Kashmir: more the things change, the more they stay the same !

While days lengthen in rest of India, nights keep getting longer in Kashmir -more home-grown separatists, more 'pebbles vs pellets' casualties, more vacuous 'moohtod jawab' and surgical strike rhetoric, more curfews, more internet and TV channel bans, nocturnal raids and what not ! A lame duck Chief Minister cocooned in secure ,cordoned off VIP areas of Srinagar darkens the nights further and adds to Delhi's nightmare.

One expected better from a new political dispensation of the same genre at Centre and State, at least a refreshingly different approach to bear on the dystopia. One sees little evidence of it. Past regimes at different times twiddled with one or more of three approaches without much success- diplomatic engagement with Pakistan, the alma mater of terror groups operating in Kashmir, taking out the militant leadership, and political dialogue with home stakeholders. Modi sarkar treads the same old beaten path. Only, each approach is being tried in isolation by turns, not in simultaneity.  

First it tried honeymooning with Pak. Not easy for a regime riding to power outraging 'weak Manmohan', ' one head for ten' and promising good use of its '56" ka chhati’. To its credit, it did. Against its grains it invited Nawaz Sharif to its swearing in, Mr Modi 'airdropped unannounced' to Lahore for Nawaz's birthday, and the two did well publicised photo ops and ‘optical’ hand waves under international gaze. Nawaz was condoned for Pak’s Kargil misadventure. Some say Kargil was Musarraf’s doing which begs the question, why then invest political goodwill on Nawaz?

Then the Pathankot shock. Still ,PM gave Pak a long rope, allowing for the first time, Pak intelligence to do investigations inside our air base without seeking reciprocity of investigations by Indian cops in Pak territory. Uri was the last straw on camel’s back leading to an avenging surgical strike by Indian army across the LOC that inflicted undisclosed damages on terror havens within Pak. 2014 status quo ante stood restored. Recent beheading of two Indian jawans by Pak will bring back echoes of Mr Modi words spoken in 2013 “The soldiers of our nation are beheaded and after a few days the Prime Minister of that nation is treated with chicken biryani,". Another shot at detente looks pretty remote. 

Though Indian good neighbourly overtures were so cruelly rebuffed by Pakistan, tragically, there was very worryingly no international condemnation of Pak perfidy. So, as before, we are stuck with a neighbour hell-bent on 'bleeding India through thousand   cuts'. Neither Pak nor terror groups took the underlying message in our surgical strike. Terror attacks and unrest at LOC continue at elevated levels, taking heavier toll of our valuable fighting assets and more unmitigated hardships for residents. Pak isolation as the 'mother ship of terrorism' is nowhere in evidence. The first beaten up vintage approach stays beaten.

As for Kashmir, it stepped into the millennium with the dreaded cordon and search operations, CASO, at doorsteps. In 2017, CASO is back, this time maybe in perpetuity as an operative part of army's on-going strategy. After burying engagement with Pak, the regime now is solely focused on eliminating militants.

Is this the way forward - effective area domination and patrolling of streets by armed forces or in 
other words brazen exhibition of muscularity to subdue Kashmiris into making the right choice between ' terror and tourism’ as the put it? isn’t this yet one more of the beaten paths? Further, one can legitimately ask, why the area domination stuff hasn’t already happened? The Armed Forces (J&K) Special Powers Act 1990 granted the armed forces in disturbed areas omnibus powers of search and seizure, arrest, and even to kill on mere suspicion with impunity. Considering the massive deployment of armed personnel, and making liberal allowances for difficult terrain and a hostile populace, twenty-seven years is a long enough time for the army to have done it. In recent times, it has been found wanting in warding off    sneaking terror  attacks inside its very  own campuses,  or to 
effectively sterilise areas en route its convoys. An India Today report listing major terror attacks shows that in 14 years from 1999-2013 there were just four attacks on army camps and one attack on its convoys whereas in two years and four month, 2014-2017(April) there were ten attacks on camps and three on convoys, a quantum jump, indeed. In itself, this is a telling evidence of growing alienation of kashmiris with rest of India.

And mind you, we have among the most professional armies in the world. So, it's not simply a matter of inefficiency. Armies are conditioned to take on enemies beyond its borders where its operations are not fettered by niceties of human rights or law. All is fair on enemy territory. But it can never have the same freedom in domestic operations. It may not shoot down but only shoo off stone-pelters. Armies win territories, quell unrest, but never keep domestic peace for indefinitely long periods. There is much evidence around to substantiate this plain truth.

