Top Kashmiri separatist leader Yaseen Malik has urged former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to prevail on his party leadership to abstain from subverting the current Indo-Pak initiative for the resolution of Kashmir, which has entered its “crucial phase.” In an unusual “open letter” addressed to the former Prime Minister, Malik credits Vajpayee for being the pioneer of the present peace process and, therefore, having the “onerous responsibility” of “safeguarding it from the compulsions of domestic politics.”

In fact, Malik is the first top separatist leader who has publicly sought BJP’s support for the Congress-led UPA to push forth the Indo-Pak peace process especially at a time when there are feelers from Islamabad that a “Kashmir agreement” is in the works.

“I have observed with much distress that your good self along with your colleagues, through your public comments, might have started adopting a changed approach towards the ongoing peace process on Kashmir,” Malik says and refers to the letters which Vajpayee himself and L K Advani have written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh thereby creating doubts about the talks process. “Then again, we have all witnessed Jaswant Singh’s disruption of the Rajya Sabha while calling into question Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s moves on the peace process and raising alarms about its direction”.

“As a seasoned and experienced statesman, you are well aware of how difficult it is to exercise political will and take visionary steps and, most importantly, how challenging the follow-through is to ensure,” Malik says in his letter. “As the leading opposition party of India, the choices that you and your colleagues make have a direct bearing on the agility of the present government in Delhi to move forward in bold ways. You have an important role and great responsibility as opposition to build political will for the weighty decisions yet to be made on the peace process”.

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