Whatever happened to PM's working groups on Kashmir?

New Delhi News.Net
Tuesday 17th November, 2009 (IANS)

The most critical of the working groups set up by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2006 to improve relations between Jammu and Kashmir and the central government has not met for over two years now, putting a question mark on how serious the authorities are when they talk of initiating confidence building measures to tackle the Kashmir problem.

The group, headed by retired Supreme Court judge Sageer Ahmed, last met on Sep 3, 2007 but failed to come up with a set of recommendations because too many members were seen to be pulling in too many directions.

The prime minister, during his previous tenure, had set up five working groups on confidence building in Jammu and Kashmir on May 25, 2006, at the end of the second multi-party round table conference here. The first and third conferences were convened in New Delhi Feb 25, 2006 and April 25 the next year.

The other four working groups -- on Strengthening Relations Across LoC (Line of Control dividing Kashmir between India and Pakistan), Confidence Building Measures Across Segments of Society in the state, Economic Development of Jammu and Kashmir and Ensuring Good Governance -- submitted their recommendations to the prime minister in the third round table conference.

The government later set up a high-level committee in February 2008 headed by the union home secretary for the implementation of the recommendations of the four groups. There has been no movement since then.

When the fifth working group, tasked to recommend measures on how to improve relationship between the central and state governments, did meet, it discussed issues of regional imbalances, democracy, secularism and the rule of law in the state. But it failed to recommend anything.

'The group on centre-state relations has not met in the last 26 months, forget about arriving at a consensus,' moaned a Kashmir politician and one of its members. He requested anonymity because the working group members were ordered to keep their recommendations away from media glare.

The group members include the Bharatiya Janata Party's Arun Jaitley; National Conference's Rahim Rather, now state finance minister; Congress' Tara Chand, now deputy chief minister, Peoples Democratic Party's (PDP) Muzaffar Hussain Beigh and Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) state secretary Mohammad Yusuf Tarigami.

'There was no consensus among the high-profile members of the group. This is the only reason Sageer Ahmed (group chairman) didn't call a final meeting, resulting in the inordinate delay in submitting recommendations to the prime minister,' the group member said.

The ideas are as wide as is the confusion in the group.

* The National Conference is demanding autonomy for the state, including more decentralisation of powers and more authority to the state government. Only three departments - defence, foreign affairs and currency - should remain with India, the party says.

* The Congress wants the 1975 Indira-Sheikh Abdullah accord to be made the final basis for a solution to the Kashmir problem. It means more or less maintaining the status quo on power sharing.

* The BJP has been stressing on the abrogation of Article 370 of the constitution and annulling the special status Jammu and Kashmir enjoys. The state has its own constitution, its own state emblem and flag. A non-resident cannot buy property in the state.

* The PDP has suggested self-rule, much like autonomy, to the state while the CPI-M has favoured the National Conference's autonomy formula.

* Kashmiri Hindu leaders want a separate homeland for the Hindus who left the valley fearing for their lives, while some leaders from Ladakh seek a union territory status for the cold region.

The delay has caused concern in the state government. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah's office and the state law ministry have written to the prime minister urging him to take up the issue with the group chairman.

'We have conveyed our concern to the central government. The chief minister has also taken up the issue with the prime minister,' state Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar told IANS.

(Sarwar Kashani can be contacted at s.kashani@ians.in)

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