Mr Home Minister, Please Don’t Repeat Mistakes Mr Chidambaram Made

Just like in 2010, streets of Kashmir are once again littered with stones and empty shells of pellet guns.

It’s like deja vu.

The streets of Kashmir are once again littered with stones, empty shells of pellet guns, cans of tear-gas. Hospitals are full of injured patients, wailing mothers, crying children. Over 40 are dead and over a hundred have lost their eyesight.

Every day brings new protests, more deaths, more injury, more misery. Thankfully, after PM Modi’s intervention, the use of pellet guns has stopped.

Events Revisited

This is exactly what was happening in 2010.

Kashmiri youth were out on the streets, throwing stones. Mr Omar Abdullah, the young first-time Chief Minister, was at sea, not knowing how to deal with the fast-deteriorating law and order situation.

In a rare admission for politicians, Omar now admits he made his share of mistakes. He even has a word of advice for the new chief minister: that she should not repeat the same mistakes. He is basically, desperately, urging her to take control.

Well, perhaps Omar’s biggest mistake was that he allowed Delhi to take over. This is where erstwhile Home Minister, Mr Chidambaram, and his Home Secretary, Mr GK Pillai, came in and made a mess of things.

They returned the Kashmiris’ stones with bullets, killing over a hundred of them. This use of excessive force gave birth to people like Burhan Wani – educated youth, who took to guns to fight the brutal security forces. It was Delhi calling the shots but resulted in the young Chief Minister taking all blame, for which he paid dearly in the next election.

Mr Chidambaram was too smart to take any blame.

He might have been a good Finance Minister, but he proved completely out of his depth in the Home Ministry, with little understanding of how parts of India – other than Delhi and Mumbai –  work. His plans for Chattisgarh (remember Operation Greenhunt?), Manipur, Telengana & AP, J&K, all backfired badly.

Governments in Delhi have taken a myopic view that the problem concerns the land (called Kashmir) and hence the land must be defended at all costs.

Chidambaram

The Present Situation

First, Mr Chidambaram must admit that he made a mess of it in 2010 and is equally responsible for this quagmire in Kashmir today.

It’s now 2016, but the Home Ministry continues to fail to come up with a non-lethal way to disperse stone-throwing crowds in Kashmir.

In 2010, security forces used bullets, which killed over a 100 citizens including children.

In 2016, they are using pellets, that have blinded over a hundred people, including children. Admit it or not, this is blatant use of force, and will not help the nation’s cause.

When Omar was the CM, Kashmiris had a safety valve in PDP. While Mufti Mohammed Sayeed provided much-needed stature, political acumen and a semblance of credible opposition in the state, Mehbooba Mufti was ever ready to put balm on the physical and emotional scars of common Kashmiris.

But now, with Mufti gone and Mehbooba as Chief Minister in alliance with the BJP, Kashmiris suddenly find themselves bereft of any political relationship. They feel disenchanted, disenfranchised, despondent, and dejected. It becomes a perfect recipe to fall for the growing radicalisation promoted by ISIS and other Wahhabi groups.

When they have nothing to look forward to, they take succor in religion, and get easily swayed to take up a gun to fight for their idea of religion and freedom, however flawed it may be.

This is an extraordinary situation, and is fast getting out of control. They need an out-of-the-box solution.

The political youth icons of the state continue to be Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah. They need to come together right now. Step into their fathers’ shoes. They need to connect and reconnect with young Kashmiris. An extraordinary show of solidarity, maybe through a rally, or a joint appeal, in an attempt to try and connect with the youth.

Give them a dream, and show them the way to fulfil it.

Delhi needs to step back. It needs to support these two young leaders with all the help they need in terms of finance, administration and security. The ongoing daily cycle of violence has to be broken. Peace has to take over the bylanes of Tral and Tangmarg, Kupwara and Kulgam, Shopian and Srinagar.

Lets all come together and join hands with Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah to give peace a chance in our “Heaven on Earth.”

Sanjay Ahirwal has worked as a journalist for over two decades with various media agencies including NDTV. His twitter handle is @ahirwal.

(This is a personal blog and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)