J&K issue can’t be confined to Valley, say interlocutors

The report of the interlocutors group on Jammu and Kashmir that the central government had set up last year may not go the way of many similar reports about the troubled state that have been done earlier by people like NK Vohra and KC Pant. First, the group kept to its deadline of a year. Second, the report is not voluminous but compact, according to one of its authors.

The key thrust of the report seems to be that the Kashmir question should not be looked at through the narrow lens of the Kashmir Valley, only of Muslims in Srinagar and specifically the Sunni Muslims in the state capital and its environs.

The group after travelling extensively and quite exhaustively through the 22 districts of the main regions of the state – the Valley, Jammu, Rajouri and Poonch, Ladakh and Kargil –  has come to the conclusion that time is now to address the concerns of the different stakeholders. That is, Sunni Muslims in the Valley, Shias in Kargil, Buddhists in Ladakh, Hindus in Jammu and the significant Muslim-majority districts in Jammu, the majority Hindu and Sikhs in Poonch town, the Muslim Gujars and Bakarwals in the rural hinterland of Poonch, the Muslim majority in Rajouri town.

Two of the three-member interlocutors – Dileep Padgaonkar and Radha Kumar  – expressed satisfaction that consultations were held on the broadest base, meeting women's representatives, Dal Lake boatmen's union, the intelligentsia, students, the sarpanches and the public at large at meetings that state legislators organised in all the 22 districts and in the three regions of the state.

While Padgoankar emphasises that it is necessary to recognise the complexity of the Jammu and Kashmir issue which arises from regional differences and disparities, the status of difference classes and communities. Kumar opined, “In Jammu, there is communal polarisation when it comes to the status question. The Muslims in Jammu feel a sense of solidarity with the Valley Muslims on the question of status of the state.”

She also said that the major issue that the group could not handle was that of the “lost generation”, which was peculiar to any conflict situation, whether it be Sri Lanka or South Africa. In the last 20 years of conflict, a whole generation of Kashmiris had not only lost lives but also lost opportunities to lead lives of their choice.