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KASHMIR MUST BE FREE TO DECIDE ITS OWN FUTURE  
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Avishek Konar
May 13, 2025
Jacobin
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_ A cease-fire deal pulled India and Pakistan back from the brink of
conflict, but the danger hasn’t gone away. The ongoing denial of
democratic rights in Kashmir ensures that the region will remain a
source of instability and potential conflict. _

Bairi Ram and his wife, Purno Devi, surveying the damage after their
home was damaged by Pakistani shelling in Jammu, Indian-controlled
Kashmir., Atul Loke for The New York Times

 

A fragile peace was reached on May 10 between India and Pakistan after
four tense days of escalation following India’s Operation Sindoor
missile strikes, officially aimed at “terrorist infrastructure.”
This recent conflagration follows the killing of at least twenty-six
tourists and civilians
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armed militants in the picturesque meadow of Pahalgam in Kashmir on
April 22.

The dastardly attack on civilians in Pahalgam deserves to be condemned
in no uncertain terms. However, actions taken in the name of
“national security” by India have marginalized ordinary Kashmiris
and fueled anger that has the potential to bring about further
militancy.

Democracy Denied

The Kashmir conflict, though not a thousand years old, as Donald
Trump has claimed
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does have a long and tortuous history. The rulers of Kashmir, before,
during, and after British colonization, have always considered the
political aspirations of Kashmiris secondary to the geopolitical and
strategic importance of the land.

The hollowing out of the Instrument of Accession (IOA) is a case in
point. The local ruler, the Dogra Maharaja Hari Singh, signed the IOA
when he capitulated and agreed that Kashmir would become part of
India’s territory during the partition.

Central to the IOA was the constitutional provision of Article 370,
which assured the Kashmiri people autonomy over all matters besides
those pertaining to defense, external affairs, and communications. The
article was supposed to be temporary and provisional because there was
a promise of a referendum by which the people of Kashmir would decide
their own political fate — to remain part of India, to join up with
Pakistan, or to become an independent state.

In reality, successive Indian governments never intended to carry out
the plebiscite. The history of Jammu and Kashmir since independence
has seen the installation of puppet state governments, typically via
rigged elections, that acted at the behest of the central government
in Delhi, with the territorial integrity of India always taking
precedence over the aspirations of Kashmiris.

The thwarting of all democratic political struggles by the Kashmiri
people laid the ground for the emergence of armed resistance, which
began in earnest in the late 1980s. Led by the Jammu Kashmir
Liberation Front (JKLF), this movement was secular in orientation and
wanted to form an independent Kashmir. Both the Indian and Pakistani
governments were hostile to the JKLF because it did not fit into their
strategic territorial schemes, and it was eventually quashed.

The vision of both the Indian and Pakistani governments have been to
control the land regardless of the impact on the people. Successive
Indian governments have suppressed any and all dissenting voices in
Kashmir, carrying out grave human rights violations to keep the
population in check. These include killings
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disappearances, use of rape
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instrument of punishment, use of human shields
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and punitive laws like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) or
the Public Safety Act (PSA).

While governments led by the Indian National Congress put in place
puppet regimes and turned the Kashmir valley into one of the most
heavily militarized zones in the world, the current Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP)–led government has turbocharged some of these
long-standing repressive tendencies. In 2019, Narendra Modi’s
administration unconstitutionally abrogated Article 370, which had
promised autonomy to the people of Kashmir.

Long before 2019, a succession of presidential orders had hollowed out
the article, legally and politically, but its formal abrogation was
still a major escalation. In addition, the Modi government repealed
Article 35A, the Permanent Residents Law, which opened the door to
non-Kashmiris buying land in the state.

Major protests erupted across Kashmir in response. The government
clamped down on dissent by incarcerating prominent opposition leaders
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blocking 4G internet services, and hounding journalists, as with
the shutting down of the Srinagar office
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the _Kashmir Times_ in 2020.

