prime Minister of Jawaharlal Nehru groomed Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad to replace his leader as and when required.\u2019 And when Bakshi was running the show, they encouraged Sadiq as his contender and denounced him as \u2018anti-national\u2019. \u00a0Narrating his personal experience he recounted the day when Mrs Gandhi had invited him to New Delhi to tell him that \u00a0Ghulam Mohammad Sadiq the incumbent Chief Minister had lost the support of the House and they wanted him to head the government. Mir Qasim had expressed his ignorance about the support she was talking about, at this Mrs Gandhi had informed him that \u2018you don\u2019t know about it, but I know it.\u2019 She had directed him to visit Srinagar and told him the MLA\u2019s would approach you\u2026.\u2019. Mir Qasim could not complete story as someone else intruded in the room.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Mrs Gandhi in the meantime had to rethink about replacing Sadiq. Some years later, I \u00a0\u00a0learned from an MLA who launched new party \u00a0(who had resigned as minister from Sadiq\u2019s cabinet)\u2019, that when Qasim supporting MLAs (he was one of them) called on Mrs Gandhi, they received a sour dressing\u2013down from Mrs Gandhi. When they insisted on replacing Sadiq,\u00a0 she harshly told them, it is me who has made you MLA and the \u00a0not people of Kashmir- go to Srinagar \u00a0and work with Sadiq Sahib.\u2019<\/span><\/h4>\n

The stories that my meetings with the two electoral politicians, one a former Deputy Chief Minister and another, Chief Minister and Union Minister revealed did not end there, in reality, these stories have been and continue to be an intrinsic part of electoral politics in Kashmir. That is the harsh reality about the Kashmir democracy, and the dream that our forefathers had seen about transfer of power to people back in 1924, is yet to be realised.<\/span><\/h4>\n<\/fb:like><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

 
\nPunchline
\nKashmir: Electoral Politics and \u2018Polo Ponies\u2019
\nZ.G. Muhammad
\n 
\nSometimes meeting an embittered politician, enables one to peep into a domain of politics that otherwise remains obscure. Moreover, on occasions sharing experiences about such meetings helps in analysing the games behind popping up of new characters like mushrooms during rains with alternative narratives for fortifying the \u2018hegemonic discourses\u2019 at the time of elections in the State. \u00a0More it also helps to understand how multiple forces, ostensibly working against each other are in reality working for strengthening the hegemonic discourses.
\nSince student activism days, I might have met many distraught leaders and bitter politicians. Nonetheless, two of the meetings, one, with Mirza Mohammad Afzal Beg, in October 1978, after his expulsion from \u00a0the National Conference and second, with Syed Mir Qasim in 1982, when Mrs Gandhi had humbled him provide an insight into the New Delhi\u2019s bible on Jammu and Kashmir. \u00a0Mrs Gandhi …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editors-take"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4041"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4041"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4041\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4044,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4041\/revisions\/4044"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peacewatchkashmir.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}