In May 2020, Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s second government was concluding its first year in office. One year before, under Modi\u2019s leadership, the Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party<\/em> (Indian People\u2019s Party, BJP) was reelected after a first term that started in 2014. Although its economic results fell short of 2014 campaign promises, BJP won even more seats at the Lok Sabha, the Parliament\u2019s lower house, going from 282 to 303 out of 543. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This increase in the number of seats can lead\nus to assume growing support for the BJP\u2019s ideological program and the Prime\nMinister\u2019s wielding of power, mostly among Hindus, the party\u2019s main electoral\ntarget. Indeed, the party advocates for an ethnic conception of citizenship,\naccording to which the Hindu demographic majority (80% of the population) is\nconsidered as a homogenous community, conceived as a group united by common\nsocio-political interests. It stems from this conception of the social body\nthat Hindus are considered as the only legitimate political body, since, as\ntheir religion is seen as the only indigenous one, they are the sole \u201csons of\nthe soil\u201d in India. By contrast, the Muslim and Christian minorities (14% and\n2% of the population respectively) are suspected of civic and moral disloyalty\nbecause of their supposedly alien ethnic groups and religions. As illegitimate\ncitizens, they must bend to the interests of what is declared to be the majoritarian\ncommunity, the Hindus. N. Modi\u2019s government is also defined by its\nauthoritarianism and centralized decision-making and implementation, running\ncounter to the Republic\u2019s federal system and usual practice in Indian\ninstitutions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Such was the context when, in August 2019,\nJammu-and-Kashmir\u2019s (J&K) constitutional autonomy was abrogated. The\ndecision was made by the Minister of Home Affairs Amit Shah, and it was\ncritical for this state bordering Pakistan, which has 12.5 million inhabitants,\n7 million of which live in the mostly (Sunni) Muslim Indian Kashmir valley.\nBeside the situation in J&K itself, the way this change of status was\nimplemented perfectly reflects \u2013 among other implications – the two main\ncharacteristics that define N. Modi\u2019s government. This analysis will aim to\nunderscore these two characteristics by focusing on the mechanisms that led to\nthe restructuring of J&K\u2019s political class. In order to better understand\nthem, this paper will also analyze these trends with reference to the national\npolitical reactions that followed the decision and the silencing of the\nJ&K\u2019s population by the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On August 5th<\/sup>, 2019, the\ninstitutional framework of the Indian Republic was deeply altered by the\nabrogation of J&K\u2019s constitutional autonomy. Jammu and Kashmir went from\nbeing a state constituted of three regions (Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir), to\nbeing divided into two administrative units: on the one hand,\nJammu-and-Kashmir, a new Union Territory with an elected assembly; and on the\nother hand, Ladakh, a Union Territory without an elected assembly. This reform\nwas carried out through the revocation of Article 370 of the Indian\nConstitution guaranteeing J&K its special status. As a ripple effect,\nArticle 35-A, which granted privileges such as property rights as well as\naccess to public sector jobs to Kashmiri natives in the Kashmir part of the\nstate, also became void.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those\narticles had taken effect with the implementation of the Constitution in 1953\nand they laid the basis for the integration of J&K to the Union. Indeed,\nJ&K is a demographically unique area in India since it is the only\nMuslim-majority state, and historically special too, as it was divided between\nIndia and Pakistan after the two countries\u2019 first conflict in 1947, in the wake\nof the British decolonization. Articles 370 and 35-A established J&K\u2019s\npolitical and cultural autonomy, even as they preserved the demographic balance\nthat existed at the time of independence. However, that autonomy was\nrelentlessly curtailed by New Delhi\u2019s successive central governments, with the\nsupport of some local parties. Besides, those attacks on Article 370 went hand\nin hand with increasingly strict \u201csecurity\u201d policies. Indeed, the central\ngovernment always presented restrictions on freedom as necessary to ensure the\nsafety of the national territory, by protecting it from the neighboring enemy,\nPakistan, and from the forays of foreign fighters, coming from Islamabad to\nwage jihad in Indian Kashmir. