Kashmir: Ethnic Cleansing Versus Demographic Change

Even the Modi government’s earnest backers are puzzled by Home Minister Amit Shah’s handling of the security situation in the Union Territory (UT) of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). The Home Ministry’s dithering gradualism is uncharacteristic, as it works via the Lieutenant Governor (LG), changed once so far.

Its reversion to old, failed strategies, of trying to win the hearts and minds of the Sunnis in the Valley, despite hostility, the raising of anti-India slogans in the mosques, the killing of Hindu shopkeepers, is a hodge-podge of wishful thinking. It is also a one step forward and two step back manner to deflect charges of communalism.

The most prominent Valley politicians, echoing the Pakistani separatist line thinly-veiled, such as Mehbooba Mufti and the father and son duo of the Abdullahs, were placed under house-arrest at first. The populace was also subjected to a restriction on internet usage. The security forces were put on high alert. But when all this was normalised, nothing much had changed, though some would talk in terms of relative improvement and degree.

The most recent jailing of Yasin Malik may not have evoked much protest in Srinagar, but coming as it has, decades late, it is something of an anti-climax. Besides we shall see, if and when he receives a death sentence for murder.

The release of names and posting spots of Pandits working for the government in the public domain has acted as a marker for the terrorists to find. Why was it done?  Several have already been target killed by terrorists. In any case, the Pandits are fed up with the government’s ineptitude and broken promises on their security, and about half of the ones who were in the Valley have left in protest.

The Government of India employs a statistical approach, as before, to track the ebb and flow of militancy. This is to demonstrate progress. This method, taking comfort in small gains, listing the number of terrorists apprehended and ‘neutralised’, has not worked in two decades or more. This does not address basic underlying issues, such as the insistence on Muslim ascendancy and domination in the Valley that is jealously guarded.

It has cumulatively claimed thousands of lives of civilians, police, and armed forces personnel, while leaving the situation more or less disturbed and unresolved. Taking off Article 370 and 35A, but walking and talking the same old line has no future.

Tactics employed by police and armed forces are still extremely ginger and mindful of invading private spaces and homes, in search of terrorists, their weapon stashes, and their sympathisers/enablers. Why are the security forces  still hobbled like this?

Only the bona fide terrorists are eliminated, often with high attrition, loss of life and limb, amongst the security forces. Defensiveness is the sanctioned norm against highly armed terrorists who can see the security forces from their vantage points inside Kashmiri homes. There is no punitive action on those who aid and abet jihadi elements. If there is intelligence, it is not acted upon in a manner where networks and support groups are apprehended in advance. This, so as not to offend the same Kashmiris who are against India. Why?

The sheer hesitancy and lack of boldness appears to be disconnected with adamant ground realities.

By implication, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, despite his undeniable popularity and charisma, is also blamed. Indeed this policy could have consequences affecting the Hindu vote in 2024. But perhaps the BJP calculates that the Hindu has nowhere to go, and can therefore be taken for granted.

It is widely perceived that nothing is done or not done in the sensitive UT without Modi’s nod. People think there is too much emphasis on his Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, and Sabka Prayas policy in Kashmir, with too little by way of dividend. The prime minister, on his part, seems to be more interested in bringing in investment from the Centre and Islamic countries such as the UAE, by showing extreme moderation.

There is less emphasis on retribution and stamping out the violence. Hindus, and even Muslim Kashmiri security forces personnel continue to be killed at a steady rate without much accountability. This is extremely demoralising, but the government seems to be holding to this policy. They show regret and visit the homes of victims, hand out purses and jobs to wives and children as appropriate, but do not escalate the retaliatory responses to wipe out the ecosystems.

 The Valley Muslims may not all be in support of terrorists, but very few are willing to publicly speak out against them. For that matter, neither do Indian Muslims from elsewhere in the country, or any of the Liberal Leftist groups. And none seem to be in favour of effecting a demographic change that would equalise their numbers, or reduce the influence of Sunni Muslims in the Valley into that of a minority.

Pakistan in particular, along with China, are backing the violence and the separatists with money, arms, covering fire, logistical support like drones and tunnels, training. This despite massive attrition in their ranks caused by Indian security forces. They are determined to keep the unrest in Kashmir alive and some say they step up the violence when they feel cornered.

But true and long-term solutions to the conundrum on the Indian side are not forthcoming, unless increased development and moderation is considered to be the key strategy. Meanwhile, the ancient Amarnath Yatra is under heightened threat of terrorist attack and has to be conducted under heavy armed guard.

Planners and strategists are restrained from coming up with anything that is not moderate. Even well thought of and influential National Security Advisor Ajit Doval appears to have failed to change the situation in Kashmir.

And yet, Amit Shah, the point person, is the same man, likened to revered strategist Chanakya, and much admired, over the years, for his electoral masterstrokes as the former President of the BJP. His elimination of Article 35A and 370 was swift, brilliant, audaciously executed, legally watertight. Overnight, at the beginning of Modi 2.0 in 2019, two Union Territories (UTs) of Ladakh and Jammu& Kashmir were created, in place of the erstwhile state within a state.

