If you haven’t heard what is going on in Kashmir, here’s a primer from Jon Allsop of the Columbia Journalism Review:
IN EARLY AUGUST, the government of Narendra Modi, India’s recently reelected Hindu-nationalist prime minister, moved troops into the Kashmir Valley, which is majority-Muslim, then cut the region off. The internet and landlines went down; TV channels were taken off the air. Prominent local politicians were detained. Without consultation, Modi revoked the special autonomy Kashmir has long enjoyed under a provision of India’s Constitution, and split the wider Jammu and Kashmir state into two territories subject to governance by New Delhi. Since then, the area has been on lockdown. Yesterday, during the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha, the streets were mostly empty, and mosques were mostly closed.
Now, as you may know, I am internet famous in India for calling a right-wing pro-Modi news anchor there an “asshole.” The whole incident is now caught up in the courts, involving allegations of slander of a sitting member of parliament who was falsely accused of plagiarizing my work. I find the whole mess endlessly amusing, but it doesn’t really concern me. I’m generally opposed to the style of politics practiced by Narendra Modi’s government but I don’t have any favorites in India. It’s not my business.
However, Kashmir is a flashpoint between India and Pakistan that could potentially lead to a nuclear war, so I am not indifferent to what takes place there. I don’t pretend to be an expert on Indian politics, but I know enough to realize that a lot of the problem here involves Article 370 of the Indian Constitution. To be more specific, it involves a particular part of Article 370 that is called Article 35A.
Article 35A of the Indian Constitution was an article that empowered the Jammu and Kashmir state’s legislature to define “permanent residents” of the state and provide special rights and privileges to those permanent residents. It was added to the Constitution through a Presidential Order, i.e., The Constitution (Application to Jammu and Kashmir) Order, 1954 – issued by the President of India on 14 May 1954, under Article 370. The state of Jammu and Kashmir defined these privileges to include the ability to purchase land and unmovable property, ability to vote and contest elections, seeking government employment and availing other state benefits such as higher education and health care. Non-permanent residents of the state, even if Indian citizens, were not entitled to these ‘privileges’.
On 5 August 2019, the President of India issued a Presidential Order, whereby all the provisions of the Indian Constitution are to apply to the State without any special provisions. This would imply that the State’s separate Constitution stands abrogated, including the privileges allowed by the Article 35A
Prime Minister Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) included opposition to Article 370 in their 2019 party platform, so its effective revocation shouldn’t come as a complete surprise. Kashmir is overwhelmingly Muslim, which means that a ban on non-residents buying or selling property is essentially a ban on Hindus buying or selling property. This and other exclusive privileges for Kashmiris have a discriminatory effect in the opinion of the BJP. However, this revision extends farther that that into issues of autonomy and self-governance.
If it were possible to make these changes without unrest, it would not have been necessary to arrest Kashmiri political leaders and close down their media outlets. Here’s some reporting from the New York Times.
Ever since Kashmir’s autonomy was suddenly revoked last week, Raja Mohi-ud-din, an editor at one of the few Kashmiri newspapers still operating, has been starting his days extremely early…
…His workers cannot get to the printing press — they live deep in neighborhoods totally cut off.
There is no way to electronically transmit data to the printer — the Indian government has shut down mobile, internet and landline connections…
…On Monday, a week into the lockdown, Indian security forces sealed off main roads, deployed surveillance helicopters, cleared side streets and turned children away from parks. It was Eid al-Adha, one of the holiest days on the Muslim calendar, and most major mosques were ordered shut. Families that usually rejoice with friends found themselves alone and depressed inside their homes.
India is often celebrated as the largest democracy in the world but the Modi government is demonstrating some very undemocratic tendencies. This is actually the point that freshman parliamentarian Mahua Moitra was trying to make in her maiden speech where she accused the government of demonstrating several early warning signs of fascism. For her efforts, she was wrongly accused of stealing from my 2017 critique of the fascist tendencies of the Trump movement. I don’t have any particular affinity for her or her political party, but she came to her conclusions honestly without causing me an injury. The way she was attacked reminded me of how Trump’s critiques are attacked here in America.
I feel some concern for the civil liberties of ordinary Indians and the health of the free press and their democracy, but I’m primarily worried that adventurism in Kashmir could easily escalate into an enormously dangerous situation. As an outsider, it has always been interesting to me that India and Pakistan split along sectarian lines but left one uniformly Muslim country and one pluralistic ecumenical country. It seems an odd and hard to maintain balance, and it seems to be coming to a head now there is a Hindu nationalist government in charge in New Dehli.
When the government moves in force into Kashmir and orders the mosques closed during Eid, that’s a pretty strong indication that India is moving to become the mirror image of Pakistan. No one serious praises whatever passes for democracy and ecumenicalism in Pakistan. It’s not going to be received well in Kashmir nor in the region.
I don’t know enough to assess the degree of danger involved here, but it’s far higher than I would like.