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The security-driven policy in the area has been enforced at the expense of Kashmiri citizens\u2019 rights and freedoms, as illustrated by two laws: the Jammu-and-Kashmir Public Safety Act (JKPSA), which has allowed the detention of Kashmiris without formal charges and without trial since 1978, and the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA), implemented in September 1990, officially in order to quell the uprising started by separatists in the Indian Kashmir Valley in 19891<\/a><\/sup>. Armed violence had erupted after the 1987 elections were rigged by New Delhi, with the support of the local section of Congress party, in order to lower the high number of votes expected for separatist parties advocating for J&K\u2019s independence from the rest of India. The AFSPA granted considerable power to the 500,000 soldiers and 100,000 civil and military intelligence officers deployed by the central government in Kashmir. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ever since those laws came into force, the armed and police forces operating under them have benefitted from a substantial degree of legal immunity, committing a vast number of crimes (rapes, torture, murders, forced disappearances, collective punishments, etc.2<\/a><\/sup>) The security-driven policy failed to quell the armed uprising in Kashmir, but it did fuel a growing feeling of national disaffiliation among the Kashmiri population. As the locals experience the Indian state exclusively through its \u2018right hand\u2019, they look at the central government as an occupying power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This brief historical overview shows that\nJ&K\u2019s autonomy had already been largely challenged on the groundcompared to what was stated in the 1953\nConstitution. However, Article 370 still existed and the Kashmiri people often claimed\nits full respect as a basis for their political claims against New Delhi.\nMoreover, Article 35-A was designed to be the ultimate protection of J&K\u2019s\nunique identity, by ensuring the preservation of the state\u2019s demographic\nbalance. Hence, the removal of both articles doesn\u2019t merely enshrine a\npre-existing situation, but it is an actual institutional, social and political\nupheaval for J&K\u2019s population \u2013 and beyond, for the Indian institutional framework\nitself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jammu and Kashmir\nwas India\u2019s most autonomous state, as it had its own Prime Minister (instead of\na Chief Minister) until 1965, as well as its own constitution, flag, and penal\ncode. When Articles 370 and 35-A were revoked, J&K lost its special status\nand was relegated to a lower level of autonomy than the other 28 states.\nIndeed, the other states are administered by elected representatives forming a\ngovernment, headed by a Chief Minister, and have their own assemblies. They\nalso have Governors who are appointed by the President of India to represent\nhim (and the central government) and who elect representatives to the higher\nand lower houses of Parliament. Finally, they have the right to promulgate\ntheir own laws, according to the distribution between central and local powers\nstated in the Constitution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In August\n2019, J&K was stripped of this status and divided into two units. On the\none hand, Ladakh is now a Union Territory directly administered by a Governor\nwho is appointed by the central government to represent the President of India.\nLadakh now sends only one representative to the lower house. On the other hand,\nJ&K is also a Union Territory, but it has the right to elect its own\nassembly, to have its own government and to send elected representatives to\nboth houses. However, elections still haven\u2019t been held in J&K, which has\nbeen under the central government\u2019s direct rule since 2018. The central\nauthorities argue that elections haven\u2019t been held because of the region\u2019s\ninstability \u2013 thereby contradicting their own version of the story since the\nrepeal of Article 370 was presented as a way to put an end to social unrest in\nthe valley. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It is safe\nto assume that the prerogatives of the future J&K\u2019s government will be\nhighly limited by virtue of its new institutional status. In the meantime, New Delhi recently enacted\nthe removal of Article 35-A. Since April 1st<\/sup> 2020, access to\nproperty and jobs has been granted to people having resided in J&K for\nfifteen years or having studied there for seven years. Similarly, more than a\nhundred texts have been amended to revoke Kashmiri natives\u2019 special rights. