27
votes
India rescinds Kashmir’s autonomous status. Troop surge and media blackout in effect
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- Title
- India scraps special status for Kashmir: Live updates
- Published
- Aug 5 2019
- Word count
- 2522 words
This is a pretty landmark geopolitical move. Kashmir has had special constitutional status in India where they’ve been mostly autonomous and self-governing. India just amended its own constitution to revoke this status and bring Kashmir under the Indian constitution.
In the short term, this will like lead to a worsening of unrest in the region as well as some pushback from Pakistan, though fully armed conflict between the two countries is unlikely.
In the longer term this opens Kashmir up for investment from the rest of India as well as the repatriation of exiled Kashmiri refugees. Who knows what this ends up doing. Making the demographics more balanced might make the state less of a political football, or it might make inter-religious/ethnic tensions even worse.
Indian political discussion on English language media tends towards the histrionic. Concern about ethnic cleansing, if we're talking about forced relocation or mass killings, is way overblown. It's likely the primary motivator is to keep a lid on unrest and insurgency that will probably keep bubbling for years (as a best case scenario). Intimidating Pakistan out of attacking would be a secondary benefit.
Unfortunately, the only proven way to keep a lid on sectarian violence is through massive police action, heavy investment in education and development, and buy-in from local (like, village level) leaders. You need all three, but the first two are the only levers the Indian Government can pull right now and the second one will take time to develop. They'll just have to grind out slow progress on the third (probably by bribing them, which is something they couldn't do when Kashmir's own parliament was in charge of the purse strings).
It is worth worrying about how effective they will be at that, particularly at doing the policing in a responsible way that doesn't make problems worse. But that's unfortunately not a big change from the situation they're in currently.
Now over the long term, there is some concern among Kashmiri nationalists about Indian investors buying up land or moving in and slowly changing the demographic, ethnic, and religious makeup of the state. It used to be a tourist Mecca, so there is definitely a concern about a land speculation circus and turning big parts of the state into tourist resorts. But I guess in that way, the line between gentrification and ethnic cleansing would come down to much state violence is involved in making it happen.
Do you think they would all-out attack Pakistan?
Anything's possible I suppose, but I don't see the logic in it. Pakistan has nothing that India would need.
The only military logic behind an attack would be to squelch cross-border terrorist camps, but that risk is pretty constant regardless of this move in Kashmir. If anything, the provocation for that would be if Trump actually ceded control of Afghan reconstruction to Pakistan as he was planning.
now seems like a good time to re-up this piece which, while i think it is slightly liberal in labeling hindu nationalists as properly "far right" is still a great deep delve into the whole phenomenon and how it plays in indian politics: Why Has India Embraced the Far-Right?
the trend is particularly concerning now that modi has a huge mandate.
I this line incredible
Their whole policy from 2004-2014 of making the economy great fails, and they still manage to win seats via a nationalist message.
i mean, if there's one thing to take away from the past decade or so in worldwide politics, it's that a nationalist message can and does work seemingly no matter what the circumstances are. it might not win you a majority in some places, but it sure won't bomb on you like it might have in the past.