Successful Lok Sabha polling augurs well for Kashmir, now prepare for Assembly elections

Having achieved peaceful elections in the first round of the parliamentary polls in Jammu & Kashmir, the portends augur well for peace and stability

Everything connected with elections and the election machinery in Jammu & Kashmir has a strong relationship to its future. It also indicates the status of things in the erstwhile troubled state now steadily moving towards achieving a state of normalcy.

I may have witnessed many elections in Jammu and Kashmir but the most turbulent one was in September 1999. This was the Lok Sabha poll in the wake of the victory over Pakistan in the Kargil War, which had ended just two months before. It was a period with terrorism and separatism at a peak. The notorious so-called fedayeen actions by Pakistani suicide fighters had just struck the state placing all security forces on the defensive before they found initial solutions against them.

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The BJP was making a brave attempt to establish electoral roots in the Valley. It was extremely unfortunate that its candidate for the Anantnag Lok Sabha seat, Ghulam Hyder Noorani, was killed along with his driver and a party worker, by an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) near Bijbehara. Electoral violence targeting candidates and preventing them from electioneering was rife at that time. Even more common was targeting polling booths to prevent electoral turnout. A low turnout was touted around as an endorsement of a particular constituency’s anti India sentiment.

A few terrorists usually appeared and fired at the local police or threw a hand grenade to create a scare and some civilian casualties, forcing people to melt away. The Army was not permitted closer than one kilometre from a booth. Its professional deployment next to a booth and the domination of the area around would have been enough deterrence against the terrorists who would seldom seek contact with regular soldiers. Yet, there was a perceived sensitivity about deploying the Army because then the elections would be considered unfair and the electoral process would be seen with a stigma attached which the world would not see as free and fair.

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Most members of the political community of J&K would have preferred the employment of the Army under certification from observers, but the system never embarked upon taking these legitimate risks. Serving as the Colonel General Staff at the well-known Headquarters (HQ) Victor Force of the Indian Army’s Rashtriya Rifles (RR) at Awantipura, I was swamped by reports of terrorist movement. South Kashmir in those days had over a thousand terrorists holed up in innumerable safe houses and in jungle/mountain hideouts. On election day for Anantnag constituency, watching from my HQ I could actually see the areas where grenade blasts were occurring and how the terrorists were being chased and encountered. A couple of Infantry Combat Vehicles (ICVs) would have been extremely handy and would have afforded good protection for our troops. That was never to be.

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With the moral high ground that the Indian Army occupied and continues to do so, combat vehicles of any kind have always been a No-No. Compare this with Pakistan which never ceases to employ every military resource against terrorists and many times against innocents in remote rural areas caught in the vortex of the fight between the Army and the terror organisations.

There is no doubt that the conduct of successful and peaceful polls contributes to normalcy and helps cement the path to stability and peace. The realisation was starkly revealed in 1996 when the polls were held after a hiatus of seven years, and that too with abysmal electoral turnout. The system accepted it and continued to progress with more such polls. The panchayat polls were conducted in 2011 with a good turnout, proving that democratic norms were at the height of inclusion and would make the major difference between stability and turbulence.

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The decision by the Government of India to bring the electoral process back to Jammu and Kashmir so soon (five years) after the amendment of Article 370 in 2019 and the likely abidance with the Supreme Court directive to hold Assembly elections before September 30, 2024, are actually force multipliers in the integrative process. It is with this in mind that I gave a description of the elections in early years.

Having achieved peaceful elections in the first round of the parliamentary polls in Jammu and Kashmir, the portends augur well for peace and stability. Unrealistic expectations of zero terror, infiltration and recruitment must not be placed upon the security forces. They have delivered well and deserve our appreciation. Stray incidents will continue in the form of targeting of minorities, migrants, soldiers on leave and unarmed policemen. These are signs of dying proxy war capability. Every effort must be made by the state and the security forces to eliminate such feasibility.

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The hybrid content of the proxy effort has diluted to a great extent due to a number of factors. The media is no longer enthused by separatism nor promotion of radical jingoism. The NIA has successfully taken control of terror financing and there aren’t enough hideouts or safe houses in the mainstream built up areas. Terrorism under ambit of proxies is classically limited to the Pir Panjal belt but can always be considered a seed element which can grow exponentially.

Was there a Pakistani intent to disrupt the current election at all? The intent would surely have been there, but current capability to effectively interfere appears low. Alternatively, this one is being exploited for lulling the stakeholders while preparation is made for the Assembly elections which bear more potential for disruption. Sentiments are also usually difficult to bring to the boil in parliamentary polls, while the Assembly elections can throw up all kinds of unpredictable issues. Thus, even though stakeholders for peace and stability in J&K should celebrate at the end of the current polls, the heavy lifting is yet to come.

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From a security point of view, focus on intelligence, infiltration of terrorist leadership, financing, movement of narcotics and the domination of the rural countryside must be undertaken as a continuum to the current efforts for the ongoing elections. There should also be no let-up in the launch and execution of welfare projects. Money is flowing into the Union Territory in positive ways and should remain rooted to the development side without finding ways of being siphoned. This is the time for the NIA to achieve its next big success after its decision to go after the financial networks.

Perhaps another word from the Central government about its promised intent of restoring status from UT to full-fledged state, will make a difference in the shifting sentiments of the populace. This should see an even better turnout than what Srinagar has currently witnessed. It will add much to the sentiments of Jammu which has sometimes felt equated with the anti-India segment, with its own status questioned.

What India needs to be careful about is the regional and global terrorist organisations and movements. The expected rise of a second cycle of global terror must not be allowed to mess with Jammu and Kashmir. We just have to isolate it to prevent any resurgence of pan-Islamist sentiment which has in the past sullied the thought process here. Keeping Jammu and Kashmir isolated is the key but alongside that, our own focus must remain upon signals picked up all around India, all the way from Afghanistan to Indonesia. No harm in being prepared and in readiness.

I, for one, would never like to see any Indian organisation in the predicament of September 1999 when we had to battle away to safeguard our electoral system and its application to Jammu and Kashmir. It’s towards that end that our stakeholders must work remembering that a successfully conducted election leading to duly constituted Assembly and government is a nail in the coffin of terror in Jammu and Kashmir.

The writer is a Member of the National Disaster Management Authority. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author.