August 11, 2019

Rising authoritarianism in the world’s largest democracy

topic:	Humans
located:	India
editor:	Tish Sanghera

Earlier this week Prime Minister Modi addressed the Indian nation in a TV broadcast. He celebrated his government’s “historic” decision to scrap Article 370 – a constitutional clause that gave special status and pseudo-autonomy to Jammu & Kashmir.

The Prime Minister said this meant Kashmiris are now able to enjoy the rights of other Indians and that the decision will empower them.

However as he said this, soldiers lined the streets of the capital, Srinagar; their ranks swelled after 10,000 additional troops were deployed. Road blockades stopped people from leaving their neighbourhoods, just as families planned to celebrate Eid together. Internet and phone lines were down and TV signals were blocked. It’s poignant that the people of Kashmir couldn’t even hear the Prime Minister’s address and partake in the supposed reasons to celebrate.

Article 370 has been a point of contention ever since India’s independence, when Kashmir’s ruler at the time, Maharaja Hari Singh, negotiated greater freedoms for the state. As the decades have passed, leaders across the political spectrum have debated its merits. But whether Article 370 needed to be dissolved or not is a separate issue. This week’s events have shown a more concerning disregard for democratic processes by the current government.

The voice of the Kashmiri people has once again been silenced, both literally and metaphorically. They were not consulted about such a fundamental change, their elected leaders were not informed but placed under house arrest and their neighbourhoods further militarised. For this reason the United Nations said it is worried about human right’s abuses escalating in the region.

Home Minister Amit Shah has defended the decision on the grounds that J&K’s previous status, outside the control of the Central government, meant it lagged behind while the rest of the country developed. But a look at human development indicators shows that in health, education and gender equality, J&K outperforms most Indian states.

Many have also pointed to the colonizing and rapacious language the Prime Minister and other politicians have used when discussing Kashmir’s future. Rather than speaking of collaboration and working more closely with the local population, Modi has centred on the resources and commercial opportunities that he has now opened up to non-Kashmiris as a result of the decision.

For many Indians, the Modi-Shah duo has fulfilled a decades-long dream. For them, concerns over the way events were conducted matters less than the powerful display of the government taking control by force. But for another section of Indians, the Kashmiris, it must be difficult to comprehend what is happening. For on one hand, India has brought them into the fold, and on the other, they’ve never felt so marginalised.

(Photo: GettyImages)