'Bluff', The Name of the Game Being Played in Jammu and Kashmir

NEW DELHI: Politics is now all about who plays the game “Bluff” best, be it bluffing the people or other political leaders and parties. It is strange that political leaders play this game best in the more sensitive and what they themselves describe as the more volatile states of India, with Jammu and Kashmir standing testimony to this power game since decades. It has not changed with time, perhaps become even more intense and deadly.

A year ago the Peoples Democratic Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party reached an understanding in Jammu and Kashmir to form the government together, if the verdict so permitted. This was a solemn assurance given by both to each other. And then began the game of “Bluff” with the people, with the PDP under Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, and the BJP under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, launching a vigorous campaign to convince their constituencies---Kashmir Valley and Jammu respectively---that they would save their voters from the ‘other’. In that the PDP went hammer and tongs against the BJP, and the BJP made it clear that it would like to have no truck with the ‘secessionist’ PDP.

The people voted for both overwhelmingly, with the PDP capturing the Valley from the National Conference and its non-performing chief minister Omar Abdullah, and the BJP wresting Jammu from the Congress party and the NC. Within days---or was it hours?---the BJP and the PDP came together to form the government, while the voters who had believed their campaigns looked on aghast.

The option before Mufti Mohammad Sayeed then was to form a government with the Congress and NC, or respect the peoples mandate and go along with the BJP. He chose the last, as he actually had no real choice or for that matter, did not even hint at reservations about this alliance. To cut the story short, the BJP went ahead with raising controversial issues such as Article 370, segregation of Kashmiri pandits in separate conclaves, while the PDP found that even its basic commitment to the removal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act could not be articulated any longer, let alone implemented. The PDP was pushed against the wall, without even the promised finances for the relief and rehabilitation of the flood victims being made available. The then Chief Minister spent his time fire fighting, and trying to convince himself and the PDP that all was well with the alliance, and that the BJP would deliver with time.

Mufti died, and the mantle has passed on to his daughter Mehbooba Mufti. She went into mourning, refused to make her mind known about government formation, and Jammu and Kashmir was placed under Governors rule under Section 92 of the Jammu and Kashmir Constitution. Six months later, the Governor if he is so convinced, can move the centre to impose Presidents rule that can be extended periodically with the consent of Parliament to two years at least.

For the record, the PDP says it wants the BJP to implement ‘confidence building measures’ so that trust is restored and both can work together. However, significantly Mehbooba Mufti has refused to spell out the CBM’s that would also then give an idea of exactly what areas of ‘trust’ is she and her party looking at. There have been several meetings between her leaders and the BJP top brass, officials attached to her government have been mediating with New Delhi, so what has all this conversation been about?

At present, given the scant information being made available and BJP keeping uncharacteristic silence it is difficult to say who is the game of Bluff being played against. Are the PDP and the BJP who seem to be trying to stare the other down at least publicly, playing the game with each other? Or are they playing it again together against the people? Assessments vary as while there are many who take the two parties at their word, there are other Kashmir watchers who suspect that the two political parties are dancing to the same pre-determined music to 1. convince the people who are largely disillusioned that they are wedded to their respectives constituencies interest and will not be brow beaten; and thereby 2. to regain the ground both have lost over the last year.

Given the anger and resentment in the Valley and within the PDP itself that was feeling the heat from the ground, there was no way that Mehbooba Mufti could step into her father’s shoes without jeopardising her entire political future. To save this, she has to appear to be rejecting power even as she fights for CBM’s for the state. The exercise thus, is to revive her party and her own image that was lost over the last months where she continued to maintain stoic silence standing by her father’s side. She needs the space to survive, and this exercise, many in Delhi and Srinagar believe is what she is working for.

But is she doing this with the BJP or without it? Here opinion is sharply divided, with many giving her the benefit of the doubt and the more cynical insisting that the two parties are basically working in tandem and will come together, after some concessions and foot play. This might or might not be true, but there are some indicators pointing at the second possibility:

1. The BJP’s silence. It is not a silent party and takes dissent on frontally. But here it seems to be waiting patiently for the PDP leader to make up her mind. It does not have to, as Governors rule can remain for six months and the BJP---given the fact that it did not ask for it---is well within its rights now to reject the PDP altogether and let Governors rule prevail in this sensitive state. In fact at the meeting with the Governor the BJP has given government formation another eight to ten days.

2. Mehbooba Mufti’s own statements where she has not even once demanded that Governors rule be removed, and the state go in for elections. Instead she continues to speak of CBMs and has reiterated just yesterday her commitment to the Agenda of Alliance, maintaining merely that if implemented with sincerity of purpose it would do well for the state.

3. The fact that she allowed the state to come under Governors rule giving the advantage to the BJP which in effect is in command and control. And hence needs not accept any demands it does not want to at this stage.

4. And what in political parlance is considered “backing off” with off the record statements to sections of the media maintaining that both political parties in the coalition will accommodate each other better than before.

The game of ‘bluff’ is on, and the next couple of weeks will tell who it is being played against.