Stating that the mood in Kashmir Valley is sullen and anti-India sentiment is growing, the former National Security Advisor and Intelligence Chief M.K. Narayanan has claimed that the current developments in Jammu and Kashmir do not look very promising.In his lengthy write-up to an Indian Daily, Narayanan has said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Jammu and Kashmir in November was premised on the belief that all that was needed to repair the unsatisfactory relations between Srinagar and Delhi was infusion of additional funds for the economic development of the State. This is the ‘mirage’ that Delhi has long chased, dictated by the convoluted nature of the semantics between Kashmir and Delhi. It has produced few results. The added expectation that Prime Minister Modi’s visit would rekindle the ‘Vajpayee spirit’ of ‘Insaniyat, Jamhooriat and Kashmiriyat’ has also been belied.He said that the Prime Minister did announce a ‘huge bonanza’ of Rs. 80,000 crore for infrastructure and economic development of the State — falling victim to Jammu and Kashmir Finance Minister Haseeb Drabu’s ‘siren song,’ that with adequate financial assistance from the Centre, the State would not only be on the road to recovery but this would impact favourably on Kashmir-India relations.
He said that Jammu and Kashmir today is a region that is challenged both from within and from outside. “Signs of alienation and a growing anti-India sentiment may look familiar, but a churn is taking place beneath the surface. Since the decade (2002-2003 to 2012-2013) when Prime Ministers Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh visited the Valley ‘bearing gifts’ for economic development and enlarging employment opportunities in the State, which seemed to produce results for some time, the situation has fundamentally changed.”Addressing directly both to the State and Central Governments Narayanan had stated that It is imperative that Delhi and Srinagar understand the nature of the change taking place, and the consequent shift in attitudes in the Valley. “Adhering to the existing formulations on how to bring about normalcy in Jammu and Kashmir, ignoring trends that could well have a tectonic impact on developments in the State, could prove to be a grievous error.”
“New Delhi must, first and foremost, shed its pet illusion that the ‘so-called’ alienation of the Kashmiri people can be overcome by providing larger and larger tranches of funds at every opportunity, on the plea of economic development,” he said adding that the PDP-BJP Agenda of Alliance is little more than an alliance of convenience. “Built into it clearly are seeds of both its incompetence and its failure and, hence, it should be no surprise that the coalition has hardly taken off. Currently, Mufti Sayeed, more adept at Machiavellian tactics than governance, finds himself with a weak hand, not only because of the nature of the alliance but more so because circumstances have changed since 2002-2005, when he was last in charge.”While talking about Chief Minister Mufti Muhammad Sayeed, the India’s former security advisor says that Mufti is physically less active today, and possibly having become more intransigent and intolerant, he is hardly in a position to understand or deal with the current psyche of the Kashmiri youth. “His pre-occupation seems to be to perpetuate his legacy by ensuring the succession of his daughter, Mehbooba, to the ‘gaddi’ in Srinagar. The latter’s sympathy for anti-India forces, including militants like the HuM, is well known, and her elevation would add yet another disturbing element to the current chain of developments.”