Islamophobia and Hypernationalism

The Pahalgam attack of April 22 is ghastly by itself. Additionally, it
is counterproductive from the standpoint of the people of Kashmir. In
fact, it has brought a large portion of the Indian opposition to stand
behind the BJP-led government. It has created a climate of
hypernationalism where it has become imperative for citizens to stand
behind the actions of the Indian army.

The existing forms of Islamophobia across the country have widened and
manifested themselves in the ugliest forms possible. Kashmiri students
in universities across the country have been subjected to harassment
and violence
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In a similar way, attacks by the Indian military resulting in the
deaths of Pakistani civilians are likely to shore up support for an
otherwise unpopular army. The fighting has created a fertile ground
for the most reactionary tendencies to come to the fore, with the
deaths of innocent civilians on either side of the border.

The Indian authorities have demolished
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houses of nine suspected terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir since the
attack in Pahalgam. This is a form of collective punishment that is
akin to the Israeli approach, and can only breed more anger, with the
potential to turn disgruntled civilians into future militants.

It was not surprising that the Indian National Congress and a number
of other opposition parties quickly rallied behind
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far-right BJP and the actions of the army. However, even the
parliamentary Communist Parties — the Communist Party of India
(CPI) [[link removed]] and
the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)
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government’s decision to launch military action.

The Indian parliamentary left takes a nationalistic line, at least
when it comes to Kashmir, and elevates the territorial integrity of
India over Kashmiri aspirations to self-determination. The main
position of the parliamentary left since 2019 has been to call for the
reinstatement of Article 370, which avoids the question of
self-determination by prioritizing autonomy within India.

The CPI(M)’s statement
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that the strikes were “focused, measured, and non-escalatory,” and
stressed the need to protect “the integrity of the country”
instead of calling for immediate de-escalation. This is lamentable,
but consistent with the party’s recent stance. In the aftermath of
the Pulwama attack in 2019, the Kerala state assembly, where the left
bloc led by the CPI(M) has a majority, passed a unanimous resolution
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support and congratulating the Indian Army for its surgical strikes
in Balakot.

Operation Sindoor

US mediation was key to securing the cease-fire and preventing a
larger catastrophe. This was also the case in 2019, when diplomacy
helped avert a full-scale war, as noted by the former US secretary of
state Mike Pompeo in his memoir.

The much-vaunted Operation Sindoor achieved little. The perpetrators
of the Pahalgam tragedy remain at large. Even if some militant sites
were destroyed by the strikes, it is likely that they were rudimentary
and easily replaceable. However, the cost to India could be more
significant.

Pravin Sawhney is a prominent Indian military commentator whose videos
the Modi government has banned, along with numerous other critical
news outlets, ostensibly on grounds of national security. According to
Sawhney, these strikes have been counterproductive, exposing
weaknesses in India’s defense capabilities.

Pakistan deployed Chinese J-10 jets equipped with longer-range radars,
armed with PL-15 missiles, which, Sawhney reports
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beyond visual range. This may explain how the four Indian planes,
including French-made Rafale jets, were hit without their pilots
noticing it.

This experience undermines India’s security claims. Modern warfare
hinges on possession of a technological edge, particularly aerial
superiority. If Pakistan’s Chinese-equipped air force can outmatch
India’s, Operation Sindoor offers no real deterrence, as with the
earlier “surgical strikes.”

The Indus Waters Treaty

It seems the only thing the two sides have agreed to is a cessation of
military activities. India has confirmed that its suspension of the
Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) — imposed immediately after the Pahalgam
tragedy with the pledge that “not even a drop of water
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would go to Pakistan — remains in effect. This is a matter of grave
concern.

 

The IWT is a landmark water-sharing arrangement between India and
Pakistan. It apportions the waters of three western rivers (the Indus,
the Chenab, and the Jhelum) for Pakistan’s use, and those of three
eastern ones (the Ravi, the Beas, and the Sutlej) for India.

David Michel of the Center for Strategic and International Studies
has described
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important the Indus is for Pakistan:

Nine in every ten Pakistanis live within the Indus Basin. Major cities
such as Karachi and Lahore rely upon the river — or on groundwater
aquifers that the Indus helps replenish — for their drinking water.
Agriculture claims 94 percent of water withdrawals in Pakistan. The
sector constitutes the backbone of the economy, representing 22.9
percent of GDP, accounting for 24.4 percent of exports, providing
livelihoods for two-thirds of the rural population, and employing 37.4
percent of the total labor force. The Indus system waters more than 90
percent of the nation’s crops.

India is the upper riparian with a history of shutting down the water
flow once before in 1948, which caused intense panic in Pakistan.
Depriving a lower riparian country of water, as India has threatened,
would be a form of collective punishment, and could be described as a
crime against humanity.

However, India does not really have the capacity to prevent water
flowing to Pakistan. In order to do so, construction projects that
could take decades to complete would be necessary. The “not even a
single drop” pledge is, thankfully, bluster. However, India can
nonetheless harm Pakistan in significant ways.

Under the treaty regulations, India is required to share hydrological
data that is essential for planning to deal with floods and/or
droughts during monsoon seasons. Denying Pakistan access to this data
would have a damaging impact.

Moreover, because of the limited storage capacity, India can change
the timing of the water flow, which is crucial for many crops during
sowing seasons. The Indian government has been wanting to renegotiate
the IWT, which might be necessary given the changed concerns of global
climate change. However, threats to suspend the treaty should not be
used as a way of gaining leverage.

Not a Security Issue — a Political One

The Kashmir problem is not a security issue; it is a political
conflict. India shares borders with Nepal and Bhutan, yet we do not
have a security issue with those borders. A political problem cannot
have a military solution. On the contrary, military approaches to
conflicts are only going to create future political problems.
Moreover, a military conflict between two nuclear-armed states is
inherently fraught with unimaginable dangers.

There has not yet been any investigation after the Pahalgam attacks,
and the Indian claims of Pakistani involvement have yet to be backed
by evidence. Even if they are true, India must exhaust diplomatic and
legal avenues instead of resorting to a military approach. Similarly,
Pakistan must come clean and carry out an investigation to make sure
those involved in planning and carrying out an attack against
civilians at Pahalgam are held accountable.

The Kashmir conflict is a history of the suppression of the political
aspirations of the Kashmiris. India insists the conflict is a
bilateral issue, which means that neither the UN nor any other body
should be able to involve themselves, with only India and Pakistan —
not the people of Kashmir — having any say on the conflict. Pakistan
does not object to third-party intervention, which would allow it to
raise the fact that there was no plebiscite held in Kashmir. However,
in all its machinations, Islamabad is committed to suppress the voices
of Kashmiris who do not want to join Pakistan.

Legal mechanisms will not solve the Kashmir conflict, either. Consider
the IWT. It is a legal framework that completely suppresses any
Kashmiri claims, in the present or resulting from future negotiations.
In fact, the Jammu and Kashmir legislative assembly passed a unanimous
resolution calling for the review of the treaty in 2003, but its vote
was ignored.

It is imperative for India and Pakistan to resume diplomatic dialogue
and pay heed to Kashmiri political aspirations. Yet Modi’s
government, in a show of extraordinary bellicosity, has announced
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it will consider “every instance of terrorism directed against it as
an ‘act of war.’”

Modi has further announced an eleven-day _Tiranga Yatra _(tricolor
march) as a nationwide outreach effort to appease its ultranationalist
supporters who are upset about the cease-fire and view US mediation as
having undermined Modi’s self-styled strongman image. Significantly,
the BJP leader has planned the march with an eye to the upcoming state
elections in Bihar.

These political gambits once again relegate the Kashmir conflict to
the margins. True and lasting peace can only come when the political
rights of Kashmiris do not receive short shrift. Kashmiris have a
right to self-determination — to choose a future of their liking,
whatever that might be.

_Avishek Konar teaches economics at O. P. Jindal Global University in
Sonipat, India._

* Kashmir
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* armed conflict
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* Self-determination
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