On the Brink? India, the Kashmir Valley and International Politics

In summer 2019, Indian parliament downgraded the once semi-autonomous state, Jammu and Kashmir, to territorial status. Soon central government transformed the legal standing of the Kashmir Valley. Currently, it is under lockdown. India has integrated the region into the wider state, with the authorities practicing a strict in-or-out policy. 

The reasons why India’s ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), intervened in the northern region are clear. As a Muslim dominated part of the country, the sudden intervention serves to support a nationalist rhetoric: that the BJP is more than ready to confront its enemies.

Throughout the second half of the twentieth-century, Hindu-Muslim violence has been a staple of post-independence India. The recent events in Jammu and Kashmir fit well within this tone of general hostility, but the current controversy seems to go much deeper than face-value ethnic division. There is an economic reason for India’s central government to rule and regulate Jammu and Kashmir’s population. 

In 2014, Anirbau Mitra and Debraj Ray argued that scholars can better understand Hindu-Muslim conflict through the lens of economics. They theorised that ‘economic progress can be conflictual’, and the fortunes of a deprived group (i.e. Muslims) heighten tensions with the previously advantaged group (i.e. Hindus). Thus, Hindus tend to react aggressively in the face of Muslim prosperity [1]. Overall, through a series of case studies, both authors found that an ‘increase in Muslim well-being’ correlated with an ‘increase in religious conflict in the short to medium run’ [2]. 

Applied to Jammu and Kashmir, the economic prosperity of the state in the past few decades has had wider implications in terms of its relationship with India. For example, Kashmir is an economic stronghold in the agricultural sector, with the apple industry alone providing an annual turnover of Rs 118.60 crore (US$ 1.4 billion) since 2000 [3]. Therefore, fluctuations in the northern economy underpin India’s intervention in the region.

From an international perspective, the current issue lies with India’s Supreme Court. As a recent article observes, India’s judges have remained silent over the BJP’s actions. Lawyers have made no effort to analyse the BJP’s ruling to determine whether it is legally viable or not. As such, the Indian prime minister is free to trample on his citizens’ civil rights in favour of his 'authoritarian instincts' [4]. His decisions are dangerous and have attracted criticism from abroad. 

India’s neighbours are critical of its northern regime, and the Indian Supreme Court’s relaxed attitude has wider implications in the international sphere. For instance, India’s border state, Pakistan, views the situation as an affront to global human rights (the Kashmir Valley is home to over seven million residents). In late September, Imran Khan, Pakistan’s prime minister, warned the United Nations that India’s actions could lead to war, that a ‘bloodbath’ may occur between both states [5]. India’s controversial domestic politics threaten its international standing. The consequences could be disastrous.

Notes:

[1] A. Mitra and D. Ray, ‘Implications of an Economic Theory of Conflict: Hindu- Muslim Violence in India’ Journal of Political Economy, 122/4 (2014), p. 723.

[2] ibid., pp 757-58.

[3] F. A. Shaheen, ‘Economics and Potential of Apple Processing Industry in Kashmir Province of Jammu and Kashmir State’ Indian Journal of Agricultural Economics, 58/3 (2003), p. 611.

[4] The Economist, 433/9163 (2019), p. 16.

[5] Quoted in R. Ratcliffe, ‘Pakistan warns India its actions in Kashmir could provoke war’ Guardian (27 Sept. 2019) [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/27/pakistan-india-kashmir-provoke-war-nuclear-states-imran-khan accessed 06.10.19].