Prof Gull Wani
Following the much-discussed ceasefire, security experts are engaged in analysing the way forward, and peace advocates are not left behind. A retired Indian Army chief cautioned that war should neither be considered good nor the first option. A prominent academic remarked that a juvenile sentiment about war has been generated, portraying it as a mere game. More significantly, some commentators have highlighted the challenges in Jammu and Kashmir and emphasized the need to address these as a national priority. It is imperative to acknowledge the public sentiment in Kashmir following the Pahalgam carnage and to appreciate the political maturity of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The geopolitical challenges that have come to the forefront require rational analysis.
National security expert Praveen Swamy, in The Print (May 19, 2025), stated that India needs to focus on winning in Kashmir, not fighting Pakistan. He asserts that the Pakistani army has shown a willingness to engage in conflict, which has rekindled hope among the pro-Pakistan constituency within Kashmir. The Pakistani generals, he notes, are not debating the threat from India or the potential economic damage from the Indus Waters Treaty; instead, they are considering how much space the crisis has created to escalate the covert war in Kashmir”. Past military strikes have resulted in only temporary tactical pauses and have not led to reducing the region’s vulnerability. There is need to go to the drawing room and draw lessons to strengthen core competence of different institutions. During the Vietnam War, U.S. Secretary of Défense Robert McNamara explained everything through statistics and quantitative data to measure the war’s progress. Like weather reports, he would detail troop movements, casualties, and enemy forces destroyed. The United States ultimately lost the war, and this approach came to be known as the “McNamara fallacy.” The reality is that emotions and sentiments of the people cannot be captured in figures and it always needs a half-naked political fakir like great Gandhi to go nearer the people to understand their dilemma. As rightly stated, it is better to live with doubt than to have answers that might be wrong. Against this backdrop, the following three points require attention from those concerned with state and human security:
First, there are visible challenges in Kashmir, and it is time to legitimise post-2024 emergence of the political order in Jammu and Kashmir. The elected representatives should become the visible markers of governance rather than non-elected institutions.Hope will return to Kashmir if we indicate a clear future. Both elected and non-elected institutions have, in the past, acted in unison to handle the most difficult challenges. Speaking at the University of California, Berkeley, on April 23, 2018, Omar Abdullah noted that the majority of individuals fighting in Kashmir are Kashmiris. However, from the last count, there were about sixteen or eighteen nationalities of people caught or killed in Jammu and Kashmir” Hence, the endgame is winning the trust of people of Jammu and Kashmir. Kashmir has become a barricaded democracy where people and power are separated. The Union Territory governance in Kashmir is much weaker compared to other Union Territories due to the excessive power of the security apparatus. Today, youth are part of Industry 3.0, engaged in technology, innovation, and social media. They are part of the digital revolution and other social movements. They witness success stories elsewhere but are frustrated in their hopelessness about the future. According to the Ministry of Home Affairs, the unemployment rate in Jammu and Kashmir stands at 18.3 percent, whereas the national average is now 8 percent. Franklin D. Roosevelt once said, “We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.” The paths are made by walking, not waiting. It is better to be exhausted from little bits of effort and learning than to be tired of doing absolutely nothing.
Second, theSecurity and political leaders have been reading too much into what Pakistan’s army chief (now Field Marshal) said about the two-nation theory. Emphasizing Pakistan’s Islamic identity has always been an ideological compulsion for many governments in Pakistan. Military Chief General Zia-ul-Haq explained this in simple terms. When asked why Pakistan maintained such an induced hostility towards India, he replied: “Turkey or Egypt, if they stop being aggressively Muslim, they will remain exactly what they are. But if Pakistan does not become and remain aggressively Islamic, it will become India again.” Herein lies the challenge and opportunity of engaging Pakistan and its various social and political constituencies to create a long-term infrastructure for peace. It is only through people-to-people contact that these hostilities can be reduced. Late Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto told veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar that only people-to-people contact can resolve the India/Pakistan issue. Pakistani scholar Hussein Haqqani likened the bilateral relationship to a joint family with first cousins who are close in every way until the matter of dividing the family inheritance arises.
Third, what makes this four-day war between India and Pakistan structurally different is China’s role, whose strategic thinking is conditioned by the belief that there can be no two suns in the sky. Former Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao, in a recent article, argued: “Beijing is not only a diplomatic shield for Pakistan but a material enabler. Pakistan’s air capabilities are influenced by Chinese platforms. India must prepare for conflicts where adversaries are networked, platforms are interoperable, and escalation is layered with ambiguity.” There is now a new diplomatic challenge and the potential danger of episodic conflicts between two adversaries, making things beyond bilateral. The United States, as a crisis manager, and China’s military posture could become recurring factors. In fact, in a well-researched book by Andrew Small, The China-Pakistan Axis, the British author states that it was China that kindled Pakistan’s interest in the use of proxy warfare against India. This was discussed during a meeting between President Ayub Khan and Chinese leader Zhou Enlai. The issue at hand is how India can face this new challenge, which is not possible without securing the immediate neighbourhood. But in India foreign policy towards neighbours is increasingly being overlaid by domestic political and ideological considerations. Many experts warn that if this continues, India will find itself more isolated than at any time since independence. It is also feared that if Delhi continues to spurn SAARC, it could open the door for China to be invited, leading to Chinese penetration in the subcontinent and further augmentation of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
In light of the above discussion, it is imperative for the managers of the Indian state to deeply reflect on the rapidly evolving developments. It is essential that we think of Jammu and Kashmir and also consider securing our immediate neighbourhood.
(The author is Kashmir based Political Scientist)
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