But the aftermath of this action elicited strong reactions from Pakistan and China. China stepped up pressure in Ladakh and indeed all along the LaC. Pakistan did likewise with greater terrorist infiltration along the LoC and propaganda in the international arena, including at the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC), the United Nations (UN), and via lobbies in several Western countries like Britain and America.

 Rahul Gandhi and others in the Congress Party, other like-minded Opposition parties, the Mufti Mohamed family in the Valley’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP), and the Abdullahs of the National Conference(NC), have chimed in against every move of the government.

This includes the recently concluded delimitation exercise, the first since 1995, that provides more representation to Jammu with 6 new seats, as well as those previously excluded amongst the residents of the Valley, with one more seat added. Will the next election, after this, yield a Hindu led government in J&K? Is that the reason for anger?

The Modi government’s reluctance to move fast on demographic changes continues. For example, the domicile requirement is retained, at 15 years, though it now does not restrict eligibility only to ethnic Kashmiris. This law should be eliminated altogether, so that Indians from any state can settle in J&K and be put on the electoral rolls as soon as possible. That would truly make it like other normal states in India.

 When there is no threat of quick demographic change, the Valley Muslims revive their taste for ethnic cleansing. This was extremely effective for them in 1990-91, and they are trying to do it again now.

But BJP’s extreme moderation is something of a universal policy position. It is also visible in the handling of the West Bengal security situation, post the state assembly election. BJP won 75 seats, up from just 2, but could not wrest a majority for itself. Subsequent defections from its ranks, and a spate of murders of BJP cadres allegedly by Trinamool Congress (TMC) goons, have met with no central response. Ditto in the Communist led state of Kerala where BJP workers are regularly killed.

 But others, elsewhere, both totalitarian and so-called democratic, have taken a different approach. The first principle of conquest, by military or political means, and let us understand that the amalgamation of J&K into India is nothing less - is consolidation. This means subjugation of one’s enemies after the conquest.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) won power in China after a four-year-long civil war that left them impoverished. But no sooner had the CCP won in 1949, hungry, tired, and practically barefoot, it set about consolidating its power.

The vanquished Chiang Kai Shek and the Kuo-Min-Tang took refuge in Formosa, present day Taiwan, to prevent its own rout and annihilation. But the CCP Chairman Mao Ze Dong and his key compatriot Zhou Enlai, did not rest on their laurels.

They took advantage of the fatigue of the Allied Powers after WWII, and its preoccupations with picking up the pieces. The Axis Powers, including neighbouring Japan, the once and former conqueror of China, were all but destroyed. 

So, Mao and Zhou caused the immediate takeover of Inner Mongolia and Tibet in 1950, largely by political means, including bamboozling India’s Jawaharlal Nehru into complicity on Tibet. Nehru even sent the rice to feed the Chinese troops during the Tibet takeover.

This was followed up with a ruthless programme of killing any in the resistance, before settling large numbers of Han Chinese in those new provinces. The idea was to effect rapid and sustained demographic change, backed by the force of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Such as the PLA was at the time, with no Air Force or Navy. This was accompanied by a relentless attack on the religion, culture, monuments, language, and localised beliefs of the populace.

Xinkiang, which had been conquered by the Chinese Qing Dynasty in 1884, was likewise subjected to extreme repression of the native Uighur population, along with a Han majority makeover. This too, immediately, from 1950 onwards, and the process continues to the present day.

When the impoverished immigrant settlers from Europe came to America, landing at Ellis Island, New York, they were incentivised with promises of free homestead land if they decided to ‘Go West’. On the way, they encountered and eliminated Red Indian tribes that were native to those great grasslands. In addition, the would-be settlers killed the Bison that the Red Indians lived on. Gradually, the remaining few Red Indians were placed in arid ‘Reservations’ while the White settlers completely colonised the vast country. This was demographic fascism backed by a so-called democratic America. The violence is in its DNA. It also explains the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, the right to bear arms.

The same thing was done to the native Aborigines in Australia. There are myriad examples from all over the world both in recent times and a deeper history.

What about ethnic cleansing? Again, it is recorded that Genghis Khan massacred entire populations in the lands that he conquered. In more recent times, we see this in the former Czechoslovakia, in many parts of Africa, and Asia.

The problems in Kashmir probably cannot be solved with the gradualism of the Modi government. But in India, patience is itself a strategy, and human losses have to be seen in the context of a huge population of 1.40 billion. It is possible that geopolitical pressures affecting a bankrupt Pakistan, and a much diminished China, will soon do a lot of the eventual work for us. Because, at the back of it all, the violence in Kashmir is sponsored, and if it is somehow orphaned, India’s gradualism can suddenly appear both smart and very persuasive.

(1,979 words)

June 5^th, 2022

For: Firstpost

Gautam Mukherjee