Rameshwar Singh Jamwal
The ticking time bomb has finally exploded and caused destruction and damage at unprecedented scales. The flash floods caused by incessant rains in the entire state of J and K was not something unexpected, though the political leadership of the state may take solace by saying that they had not anticipated such an eventuality as rains and floods of this magnitude have revisited the state after more than hundred years. But you can’t expect a better statement from a politically bankrupt leadership which was visionless and clueless to foresee the looming danger which was knocking state’s doors almost every year, for it is this leadership or their ancestors, who are responsible for such destruction by contributing to the fast ecological imbalance, large scale deforestation, and their criminal negligence to plan any way out. The persons who are facing enquiries before Accountability Commission for causing damage to the forests and looting of Forest Department are ministers in present dispensation, thousands of acres of State and forest land is gifted to the land grabbers under an act passed by the state, called Roshni Act, three past or present Chief Ministers having bungalows in encroached Forest Land in Jammu who contributed in anti graft bodies defunct to protect such criminal elements enjoying power, and hundreds of such more examples, the tragedy was waiting to happen.
One can pen down an entire book dwelling on the reasons for such horrendous situation but to sum up it in a few hundred words in the present write up, you have to be very choosy about your words and the major reasons to be covered.
The fault lines leading to the present tragedy and similar one’s which may occur in near future, fissures run vey deep with no signs of their being bridged with present way of thinking. These fault lines run both at physical and psychological level. At physical level, experts have identified the reasons, peculiar shape of Kashmir Valley, occupying of major drains in Jammu region and lakes in Kashmir by land mafia, large scale deforestation resulting in less holding of water by plants, shrubs and trees, inability of only natural drain of Kashmir, Jhelum, to hold or flush out waters collected from thousands of square kilometers of catchment areas and so on. Instead of calling such experts to suggest ways to overcome the impending disaster, valley based leadership remained busy in discussing and devising ways to attain Azadi, Autonomy, Self Rule, Joint Control of State and such like impractical solutions and never bothered to touch such like issues concerning the lives of present and future generations. Jammu and Ladakh’s problems on this front are man made, but have genesis in the psychological fault line emerging from Kashmir which needs to be understood and properly analysed, without any biased opinion or preconceived notions, if you are really interested in finding permanent solution. Such suggestions can invite outright rejection, condemnation, ridicule or even threats from vested interests but need to be projected for the ultimate benefit of hoi polloi of this state who have nothing to do with big game plans.
This fault line started emerging around 1947, when it was clear that the country would attain freedom, there would be a separate nation in the neighborhood based on ideology of religion. The gullible masses of Valley were fed with anti India sentiments and ideas that their fate lies with their co-religionists aspiring for a separate nation. The country attained freedom, the neo converts to secularist bandwagon captured power but instead of curbing those simmering religious feelings and the zealots, they encouraged and patronised them and allowed Anti India feelings to flourish and gain ground, antipathy to Indian state was considered as prized feeling and the week kneed Indian political leadership allowed the things to go out of hand slowly. In order to consolidate and gain grip over all organs of state, to subjugate all pro India forces and to bleed Indian state, even mediocrity was tolerated in institutions which required excellence. To achieve these twin objectives, below average persons came to be accommodated to man all important positions in almost all organs of the State, Civil Secretariat and even at junior level positions. Sycophants and illiterates from Jammu region were given important political assignments just to project a semblance of sharing of power. Even those services which required specialisations and higher order capabilities, like those of KAS, Medical and Engineering Services were stuffed with people from a particular religion and region, by manipulating the results of recruiting agencies, little realising that ultimately their own people will suffer because of such poor stuff manning key positions. And it is the work of this stuff, which is every where to be seen, by any body, that the commoners of State and Valley have been made to suffer. The ill planning in fast expanding cities, ill designed and below standard bridges, hospitals, roads, bunds, drainage systems and so on poor health care system, the scams ridden and seldom working civil secretariat, all has been digested in the neurotic feelings of hatred for Indian state. I am reminded of an astonishing reply given by a leading secessionist intellectual of Kashmir to one of my colleagues, who pointed out to him that corruption was eating vitals of Kashmir. He said that even corruption helps to drain Indian money and this is one of our sacred mission. People with such mission abound in Kashmir and they are responsible for the present day problem in Kashmir but nobody will admit it openly. The same venom spitting against their present saviours, the armed forces and the Indian state, the same machinations to extract as much from Government of India and then siphoning of major part of same reason of bleeding Indian state to weaken it, again projecting a weak and corrupt leadership in Jammu region, victimising and harassing the competent and honest bureaucrats to adjust local favorites, strengthening those elements who can be helpful in this perceived noble cause, either willingly or due to sheer ignorance, cultivating a favourable press and so called intelligentia at national level to project a biased and coloured vision of Kashmir as part of a grand design but who could have imagined that all these grand designs could be set at naught by nature, which was witnessing and bearing this onslaught for more than sixty years. It has repaid back and with full fury. Vested interests will resist all such attempts, will try to derail the process and attempts at local and international level will be made to scuttle any such attempt to let the commoners enjoy a peaceful and prosperous life under an emerging power, the Indian State. The future is in your hand, the leadership of Kashmir, one more wrong step and Kashmir will again revert Back to Kashyap Mar, from where it once emerged, the choice is yours.