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The decision\nto abrogate Articles 370 and 35-A was unilaterally implemented by the central government,\nwithout any discussions with its partners in the National Democratic Alliance\n(NDA) coalition, even though the repeal does away with the historical\nmodalities of J&K\u2019s integration to the Union of India. Moreover, local\npolitical forces weren\u2019t consulted in the process, even \u201clegitimist\u201d groups who\ndon\u2019t object to J&K\u2019s integration with India, such as the National\nConference (NC), the People\u2019s Democratic Party (PDP), the local Congress section\nand the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)). Contrary to the separatist\nparties of the Hurryiat Conference (HC), those parties are considered\nlegitimate by New Delhi and have successively administered J&K since Independence.\nBut not only were those parties not consulted, they were silenced along with\nall active political parties in J&K after A. Shah\u2019s announcement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As early as\nAugust 5th<\/sup>, all the main local leaders, including former BJP allies,\nwere placed under house arrest or even jailed. Among the people arrested were\nfor instance Farooq Abdullah and his son Omar Abdullah. The former is the son\nof Sheikh Abdullah, a tutelary figure of Kashmiri political life and the\nfounder of the NC. Farooq Abdullah has headed the NC since 2009 and has also\nbeen J&K\u2019s Chief Minister three times between 1980 and 2000. As for Omar\nAbdullah, he was Chief Minister from 2009 to 2015, and Minister of External\nAffairs in the first BJP government (1999-2004). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Another\nprominent figure of the legitimist political group to be arrested was Mehbooba\nMufti, the latest Chief Minister, who ruled over J&K from 2016 to 2018 at\nthe head of a coalition government with BJP which won the 2014 elections in\nJammu. Mehbooba Mufti had succeeded to her father, Mufti Muhammed Sayed, who\ndied in office in 2016, and who had also been a major figure of Kashmiri\npolitical life since the 1970s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Just like\ntheir leaders, political activists were arrested en masse<\/em>. The centralized authoritarian power exerted by the\ngovernment is also illustrated by coercive measures against the Kashmiri\nsociety as a whole, betraying a refusal to take citizens into consideration.\nAlong with the violence used by armed forces against protesters, the imposition\nof a curfew, the increased number of police controls, and the blackout of any\ntype of communication (cell phones, landlines, and internet) for several months\namounted to a sentence in an open-air prison for J&K\u2019s inhabitants. They\nwere the ones who were most affected by J&K\u2019s change of status, and yet\nthey were unable to express themselves. In some towns, the roads were not\nreopened until early 2020. At the end of August 2020, only 2G internet services\nhave been restored in J&K, even though 4G is available in the rest of the\ncountry. Communications are restricted by this poor coverage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n More than a\nyear after the abrogation of the special status, the lack of consideration for\nthe local population is still patent. The government has now begun a policy that\ndeliberately turns Kashmir\u2019s cultural and historical heritage invisible. For\ninstance, two days were dropped by New Delhi from the official list of holidays:\nSheikh Abdullah\u2019s birthday on December 5th<\/sup> and \u201cMartyr\u2019s Day\u201d on\nJuly 13th<\/sup>, which commemorates a protest that was harshly suppressed\nin 1931. But a new day was added to the list: the day when J&K officially\njoined India, October 26th<\/sup> (1947). Similarly, the Sher-i-Kashmir (Kashmir\u2019s\nLion) International Conference Centre in Srinagar, which was named after the\ntitle attributed to Sheikh Abdullah, was renamed Kashmir International\nConference Centre in early March. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Finally,\nschool textbooks have been revised. Since March 2020, they have included the\nchange in status, without explaining, however, how the decision was actually\nenforced (legal procedure, communications blackout, numerous arrests).\nMoreover, the recent change in property rights fuels longstanding fears of a\ndemographic replacement among Kashmiris in the valley. On the ground, all these decisions are seen\nas expressing the desire to make J&K\u2019s Kashmiri Muslim population \u201cdisappear\u201d\nin order to exploit the land, which is rich in agricultural resources and\nhydropower, and is also a famous tourist site. Far from improving the\nintegration of the local population to the national community, the measures\nonly feed into the popular feeling of disaffiliation from the Indian state. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The scrapping of Article 370 didn\u2019t come as a surprise, since it had always been at the heart of the BJP\u2019s Hindu nationalist political program. It is in line with the centralized conception of power favored by the nationalists, particularly for a territory where the majority of inhabitants are Muslim and therefore considered as illegitimate. Besides, the abrogation was one of the key arguments in the BJP\u2019s campaign in 2019: the party presented the measure as a necessity for national security after the attack on an army convoy in Pulwama, J&K3<\/a><\/sup>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, the way the decision was made was highly authoritarian, which challenges its validity under traditional institutional practices. A. Shah took advantage of the \u201cPresident\u2019s rule\u201d (direct rule exerted by the central government) over J&K since June 20184<\/a><\/sup> to have the President abrogate Article 370, thereby avoiding the necessary legal ratification by the Kashmiri assembly called for in the Constitution. As the BJP won a substantial majority at the 2019 elections, it is no surprise that the removal of Article 370 was largely supported by the members of the NDA coalition, nor is it surprising that there was no objection to the manner in which this was carried out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is more\nstriking is that many opposition parties also supported the measure, especially\nregional groups whose political latitude, and therefore their very existence,\ngreatly relies on the Union\u2019s federal architecture and the respect of its\ninstitutions. And those parties even adopted the government\u2019s version of\nevents, arguing that the insurrection was caused by J&K\u2019s socio-economic\nbackwardness, and that the \u201cnormalization\u201d of the institutional situation\nshould put an end to it. This,\ndespite J&K figuring among the most developed\nstates in the Union according to national indicators. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Supporters of the abrogation also failed to\naddress the obvious contradiction between the Minister of Home Affairs\u2019\nstatements, asserting that the situation in J&K is \u201cnormal\u201d, and the fact\nthat the state had been cut off from the world and its population kept under\nlockdown from August 2019 to March 2020. In the Congress party, supposedly the\nmain national opposition party, the mild objections that were raised reflected\ndeep ideological and structural divisions, which prevent the group from\nseriously standing up to the BJP. In the end, political parties merely provided\na rubberstamp for the government\u2019s discourse. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a context\nof general political apathy, the main act of contestation was to inform people about\nthe ongoing situation. Since the local press was also affected by the\ncommunications blackout, independent English-language media from the rest of\nthe country were the ones relaying Kashmiri voices and telling what was\nhappening on the ground. Such articles revealed a situation starkly different\nfrom the \u201cnormalcy\u201d described by A. Shah, who simultaneously admitted to the\narrest of nearly 4,000 people in the first weeks of August. Contrary to what\nthe Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh said, Kashmiris were far from accepting\nthe decision, as they opposed it in various ways. Daily protests were organized\nin the valley after the removal of J&K\u2019s special status. They were\nviolently suppressed, sometimes with armed violence, as hospital records confirm,\neven though the Minister of Home Affairs denied it. News reports also allowed\nKashmiris to express their anger, their fear of moving, their grief for the\ndead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On top of\ndocumenting the situation, some media also condemned it: the harshest criticism\ncame from independent journalists and activists expressing their views in\npublic statements, analytical papers, and opinion articles. A group of five women\nactivists travelled to Kashmir in September 2019 to report on human rights\nviolations after the August 5th<\/sup> decision. They publicly disclosed\ncases of temporary or long-lasting disappearances of young men since the\nabrogation, estimating them at 13,000 approximately. Such arrests are generally\nfollowed by the search or even the ransacking of people\u2019s houses. But those\nvoices remained marginal, as they were constantly delegitimized by the central\ngovernment and its supporters, who accused them of being \u201canti-national\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Outside\nJ&K, the abrogation of its constitutional autonomy provoked no major\npolitical or social protest, except in a few traditional left-wing strongholds\nsuch as universities, and more specifically the Jawaharlal Nehru University in\nNew Delhi, were voices raised. The media\u2019s version of events largely aligned\nwith the official discourse, notably in non-English language press and\/or TV\nnews. This friendly coverage should be understood in the light of Narendra\nModi\u2019s close personal relationships with the heads of the big industrial groups\nowning those media outlets. By and large, on the national scale, the abrogation\nof Article 370 was rather widely accepted by Indian people, and even acclaimed\nby some, as demonstrated by the celebrations held in the wake of the\nannouncement by members of several Hindu nationalist movements. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Opposition parties weren\u2019t the only ones to unexpectedly support the scrapping of Article 370: some Kashmiri politicians also backed the decision. Initially, the support came from political newcomers, such as members of the All Jammu and Kashmir Panchayat Conference, of the Jammu and Kashmir Political Movement (India)<\/em>, and the former president of the Congress party\u2019s Kashmiri student wing, Mir Junaid. All of them benefitted from the government\u2019s publicly staged special favors. During the J&K blockade, the members of the All Jammu and Kashmir Panchayat Conference were invited to New Delhi by A. Shah in early September 2019, and those of the Jammu and Kashmir Political Movement were the only ones allowed to hold a press conference in Srinagar. As for Mir Junaid, he remarkably came into the media spotlight thanks to iconic TV host Arnab Goswamy, a fervent government supporter who invited him to his shows on \u201cnaya Kashmir<\/em>\u201d, \u201cthe new Kashmir”5<\/a><\/sup>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\ncongruence of the arrival of those newcomers on the Kashmiri political scene\nand the decision to silence J&K\u2019s longstanding political class leads us to\nconsider the two phenomena together. It seems that the central government and\nits Kashmiri political supporters were mutually using each other. For New\nDelhi, co-opting or even \u201ccreating\u201d local political figures perfectly suited\nthe current authoritarian centralized power. The government chose J&K\u2019s local\nleaders from New Delhi. This allowed the central government to mold the Kashmiri\npolitical scene into what served its interests best. As for the newcomers, the\ncloseness to the central government presented the opportunity to build a career\nin a political arena that had been emptied by the imprisonment of traditional\nparty leaders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As a matter\nof fact, being anointed by the BJP seemed to be an absolute prerequisite to\nexist in the political field, given the control exerted by the central\ngovernment on Kashmiris\u2019 political and social lives, and more generally\nspeaking, given the territory\u2019s reduced autonomy from now on. In turn, making\nthis local political class visible was also vital for the BJP. The statements made\nby the members of these new groups confirmed A. Shah\u2019s version, according to\nwhich the traditional Kashmiri political class was entirely corrupted and had\nto be renewed. These supports strengthened the BJP\u2019s hegemony. <\/p>\n\n\n\n What is even\nmore significant in the long-term is that those new actors allowed the BJP first\nto establish a political class whose very existence depended on the central government,\nand second to entirely renew the political landscape by getting rid of any\njarring voices. But since April 2019, this strategy seems to have reached its\nlimit. The newcomers were excluded in favor of better-known political figures\nwho are well established in J&K. One can assume that this turnaround is due\nto the absence of local political spokespersons for the new elite, and to their\ninability to properly administer the territory, even if they were covertly\nsupervised by New Delhi. The figure of Mir Junaid perfectly illustrates the\ndiscrepancy between the central government\u2019s discourse and the reality on the\nground: even as he was on a media tour in New Delhi and was presented by\npro-government newspapers as the embodiment of J&K\u2019s political future, he\nwas, and still is to this day, virtually unknown across the Kashmir valley. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Two facts attest to New Delhi\u2019s new strategy.