Kashmir needs out of box thinking. One such could be gradual 'ulsterisation'. An army that speaks in tones like ' ......displaying flags of IS and Pakistan, then we will treat them as anti-national elements and go helter-skelter for them’ or 'those who obstruct our operations during encounters and aren’t supportive will be treated as over-ground workers of terrorists' comes across more as an army of occupation than an 'Indian' army. Ulsterisation will lead to gradual replacement of it by army units raised from carefully selected local recruits. These units may be more acceptable hence more likely to get local support. Besides, it would gainfully employ the youth who are now getting brainwashed into terrorism to take off from where Paki mujahideen of yesteryears left. Already J&K has the highest unemployment rate in the country. As many as 27K govt vacancies lie unfilled.

But not the least, it would reduce casualties of army personnel from rest of India. The bodybags arriving from theatres in the valley are inflaming puerile hatred against valley Kashmiris and those Kashmiris, particularly, students living outside the state. Whipping up hysteria merely complicates reconciliation.

Building domestic peace is the realm of politics. This is even truer in the scenario of a hostile populace egged on by a nasty neighbour with emotional and religious ties to it, and one waging a relentless war 'by other means'. Our Northeast hold a valuable lesson. It too is in much the same boat. But it has relative peace largely due to political breakthroughs  with separatists. Rajiv Gandhi's Mizo accord settled Mizo insurgency without any loss of sovereignty. A new Mizoram state with the insurgent chief Laldenga as CM brought peace. In a like manner, Rajiv-Longowal accord suffocated Khalistan cries once and for all. Of course, in both cases, the army chipped in by doing what it knows best - 'softening up’ the opposition.

On its own the army can do little to bring lasting peace.  As long as Sheikh Abdullah, notwithstanding his oft flirtations with the 'independence’ idea, was around pro-India voices could be heard in the valley. Since then Kashmir has only been hemorrhaging goodwill for 'Hindustan'. Mainstream parties are increasingly feeling the disconnect with masses. Even PDP, once the voice of sympathy for the azadi cause in South Kashmir , finds its turf overrun  by home bred militants.North Kashmir seems no better as evidenced from people's  participation in the just concluded Srinagar LS bye- election- a record low of 7% .In 2014, the voting percentage for whole of Kashmir was 49%. The down slide is disconcertingly steep .Kashmir urgently needs a charm offensive to accompany the disarm offensive of the army. Mr Modi is committing a great folly by relying only on the latter ignoring the former. In this connection, the following words of Nehru, reproduced in the book ‘India after Gandhi’ by Ramachandra Guha sound truly prophetic,

“but however, much we may want this(Kashmir), it cannot be done ultimately except through the goodwill of the mass of the population. Even if military forces held Kashmir for a while, a later consequence might be a strong reaction against this.”

There is no alternative , TINA  , to reconciliation and statesmanship in cutting the Kashmir knot. 

One last thought on history of the imbroglio. The India Independence Act lifted Crown's suzerainty over princely states and lapsed  all obligation to it . It did not, however, require them to join one or the other of the new dominion. So staying independent was an option, however  unviable. Maharaja Hari Singh chose to be  an independent ruler from 15.08.47 to 27.10. 1947, the day Lord Mountbatten accepted his instrument of accession with a remark, “it is my Government's wish that as soon as law and order have been restored in Jammu and Kashmir and her soil cleared of the invader the question of the State's accession should be settled by a reference to the people.” Those who calumniate Pandit Nehru for agreeing to a plebiscite in UN miss the point, plebiscite was a fait accompli. It will be naive to believe that a Governor General, that too a British, of the dominion (India was still a dominion ) would not have had his say in this and the decision to refer  the matter to UN. For Nehru, too it was a case of TINA, there is no alternative! 

One more, One less may make world of a difference !

Who wouldn't like to live life ONCE more or be rid of the ONE pesky neighbour next door or get ONE more like to one's  FB   post or that the dinner bill at Hotel Taj have ONE zero less, or wish one weren't just ONE day late in paying credit card bills or home loan EMI ,or arrive ONE second before the traffic lights turn red , or that ONE and ONE  make eleven ,not two, or that the party host doesn't grudge ONE for the road .....the wish list is endless. Life is all about hits and misses, some agonisingly close ,just a matter of  ONE more or ONE less ! 

This 'one' thing in no frivolity. Don't believe it ,then read on . It has had profound impact , changing courses of history or destinies of men and nations. In fact , it has determined our very existence.

Yes ! our very existence ! Indisputably now, the universe began with a Big Bang. An Infinitesimal point at an infinite temperature some 13.7 billion years ago exploded creating, space and time. All matter too emerged out of it. So did anti-matter that sought out matter for a deathly embrace and mutual annihilation, leaving just mass-less energy in its wake . Had it not been for a quantum quirk ( the quantum roost of the micro-world of elementary particles has many idiosyncratic strands like certainty of 'uncertainty', reality of 'virtual' particles.....) that for every billion of anti-matter , the Big Bang produced one billion and ONE of matter. That extra ONE survived to give substance to the stars, the universe and the cellular fabric of which we are made. Otherwise, the universe would have just been an ever expanding expanse of desolate, matter less ,lifeless dark void.

