Jammu and Kashmir's powerlessness found an expression in a viral satire days before the heavy snowfall when Kashmir Valley was filled with worries of a dry spell.
A man, personifying Chillai Kalan (the harshest 40-day winter period), visits the chief minister to report the unusual absence of snow and requests that it be permitted to fall. The chief minister, embodying bureaucratic helplessness, labours to explain that even weather patterns are ‘under control’ and require clearance from New Delhi. He finally pleads with a bureaucrat to arrange Chillaikalan’s meeting with the Lieutenant Governor, the Centre's appointed administrator in Kashmir.
The spoof cleverly captures Kashmir's political reality where nothing misses the overarching control of the central government that extends beyond the administrative matters into the very fabric of daily life. Nothing can escape it, not even nature.
Through the metaphor of missing snow, this highlights the region's diminished autonomy and democracy on the one hand and on the other the reduction of the local government to at best act as an intermediary for forwarding the local complaints.
It thus showcases the gaps between the promised land after the National Conference rode the wave of lofty expectations and assurances to secure power in Jammu and Kashmir and the on-ground performance.
As the dust settles, more than two months after the elections, governance is marked by a lack of clear rules outlining legislators’ powers and the glaring issues of employment, electricity disruptions and basic development - revealing a complete disconnect.
Legislative Paralysis & Crisis of Credibility
One of the most telling indicators of this mismatch is the prolonged delay in disbursing the Constituency Development Funds (CDF). For over two months since taking their oaths, the 90 legislators, comprising both ruling and opposition members, have been left empty-handed. The funds that are crucial for addressing local development needs are as much missing as clear guidelines outlining their powers and limitations, tarnishing the credibility of the new government and alienating the very electorate it claims to serve.
While the youth, are left grappling with the same stagnation and lack of unemployment prospects that have plagued the region since 2019 when Jammu and Kashmir was stripped of autonomy and cleaved into two centrally controlled Union Territories, the promised free electricity rings hollow in the face of regular disruptions and exorbitantly priced electricity. This talk is now replaced by the promise of an uninterrupted power supply conditional to the installation of smart meters – which the common masses complain has added to their financial burdens.
What makes such failures even more jarring is the inability of the new government to set its spending priorities right. The National Conference is under fire for going on a vehicle-buying spree, the optics of which look extremely jarring, if not cruel. While essential services remain in disarray, there is a grand splurging on luxury items.
The National Conference’s election promises were high on steroids – from promising development and jobs to restoring Jammu and Kashmir’s autonomy and statehood. While one of the political planks is already put in the cold storage, the promise of statehood has been locked in a fine glass case with a professed assurance from the Centre, even as the latter is non-committal. Far from fulfilling these ambitious political adjectives, the response to the minimalist demands of the public – the basic issues of sadak, bijli and paani – is as dismal.
Between Optics & Conciliation
Partly, the limp mode of governance stems from the governance structure that has clipped the wings of the elected government. Partly, it also stems from a lack of imagination – pushing National Conference on an overdrive of politicking and optics manufacturing while navigating the difficult path of not just altered structures but lopsided laws and policies that were framed by the BJP as mere executive decisions without consultations with stakeholders.
For instance, the reservation policy is a pandoras box opened by the BJP government with disastrous divisive potential. While the government was put on the defensive in the face of recent protests demanding rationalization of reservations, the party members including chief minister Omar Abdullah’s son joined the latter to mollify the anger.
The anger can at best be suppressed for the short term by such tactics or by pretending that there can be some reconciliation with the Centre on serious issues. It is wishful thinking. Neither the BJP’s political and ideological ambitions in Kashmir encourage harmonious relations, nor does the system it has created.
National Conference’s decapacitation suits the BJP which wants to see the former discredited, the gains of which will not accrue to any other regional political player but solely to the BJP. Thus, far from yielding to demands of statehood, the BJP’s strategy would be to pin down the Omar Abdullah government and disable it from performing. By holding elections and handing over the reins of a powerless system, the BJP can then direct public anger to the new government.
The National Conference cannot be faulted for the tumultuous changes and alterations in policy decisions that impact the public adversely, or for the increasing impatience. But it would certainly be responsible for its lack of political acumen and its inability to assess the ground realities – both in Jammu and Kashmir and New Delhi.
The political twists and turns in Kashmir’s history have taught National Conference to be on New Delhi’s right side. But this is a different central government from the past. It doesn’t want a compliant local leadership in Kashmir. It wants a completely decimated one. Given this cold hard fact, the only source of its power is its electorate, not the string pullers seated in India’s capital. Its priority should be protecting the former, not the other way round.
The best course of action would be to meet some of the expectations of the local masses by focusing on low-hanging fruits. While the government must get its public messaging right, it will have to think of innovative ways to use the few opportunities it has at its disposal. It can leverage its powers in the health, education, tourism, social welfare and municipal departments to deliver on some of the promises. But it needs to go beyond that. It must break its silence on human rights issues, arbitrary detentions and terminations and unsustainable development models that are wreaking havoc on the region’s ecosystems and livelihoods.
It would be pragmatic to try and mend fences with the Centre through cautious handling of several issues and attempt to build pathways for some working relation. But it would be foolish to expect that the National Conference’s silence will appease the BJP which is waiting for Kashmir’s largest regional party to die under the weight of a crisis of credibility.
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