Highway ban: Misplaced Ideas, Misdirected responses

The Srinagar-Jammu highway always believed to be a lifeline for trade and industry in Kashmir is now used as a route to block links of Kashmiri traders and industrialists with their counterparts in other parts of the country as is evident from the unwanted blockade of this highway in the beginning of tourist season in May this year and for the second time in mid tourist season in this month of July now. Unfortunately the responses of the mainstream leaders to the provocative policy decisions and announcements of both the incumbent central government and as well as governor’s administration are misdirected. While BJP endorses the official positions of both the central and state governments obviously for reasons of its own political conveniences, the other mainstream leaders particularly those propagating regional politics for last several decades in Jammu & Kashmir condemn and question the workability and applicability of the provocative decisions on the grounds of logic and reason. Knowing that BJP commanding and controlling the central government tends to curb the economic and political freedom of people of Kashmir, the two top regional political parties have a situational compulsion to come on one page to counter economic offensives taken against the people of Kashmir by the governments in Delhi and Srinagar . Unfortunately over half a dozen Delhi based civil society groups who visited valley to break the cycle of street violence during six month long unrest in the year 2016 are keeping silence over the proactive measures of Modi government even over the conduct of a routine religious pilgrimage like Amarnath Yatra.
Since routine condemnation statements issued in response to provocative decisions coming from New Delhi and governor’s administration are taken casually by the helmsmen in both Delhi and Srinagar, the mainstream leaders have to seek the support of political and non political groups against the government ban on civilian traffic on Kashmir highway amid the ongoing amaranth yatra and show their physical presence on the ground so that government shows respect to public sentiment and takes care of public interest. Politicians issuing press statements from the cozy bed rooms of their palatial houses will have to wake up from deep slumber and move out to lead the people from the front to take the fight for economic and political justice to the doorsteps of the Governor Satya Pal Malik in Srinagar and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi.