Outlook English - Print Subscribers Copy Outlook English, 02 July 2018 | Page 27

VA L LEY T URN
YASHWANT
SINHA
OPI NI ON
COLLAPSED TO
COALESCE FORCE
People are relieved by the uneasy alliance’s end, but anticipate a sterner future
T
People are telling me that they feel now the time for suspension
HE PDP-BJP alliance government in Kashmir has fallen
of (anti-terrorism) operations in the region is gone and the
after just three years of being in power. That the BJP has
Centre will turn towards an all-out operation. Some think that
pulled out is nothing but an admission of failure on their
this time the government of India will be directly in charge of
part and on the part of the government of India. It is,
this all-out strategy. This is likely to be the government’s app­
finally, an admission of the fact that theirs was an
roach now that the ceasefire is over. What they don’t understand
unlikely combination from the very beginning. They
is that this approach has its negatives and its positives. Both the
were simply pulling along without even a semblance of govern-
government of India and the BJP seem to be hoping that they
ance being offered to people in Kashmir.
will enjoy all of the pluses that arise from it and will have to face
I am in Srinagar today, as I have been so often in recent
none of the after-effects of its minuses. What this type of
months, and it is so evident that there is relief among the people
thinking actually results in is still to be seen.
that this alliance is over. There was massive opposition here to
Another aspect they don’t seem to realise is that there has to
the way the state was being run. All the people I have met here
be a sense of timing to everything. Last
were unhappy with the PDP-BJP govern-
year, just before Ramzan I had made this
ment. Not merely unhappy with some
suggestion to the government that there
general governance deficit, but with the
should be dialogue, negotiations and as
fact that the coalition had done absolutely
part of that, suspension of operations. But
nothing of what it had promised to.
at that time the government of India did
It is my understanding that ex-J&K CM
not yield to my advice. If they had listened
Mehbooba Mufti has paid a very high
at that time then today we would not have
price for having undertaken this alliance
come to this situation.
with the BJP. She was the head of this
People tell me that this government was
government so, naturally, she has to take
doomed to fail from the very beginning.
the responsibility for what has happened,
This is because the government of India
but there is more to it. As someone told
did nothing to implement what it had
me, after three years in this alliance,
GETTY IMAGES
assured people of. It kept not even a single
Mehbooba has been left only with debits
one of the commitments it had made. It is also
in her account and absolutely nothing to her
After three
true that this step fits into the bigger strategy of
credit. The BJP has exploited her for all they
years in
the BJP for 2019.
could and then they have left her in the lurch.
this ­alliance,
Any democratically-elected government is
This, and the fact that nobody is sorry at the
Mehbooba has
better than having central rule in a state, but
demise of this government, is one part of the
even more importantly for Kashmir, the buffer
story. The other aspect is that everybody here is
been left only
that existed in this region is now gone. I mean
looking at the BJP’s withdrawal of support and
with debits in
here the buffer that existed between the govern-
its exit from J&K as a strategy by the govern-
her account.
ment of India and the people of Kashmir. This
ment of India and the BJP from the point of
was a role that the PDP and Mehbooba Mufti
view of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Everything
had been playing. Now, for anything that goes wrong here, for
the BJP and the Centre have been doing here, whether you talk
everything (untoward) that happens, it is the government of
about engineering the Hindu-versus-Muslim conflict, or the
India that will be directly blamed. Mufti Mohammad Sayeed is
Jammu-versus-Kashmir conflict, fits into that strategy. This is
no longer alive but had he been, I’m sure he would have played
why, I find, even people in Jammu are happy that this govern-
this game differently. After all, he was a mature politician. O
ment has fallen. For, even in Jammu, there has been a great deal
of disenchantment against them.
(As told to Pragya Singh)
The other implication of this development is that it has given
(Yashwant Sinha, a former finance and external affairs
rise to apprehensions here that the government of India will
minister, has led a team of concerned citizens to Kashmir
now pursue a harder policy as far as Kashmir is concerned.
several times in the last year and a half.)
2 July 2018 OUTLOOK 27