"Why didn't you Indians come before?" demanded the young Kashmiri lawyer. He was addressing a room packed with civil society activists from various parts of India who had come to Srinagar to enter into the first-ever dialogue with their counterparts in Jammu and Kashmir. After 11 years of silence and deepening distrust, educationists, doctors, psychologists, journalists, film-makers, human rights workers, social and political activists, lawyers and retired civil and armed forces personnel, had come as concerned citizens to link up with the activists of Jammu and Kashmir fighting for justice, peace and human rights.
Such an angry outburst was to be expected, for many of the activists who were in the forefront of struggles for substantive democracy and human rights in India, had incongruously chosen to remain silent on injustices suffered by Kashmir's civilians. "Why have you come now, to rub balm on the wounds made by your security forces," asked a Kashmir University teacher. What the Kashmiri activists wanted was not relief but partnership against the all-engulfing violence.
The tone for this meeting of Kashmiri activists and professionals from various parts of India was set by an elegiac poem by G N Gauhar contrasting the fabled beauty of the Valley with a land now become barren, houses burnt, children killed, and a place where women no longer laugh. The Kashmiri participants did most of the talking, for it was their voice, silenced for so long, which had to be transported. Their problem was the systematic denial of justice by the Indian State and the total collapse of all social delivery systems. New Delhi may insistently claim that the UN Security Council Resolution on plebiscite was no longer valid, but as the J & K Bar Association Chairman, Zafar A Shah passionately avowed, most Kashmiris still believe that the political status of Jammu and Kashmir was not a settled issue. Even now, he said, the hearts of the Kashmiris could be touched "if India would fly its national flag at half mast for a fortnight in recognition of the suffering of the Kashmiri people".
Victim's perspective
The "victim's perspective" was necessarily different from that of the "non-victim", as was clear from the two days of remarkably candid exchanges in Srinagar, on 10 and 11 June.