In the images that are being flashed all over the country and the world, Jammu is beginning to be represented as communal and chauvinistic. This tends to obscure the more recent past of Jammu, the past twenty years of conflict when Jammu stood for much more — for its plurality, for its mixed life, for its inter-communal harmony, for its shared social and political spaces. These twenty years proved that there is a secular ethos that has seen the people of Jammu through very difficult phases of militancy and which has frustrated all attempts to use religious differences for creating communally divided constituencies.

This has been a testing period for all of Jammu — for Hindus and Muslims alike. Enough attempts were made to polarise the people on a communal basis during the period of militancy. There were occasions when important public or religious places were targeted by militants- there were twice shoot-outs in the famous Raghunath temple, and in the crowded railway station. Fundamentalist organisations sought political advantage out of these incidents, but the people refused to fall prey to these provocations. There were numerous occasions of selective killings of minorities by the militants in far-flung parts of the region, mainly aimed at provoking communal backlash. But beyond generating tension for a few days or months, these incidents did not succeed in creating permanent divisions. During the last such incident of selective killings in Kulhand, in Doda district, Hindus and Muslims jointly organised a peace march and restrained the political parties from using the issue for their own vested interests. During this period, attempts were made to use militancy to generate and perpetuate electoral politics, but these did not succeed in the long run. Attempts were also made to float the age-old formula for resolution of conflict on the basis of a division of the state on communal lines, whether under the name of the Chenab formula or as a trifurcation of the state. But such formulae did not appeal to regional sensibilities and were clearly rejected.

... contd.