‘We Tried to Balance Political Agenda with Economic Development’
President, People’s Democratic Party, Mehbooba Mufti
How would you describe the situation in Kashmir today?
The situation is much better today. The level of violence is much less, though unfortunately there was an incident in Samba and some firing in Tangdhar. But things are improving constantly, more tourists are coming in and more development is taking place.
How would you sum up the last five and half years?
The election of 2002 was the beginning of change. The coalition government led by the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) took over governance at the time when the situation was quite bad. Our alliance was formed on the basis of common minimum programme and fortunately, the Congress party accommodated 80 per cent of the PDP agenda, which we called our ‘healing touch policy.’ Our focus was to release people, abolish POTA and make the security forces more accountable. This was followed by developmental projects like starting new colleges, schools and even universities. The NDA government at the Centre and even more the UPA government were very generous as far as funds were concerned. We did not find ourselves wanting for anything as far as the needs of the state were concerned, which was a new development and a new approach to the state. We also tried to strike a balance between all the three regions of the state, so that there was a sense of sharing and no region could say that there was a bias against it. There was some movement on the political process as well. New roads were opened connecting the two Kashmirs. I agree that travel is not hassle-free as of now, but a beginning has been made.
Another significant development was the connection established between the leadership in New Delhi and the people of J&K, especially the Valley. When Prime Minister Vajpayee came to Kashmir, for the first time thousands came out to greet him. This was unprecedented. Before this, whenever the Prime Minister came to Kashmir, whether it was I.K. Gujral or H.D. Deve Gowda, they used to land at the airport, where a helicopter used to pick them up and take them to Nehru Guest House. So in this respect, it was an important development because the traditional anti-Delhi leadership stance of the people had started changing. Vajpayee’s visit was followed by Mrs Sonia Gandhi’s and then Dr Manmohan Singh’s. Despite some fidayeen attacks, people thronged the leaders.
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