Opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) alleged that the present situation in the Valley is a result of a “heartless response” on part of the government and a “neglect” of people’s political urges.
“I feel this is the direct result of a callous attitude of apathy towards the basic political urges and aspirations of the people, unabated human rights violations and a heartless response to them apart from inept administrative handling,” PDP patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed said in a statement here.
He said the present situation was a result of a “long drift and a contemptuous neglect” of the people. “It did not arise overnight and the youth of Kashmir were not para-dropped on the streets to raise slogans and stage protests.”
Mr. Sayeed said the Kashmir cauldron has been simmering for long and during the past three years the people here gave enough indications of their anger and discontent, be it in the summer of 2008, 2009 or earlier this year.
Even while they gave a chance for democracy to play itself out, unfortunately signals were either ignored or responded to with an insulting behaviour by the state and the centre which was guided by the more hawkish elements in the establishment, he said.
The PDP patron said it was sad that the Government of India seemed “to have run out of ideas, and the thinking capabilities at the Centre seem to have reached a dead end.”
He said the authorities were taking recourse to more force rather than reducing the dependence of the state on “its military might”.
“Such high-handed measures would only fuel rage and alienation,” he said, adding that the democratic polity of India must respond to this challenge before “the political and humanitarian crisis” in Kashmir “degenerates into a catastrophe.”
