ISLAMABAD, Mar 6 (APP): On December 13 last year, India’s Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai presented investment data for the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).
The numbers spoke for themselves: investments have fallen by 55 percent over the past four years.
According to an article published on the Al-Jazeera website, the declining investments and violence contradict two central arguments that have been at the heart of the Indian government’s rationale for the 2019 abrogation of the semi-autonomous status that the region previously enjoyed: that the move would help improve security and spur economic development.
In the past, federal governments in New Delhi have often blamed Jammu and Kashmir’s woes on local governments in power in the region. That’s no longer an excuse that works.
When the Hindu nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi eliminated Article 370 of the Indian Constitution — which gave Kashmir “special status” — it also carved out the territory of Ladakh from the region. Kashmir’s statehood was withdrawn, and it was made a union territory, directly controlled by New Delhi.
Jammu and Kashmir does not even have the disempowered legislature that other union territories have — the region has not had elections in seven years. Yet it should now increasingly be clear, if it was not previously, that sidelining democratic processes and principles, and steamrolling constitutional provisions, are not working in improving the region’s security or economic allure.
The abrogation of Article 370 allowed non-residents to buy and own land in Jammu and Kashmir for the first time. Critics of the region’s previous special status frequently cited restrictions on land ownership as a major reason why private sector industries were reluctant to set up businesses there.
However, data published by the Indian government’s Ministry of Home Affairs — and made public by Rai — calls a bluff on those claims. Total investment in 2021-22 in Jammu and Kashmir stood at $46m, down from $50.5m the previous year, and dramatically less than the $102.8m spent in 2017-18.
While the COVID-19 pandemic no doubt affected Kashmir’s economy, the statistics suggest that was not the biggest factor in investments drying up. After all, the steepest fall in investments came the year that the Indian government ended Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status, before the pandemic, halving from $72.3m in 2018-19 to $36.3m in 2019-20.
The Indian government had claimed that Article 370 restricted people’s participation in the political process and led to a few families dominating the politics of the region. However, since 2019, Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party has taken steps to further disempower local Kashmiris.
First, constituency boundaries for the region’s legislature were redrawn in a way that gives Hindu-majority Jammu a greater say in elections than its Muslim population.
In effect, that strengthens the chances of the BJP coming to power in Jammu and Kashmir.
Then a revision of the voter list was carried out, giving voting rights to outsiders. Jammu and Kashmir is home to hundreds of thousands of migrant workers and army personnel — if allowed to vote, their electoral influence is going to be significant.
Some Kashmiri leaders have invoked the region’s 1987 elections which were allegedly rigged and were considered a tipping point when the armed freedom movement in Kashmir took off.
While Kashmiris and non-locals alike suffer, there is no reason to expect that Modi and his government will change their policy towards the region.
The BJP’s policies have led to increased insecurity for people living in the region — whether they are Hindu or Muslim. And there has been no economic payoff, either.
