December 2009 marks 20 years of the insurgency in Kashmir. During this period, Kashmir has metamorphosed — in terms of its politics, discourse, the nature of the militancy, the level of external intervention and perceptions of the potential solutions. Yet, much of India’s understanding of Kashmir remains ensnared in the limited confines of history, and thus India fails to understand the changes, declines to advance from age-old positions, and refuses to look for fresh ways to address the conflict.
What has changed since 1989? Let us compare the big picture, then and now. In 1989, India found itself on the losing side of the Cold War with hardly a friend in the international community. More so, the international community was negatively disposed towards India vis-À-vis the Kashmir issue. Pakistan was optimistic after having been part of the alliance that had defeated the Soviet Union in the Afghan war and was confident of its ability and standing in the region. The Kashmiri dissidents, Pakistan and the militants in Kashmir had managed to ‘internationalise’ their cause and garnered significant levels of sympathy for it. India was being pushed into a corner.
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