The Union and J&K governments may have scored a victory of sorts by offering an agreeable formula to SASB, ending its two-month-long agitation
NEW DELHI: The Union and J&K governments may have scored a victory of sorts by offering an agreeable formula to SASB, ending its two-month-long agitation, but the expected bitter response from Kashmir to the development has left no one in doubt that the regional divide runs deeper than never before.
The Kashmir co-ordination committee leading the anti-Amarnath agitation in the Valley lost no time in rejecting the “unilateral” formula. So did the Peoples Democratic Party.
Though the polarisation in Jammu and Kashmir had begun right after the state came into being during Maharaja Gulab Singh’s time in the 19th century, the posturing between the right-wing Shri Amarnath Sangharsha Samiti and the Kashmir committee on communal lines has done an irreparable loss to the state.
“Polarisation has been there ever since Gulab Singh wrested Kashmir from the British paying Rs75 lakh. And the anger has been coming to the fore from time to time. But the deep communal tones the current scenario has acquired is alarming,” Om Saraf, an octogenarian journalist from the state, said.
The Samiti might be rejoicing over its “limited success”, but it has widened the gap between Jammu and Kashmir.
Both the Centre and the state government are equally to blame for the mess. Their apathetic attitude in allowing the situation to drift contributed in a major way to deepening the communal divide.
Permitting the separatists to go up to the LoC and the total inaction in Jammu resulted in the vested interests on both sides having a field day in pursuing their communal agenda.
There is nothing objectionable in the agreement offered by the government to the Samiti, but it is the air of suspicion on both sides that has led to the Kashmir committee
rejecting it. A saner thing to do would have been to bring both to the table.
a_anil@dnaindia.net
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