\nFirst, the creation of the Apni Party (\u201cOur Party\u201d) headed by Altaf Bukhari,\nformer local Minister and ex-member of the People\u2019s Democratic Party(PDP). This new party is seen by Kashmiri people as controlled by New\nDelhi, and that is confirmed by A. Bukhari and A. Shah\u2019s close relationship,\nwhich is well reported in the media, although party officials deny it. Secondly,\nFarooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah have been freed, in March and April 2020\nrespectively, whereas most political leaders remain under house arrest, such as\nMehbooba Mufti and the other members of the HC. Their liberations incite\nobservers and the population to think that Omar Abdullah will play a major role\nin the new J&K. Actually, since they were allowed to express themselves in\npublic again, neither of them has mentioned Article 370. On the contrary, they\ntacitly endorse its abrogation since they don\u2019t object to the August 5th<\/sup>\ndecision per se<\/em>, and they only bring up the restoration of the status of\nfederal state, whereby the authority of the Chief Minister is higher than his\ncounterpart\u2019s in a territory. Only NGOs questioned the legality of the decision\nby bringing the case to the Supreme Court, but no political party has done so. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This new strategy of co-opting\nwell-established political figures who already have a wide network serves the\nsame purpose as the overhaul of the local political class described before. For\nthe central government, it is a way to administer Kashmir by using the existing\npolitical leaders who are now all the more tied to New Delhi. As for the local\nfigures co-opted by New Delhi, they can still hold their political office and\nenjoy the associated political and economic rewards. As a consequence, even\nthough A. Shah presented the August 5th<\/sup> decision as a way to fight\nagainst cronyism, the central government actually encouraged it and allowed it\nto function unchecked, just like its predecessors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Far from\nbecoming a \u201cnew Kashmir\u201d, the territory is marked by the perpetuation of old\npractices, where the distribution of political resources by the central government\nbuys the votes of local representatives: the indispensable varnish of\ndemocratic legitimacy applied over political decisions that are made without\nany local consultations. The dynamics\nwill therefore not be different from what they have been since Independence,\nand mostly since the 1980s, continuously eroding the population\u2019s trust in both\nthe central state and the local legitimist political class. The former is seen as\nmore interested in the territory than the wellbeing of its inhabitants, and the\nlatter are accused of being corrupt and controlled by New Delhi. So even though\nthe institutional framework has changed, the factors of disaffiliation remain\nunchanged, as the population finds itself, once again, \u201clike an insect stuck\nbetween two elephants\u201d, to quote a phrase that is popular among Kashmiris. They\nconsider those political maneuvers with their usual contempt, which they\ndisdainfully sum up with the formula \u201cbusiness as usual<\/em>\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Since March\n2020, the fight against Covid-19 has also been used as an argument to heighten\nthe authoritarian and violent silencing of the Kashmiri population. Since the\nbeginning of the lockdown, nearly 2,300 Kashmiris are estimated to have been\narrested, some of them have been killed, hundreds of stores have had to close\ndown, and hundreds of vehicles have been seized. Violent arrests and physical\npunishments for violating the lockdown are common throughout the whole country.\nBut they acquire special significance in a territory that had already been placed\nunder lockdown for months and whose inhabitants have lived under a special\nregime for thirty years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\ngovernment presented the abrogation as a way to better integrate J&K into\nthe Indian Union and to restore \u201csecurity\u201d in the context of terrorist threats.\nBut in reality, Kashmiris\u2019 feeling of disaffiliation has been exacerbated and\nhas spread to the populations living in Ladakh and Jammu, where protests have\nalso been observed. In the meantime, enrollment in the insurgency hasn\u2019t gone\ndown. So it is now obvious that none of the government\u2019s official objectives\nhas been successfully reached so far. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond the\nlocal effects and ideological implications entailed by the silencing and the\ninvisiblization of the only Muslim-majority area in India, as well as the\nerosion of its institutions, the assertion of an increasingly centralized and\nauthoritarian power didn\u2019t really cause a stir in the country. On the contrary,\nboth the decision of the abrogation and the way it was implemented were\nreceived either with passivity, or with satisfaction and enthusiasm. Those\nreactions reflect the desire for, or at least the acceptance of, a power rooted\nin an ethnic conception of citizenship whose implementation relies on the\nexecutive government\u2019s centralized, authoritarian control, at the expense of\nthe traditional Indian institutional functioning. <\/p>\n\n\n\n All of these elements corroborate the hypothesis presented in the introduction: that of a growing hegemony of Hindu nationalism. This hegemony is conceived in its Gramscian sense, as \u201cuniversally valid\u201d in the whole Indian society, and especially the Hindu population, which is constituted and maintained as an organic group by the Prime Minister. The massive support shown to the BJP at the 2019 spring elections materializes this hegemony as it contributes to it. But the attraction exerted by the party can no longer be limited to a single election cycle. And yet, in the wake of the citizenship laws drafted in late 2019, this new hegemony challenges the open and inclusive quality of the Indian citizenship as it was forged in 1953. