Fresh threat of extremism in Kashmir awaits attention of Nawaz, Modi

ISLAMABAD: Even as Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi met in Ufa and speculations about another meeting in September are rife, how serious are both these leaders in the face of a newer threat emerging in Jammu and Kashmir?
There has been little debate here in Pakistan, though Indian and Kashmiri intellectuals and columnists have been laying it down in black and white, but the reality is that intelligence agencies in both countries have little or no means to arrest this development or in some cases looking the other way which will be disastrous for both countries.
Speaking to various opinion makers on both sides of the Line of Control, the worry for many is a new dimension in the already complex state of Kashmiri affairs which today sees “a younger group of militants emerging in Kashmir - Lashkar -e-Islam (LeI)” in Occupied Kashmir.
Today 65 percent of Kashmiris in Occupied Kashmir are below the age of 35.Together with LeI what has taken the Kashmiri media by storm is the 20-years-old Burhan Muzzafar Wani from Tral, in South Kashmir who at one time only had a desire to be a cricketer but today is commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen.
“His social media skills have paid the terrorist group dividends much to the headache of the Indian security agencies. The Kashmir battle is changing in a lot of respects and the use of the social media,” comments OneIndia.
Explaining in greater detail is a highly respected head of an Indian NGO working in Track Two who tells The News, “There is another dimension - a younger group of militants has emerged in Kashmir - Lashkar-e-Islam. They are break away from LeT and Hizbul and recently were involved in killings in Sopore.
The group’s emergence and Sopore killings have rattled Kashmiris, including the separatists, while apart from this another group, Hizbul Mujahideen is operating in South Kashmir led by a 20-year-old young man.”
Prem Jhankar Jha, a distinguished intellectual, admits that it is the fear of a BJP-ruled India and intense distrust of their own leaders which has finally coalesced into the merger of radical separatism and Salafi Islam that Kashmir’s Shias and the older generation of Kashmiri Sunnis have been dreading for the last decade.
While Pakistan and India are now trying to reinvent the wheel by bringing in the back channel on Kashmir once again even though the process was completed by General (R) Pervez Musharraf. Ershad Mehmud of Centr for Peace, Development and Reform (CPDR), tells The News, “The Pakistan government approach towards Kashmir conflict has stuck in 1990’s. The gains which were made during the peace process during 2003-2007 have been buried in the dustbin of the history. Now, Pakistan has almost reverted back to its traditional Kashmir policy which led India and Pakistan to dead end and once again we headed towards the same end. Indians see Pakistan’s policy as “renewed animosity and re-awakened ambitions in Kashmir.”
No one wants a new generation militancy to start.
Will this “Salafi uprising”, see in the greater interest of Kashmir, saner minds in the valley unite on a command agenda?“It is a difficult question to answer. After all, after taking care of their ‘interests’ as the former RAW chief exposes in his book, it has been embarrassing for Pakistan in the past, to see even on festive occasions at its Delhi High Commission, Syed Ali Shah Gillani sitting in a separate room from other leaders like Mirwaiz, Shabir Shah and Yasin Malik,” comments a diplomat.
There may be hope yet as one report comments, “All (moderate Kashmiri leaders) of them have condemned violence and publicly denounced IS ideology as being anti-Islam and against Kashmiri struggle.”
Notes Prem Jhankar Jha in Greater Kashmir, “To this volatile mix we must add Pakistan’s renewed animosity and re-awakened ambitions in Kashmir. If Salafi violence envelops Kashmir, it will not be easy to prevent it from dragging India and Pakistan into a war with each other. The need for the two countries to recognise this danger and resume the search for peace has never, therefore, been greater. Modi and Nawaz Sharif’s decision to reopen and institutionalise consultations has not therefore come a day too soon.”
He narrates a PDP grassroots worker from South Kashmir who cautions that today’s Kashmir youth have never known peace.“They have also not known the Pandits. They know very little about Kashmiri syncretism. For them Kashmir is a Muslim country and, increasingly, the only Islam they respect is Salafi Islam. They see Salafis winning battle after battle, gaining territory, pushing back the West, in Iraq and Syria,” adds the worker.
Jha also points to new realities of this new generation who see that Salafi mosques in Kashmir are far richer, their imams far more politically aware, their books far more current. “By contrast the Sufi ziyarats are poor, the imams know little about world affairs and there is nothing to read. So more and more of young people are praying at the Salafi mosques,” he notes.
While both Pakistan and India have not shied away from discussing terrorism, are they ready to look into their backyards to see this new Salafi trend emerging which will have devastating affect in the region?