Kashmir Policy: Appointment of Dineshwar Sharma as Interlocuter

The Union Government has appointed former IB chief Dineshwar Sharma as India’s representative to hold a ‘sustained dialogue’ with various stakeholders in Kashmir.

Who is Dineshwar Sharma? Why he has been chosen for the task?

Mr. Dineshwar Sharma is a 1979-batch (retired) IPS officer of Kerala Cadre, who had served as the IB director between December, 2014 and 2016. While playing the role of Centre’s Special Representative, he will hold rank equivalent to the Cabinet Secretary.

Though known to keep a low profile, Sharma is best known for his dealing of 2015 Gurdaspur attack; aftermath of Burhan Wani encounter;  2016 Uri Attack and also rise of ISIS recruitments in Kerala.

In past, Mr. Sharma has also served as mediator in talks with insurgents in Assam. He has wide experience in Kashmir, served as DIG of BSF and IG of CRPF in the state.

Is this for the first time, Centre has appointed interlocutor(s) for Kashmir Talks?

No, this is not for the first time. The militancy in Kashmir had erupted in late 1980s. In 1990, an all party delegation led by Rajiv Gandhi had visited the valley to engage the separatists through back channel, but this was not successful. No substantial formal effort was done during United Front and Narsimharao led government in 1990s. In 2001, the AB Vajpayee government had appointed former union minister K C Pant as New Delhi’s first official interlocutor to hold talks. At that time, the Hurriyat conference refused to meet him. No breakthrough was achieved. In 2002, an eight member Kashmir Committee was organized under leadership of noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani. This also could not make any progress. In 2003, the NDA government at Centre appointed NN Vohra as another official interlocutor but then the separatists said that they won’t talk to anyone other than Prime Minister. Later, Arun Jaitley was appointed as centre’s point-man and also former RAW chief A S Daulat. These efforts did not bring any result.

In 2004 elections, UPA came to power. In 2006, the UPA government tried to conduct a round table conference to bring all stakeholders on table but then separatists refused to participate in this also and thus this initiative also failed.

In 2010, there was a month long uprising the Kashmir leading to death of more than 100 civilians. The Manmohan Singh government then had appointed three interlocutors—Dilip Padgaonkar, MM Ansari, and Prof Radha Kumar—to suggest a roadmap for resolving Kashmir issue by engaging in talks with various stakeholders and people of all the three regions of the state viz. Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. Its report had some radical (and also impractical) suggestions thus was not followed by UPA as well as current Modi government. The Dineshwar Sharma is thus, latest in the series and how things go ahead is yet to be seen.

What were the recommendations of UPA appointed three interlocutors? What happened to them?

They had recommended a number of Confidence-Building Measures (CBM) and other recommendations of which some seem to be impractical. The key recommendations were as follows:

• Upholding the autonomy of state under article 370
• Review of Disturbed Areas Act
• Re-appraisal of application of controversial AFSPA in the state.
• Setting up of a constitutional committee to review all Acts and Articles of the Constitution extended to Jammu & Kashmir after the 1952 Delhi agreement.

All of them are controversial and implementation of them results the government going on back foot. The last one is most impractical. Before 1953, the jurisdiction of centre in Kashmir was restricted to defence, external affairs, communication and finance. But the 1952 agreement enabled extension of all the central acts, Articles of Constitution of India and hoisting of Indian tri-colour along with the state flag. These have gradually led to more and more integration of state in India which is one-directional and cannot be reversed.

What has been current government’s Kashmir Policy? Is the appointment of Dineshwar Sharma a sudden reversal of that policy?

The current government policy in Kashmir so far is mainly characterized by intense counter-insurgency operations with high kill ratio; no talks amid terror with Pakistan; no let-up in terror cases against separatists; strong hand on terror funding; no talks with Pakistan and so on. The result of these has been a  frozen political dialogue. Around 160 militants were killed in 2017 only and this strong policy has put the militants on run.

However reportedly, for every terrorist killed, 3 or 4 new local youth are joining the militants. This implies that government needs to realize (and it realizes) that Kashmir is a political problem and needs a political solution. The relentless pursuit of catch and kill is not a solution but while militants are on the run, it seemed to be a correct time for restarting a sustained dialogue.

The decision to appoint interlocutor is not a sudden reversal of the policy also. Government had earlier made it clear that it would resume the talks but at its own choice of time.

Who are the various people and parties with whom Mr. Sharma will deal?

Currently, the position of separatists appears to be weak and most of them, particularly Hurriyat Conference led by SAS Geelani , are trying to anyhow maintain their relevance. Shabbir Shah and others are under sustained NIA investigations for links to terror funding. The other Hurriyat factions appear to have limited influence in Sri Nagar. So, it may be possible that Hurriyat tries to engage with government, if yes then it would in contrast with its earlier stance of outright rejecting talks.

Further, there are other segments with which Sharma would engage as follows:

• The mainstream poetical parties of Kashmir (PDP, National Conference, Congress). They have faced the wrath of locals for their pro-India stance.
• Heads of religious institutions on valley. Lending them an ear is necessary.
• Most important segment is youth of Kashmir, who is jobless and directionless; and can be easily lured to militancy. Engaging with them may be difficult as they don’t have any identified leader.

Government has given Sharma freedom to talk to anyone who likes to. He would have complete independence in deciding who to hold talks with.

The mandate of Sharma is to initiate a sustained interaction and dialogue to understand legitimate aspirations of people in Jammu and Kashmir. Here, the term “legitimate aspiration” would mean anything which is less than cessation from India.