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In August 2019, Narendra Modi\u2019s Hindu nationalist government removed the constitutionally mandated autonomy of Jammu and Kashmir, the only Muslim-majority state in India. The decision is analyzed in the wake of N. Modi\u2019s triumphant reelection to the office of Prime Minister in May 2019, after a first term which started in 2014. Through the example […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":19414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_molongui_author":["user-32"],"footnotes":"[{\"content\":\" The insurgency was started by Kashmiri fighters, who were then joined by Pakistani and other foreign fighters, including \u201ctransfuges\u201d from the Afghan war (1979-1989). Those foreign warriors were rejected by the local population because of the crimes they committed. There were essentially two categories of fighters at the time: Kashmiris mostly asking for Kashmir\u2019s independence; and foreign fighters who wanted Indian Kashmir to join Pakistan, and who were therefore actively supported by Islamabad.\",\"id\":\"noria-6442\"},{\"content\":\" See the latest report by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights: https:\/\/www.ohchr.org\/Documents\/Countries\/PK\/KashmirUpdateReport_8July2019.pdf<\/a> It is worth adding that India condemned this report and considers it as an interference into Indian internal affairs (see https:\/\/economictimes.indiatimes.com\/news\/politics-and-nation\/india-slams-un-rights-office-report-on-jk-as-continuation-of-false-narrative\/articleshow\/70127923.cms<\/a>), and that Pakistan has also been accused of violating its own Kashmiri citizens\u2019 rights namely those living in Gilgit Baltistan and Azad-Kashmir.\",\"id\":\"noria-7836\"},{\"content\":\" On February 14th 2019, a car carrying explosives was rammed into an army convoy by an Indian Kashmiri as the vehicles were passing through the district of Pulwama, south of Srinagar. 46 soldiers lost their lives, and the attacker also died in the explosion. The attack was claimed by Pakistani armed group Jaish-e-Mohammed.\",\"id\":\"noria-18405\"},{\"content\":\" When the BJP left the coalition government and the Chief Minister resigned, the Kashmiri assembly was dissolved and J&K was put under the direct rule of New Delhi before the next elections.\",\"id\":\"noria-19075\"},{\"content\":\" The use of the phrase is very clever because it is a reference to the title of a memorandum on the restructuring of J&K drafted in 1944 by Sheikh Abdullah in order to achieve emancipation from the Dogra absolute monarchy that the state was submitted to back then.\",\"id\":\"noria-25516\"}]"},"categories":[1],"tags":[27,28],"podcast":[],"project":[],"region":[19],"class_list":["post-35","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article","tag-india","tag-south-asia-program","region-asia"],"yoast_head":"\nFrom State to Union Territory: Central Government Increased Control over J&K<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Security-<\/em>driven Policy<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/noria-research.com\/south-asia2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/JK_picture_1-1920x1280.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nShrinking Autonomy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A Centralized, Top-Down\nDecision<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Invisiblization<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
In New Delhi,\nAuthoritarian Government and Silent Opposition <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Sporadic Protests<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/noria-research.com\/south-asia2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/JK_picture_2-1920x1280.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nIn Jammu and Kashmir,\nPolitical Expediency and Popular Resistance \n<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
A New Political Class?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Governing the Kashmir Territory through Political Co-optation <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nNotes<\/h2>\n\n\n