SRINAGAR, 22 September 2003 — Five months after India and Pakistan began mending relations, peace hopes are fading in Kashmir, the Himalayan territory that divides the nuclear powers, with more than 10 killings a day and a major split among the separatists. The Indian government, facing national elections within a year, seems to be hardening its approach and Pakistan has grown impatient after seeing no concrete gains from the peace drive, observers in Indian Kashmir say.
Indian troops on Aug. 30 killed a top pro-Pakistani guerrilla leader, Ghazi Baba, setting off a furious cycle of violence in which 250 people have died, according to police.
It is a world away from the international optimism after April 18, when Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee visited the Kashmir summer capital Srinagar and offered a “hand of friendship” to Pakistan, a symbolic gesture after a year and a half of war tensions. The newfound hopes were briefly felt by Kashmiris this summer with fewer troops patrolling the streets and a dramatic increase in the number of tourists.
In May and June, 70,324 tourists, most of them Indians, visited the scenic Kashmir Valley centered around Srinagar, compared with 6,451 in the same period in 2002, according to provincial government figures.
“For the first time in 15 years, there was complete normalcy,” a separatist said.
“There was international pressure on (Pakistani President Pervez) Musharraf. Everybody expected dialogue. And that’s when the government of India saw an escape route and did not move,” he said.
India viewed the relative calm in Kashmir as vindication of its policies in a territory it considers an integral part of the union. Rebels, seeing no movement toward negotiations, responded with their guns.
“The militants thought: if you don’t talk, here is the answer,” said Omar Farooq, the 30-year-old chief religious leader of Kashmir and a prominent separatist.
“There is a hardening of attitudes on all sides,” he said.
“Things will harden for now because of upcoming elections,” said Farooq, referring to national elections Vajpayee’s Hindu fundamentalists face before September 2004.
“They don’t have a clear policy,” Farooq said of the Indian government. “Sometimes they want to talk, sometimes they don’t want to talk. There’s confusion in the minds of the people.”
