The Congress-NCP Kashmir saga is beginning to look like Subhash Ghai’s Saudagar. We are now into the third generation of the story. Sixty years ago the Kashmir dispute began. Then we had Nehru and Sheikh Abdullah doing a bhai-bhai routine. Then, in 1953, the brothers fell apart. Nehru incarcerated Sheikh Abdullah and blotted his record as a democrat and a man who obeyed the Rule of Law. That generation failed to tackle the issue of Kashmir.

As far as Indira Gandhi was concerned, she could blow hot and cold on the issue and treat Sheikh Abdullah like some family retainer rather than a leader of a large state of India. (She treated the rest of India not much better when she lost her cool.) Elections had to be rigged in 1983 to make quite sure Kashmiris did not get infected by the disease of democracy. Whenever convenient, any Abdullah could be tarred with the secessionist brush. The next generation of Rajiv Gandhi and Farooq Abdullah started off better, but still things went from bad to worse.

Now 20 years on, we have another generation of the Abdullahs and the Nehru-Gandhi family. This time it looks like there may be a happy ending. For one thing, Congress does not have the overwhelming power it used to have. It needs all the friends it can get. But, also as we saw in the case of Mizoram, it is possible to convert guerrilla warriors into democrats, and teach them to fight elections rather than wars. India is beginning to get relaxed about any threat of balkanisation, the fear that haunted the first generation of leaders after 1947. The anti-Hindi agitation of the 1960s was settled consensually, even though Annadurai was threatening cessation in Lok Sabha itself. The Khalistan disputes of the 1980s, the long struggle in the NEFA region with the many local communities-Nagas, Mizos and many more got settled eventually. Each time a judicious combination of guns and ballot boxes has worked. So can we hope the same for Kashmir, at last?

... contd.