By God's design ,we survived this one and another by a whisker. If the percentage of Oxygen in total matter in the universe had been ONE percent less, earth would have been as sterile as Mars. Why ? There would have been no oxygen at all, for one percent is all there is. .

Well, our existence as a human too owes much to this 'ONE' fortuity. But for ONE chromosome ,we would have been  Chimpanzees living on trees ,sporting a tail. We would be having the same 24 chromosomes. One good thing would have happened, the rape of our eco-system would have been avoided.

Never mind , we as humans moved on, setting up distinctive civilisations in different geographies and climes, among them our own Vedic culture. At a self destruct moment in the evolution of Indian civilisation, Duryodhana refused to give ONE village to each Pandava ,triggering  a  fratricidal war , Mahabharata, as bloody as WW I . That surely shaved off  Bharata's civilisational gains by a couple of centuries at the least . What if Duryodhana had not committed the epic folly of choosing the Yadava legions over the ONE man army, Lord Krishna ? Would he have won the war ? Evil that he was, would  Bharata have seen a rule of the devil ? My heart just missed ONE beat ! 

Let's take an episode from a more recent period of history. In 1452, Orban,an arms seller, made a cannon for the Byzantium army. The emperor ,however, had no money to buy it ,so Orban sold it to the Ottoman Sultan. Next year the Sultan made good use of the cannon to blast a hole in the defensive wall of Constantinople ,the capital of Byzantium, through which the Turks poured in to pillage and erase Byzantine from the pages of history. But for ONE cannon Byzantium may have lived on  ! 

Being a cricket enthusiast one miss I most rue - failure of Sir Donald Bradman to hit ONE boundary before calling it a day. With 6996 Test runs from 80 innings and 10 not outs that was what he needed for a career batting average of 100, no more no less. 

Finally the golden miss. Platinum must be disappointed that the starry cauldrons that created all elements failed to put one more proton in its nucleus, to make it golden. It needed one to add to its 78 to attain the atomic number of Gold. 

Negotiating the maze of rights

“What one thinks is right is not always the same as what others think is right; no one can be always right.” 

― Roy T. Bennett

 So very Right !!!

My father must have been much anxious that my life get right off to a right start right after emerging from my mother’s womb. So ,not one, two astrologers were  engaged to make my kundli . Surprisingly, both agreed that the disposition of my stars was just right. Rahu and Ketu wouldn’t cast their malevolent shadows on me as they were on the right side of my life journey.

However ,neither of them were around when someone right behind shoved me and my left arm went right through the glass of the refectory door. Bleeding profusely from a nasty gash on the wrist with little shards of glass ensconced in it, I was led to the school dispensary. Sister nurse picked off the shards and thought it right to sew it up instead of a simple dressing. So she draped a towel  over my head and proceeded right about the business of  sewing up . What didn't seem right was that she did it without  anaesthesia. She hadn't the  time to do the right thing. I still carry two scars from that accident, one on the wrist and the other in my heart which still rebels against the cruelty of the anonymous Sister nurse.

Time went by. I learnt the rights and wrongs of things and went right on to college. Till then Marx hadn't entered into my consciousness. So whatever I did was right. Then some bright hat said going right wasn't right . Left was the way to go . I thought that was right too. One always walked through the streets on its left , why not the same for the street of Life? So I became a rights activist on the left side of the political scale. That put my father, a right-minded soul, right out of his mind. He bristled with righteous indignation, how dare his right arm lean left ! After all ,right was ,by definition, right. For one with a heart in the right place ,rebelling against father didn't feel alright. I did the next right thing ,like a pendulum I sometimes swung right ,at other times left since nobody ever suggested staying centre.

That led to contretemps with both left and right over my being confused. They said you are either left brained or right brained . Being neither an organised or creative person, I deemed it right to remain scatterbrained. 

That's how I have muddled through life, met mr Bright, mr Wright ,mr Upright ,mr Forthright ,mr Spright, but never one only right. Except , perhaps ,Mr Bennet.  

The chrysalis period of retirement

 " NOW THAT YOU ARE RETIRED 

 YOU GET AN EVEN TOUGHER BOSS......YOUR WIFE "

I became one with a growing crowd of bank retirees a year and a half ago. At close of first decennial of the millennium, it wasn't a crowd, just a trickle. The numbers swelled phenomenally from retiree outflows across the entire PSB spectrum especially in the last five years with more in the wings. In fact, it’s a deluge quite reminiscent of the spectacular rise in child births in the west immediately following WW II, one that coined the term ‘baby-boomers’ for young couples. Our PSBs have gone to the other end of human life scale and turned ‘retiree -boomers’.

This unprecedented swell in retirees has put focus on our handling of senior citizens. For bank retirees the foremost issue is not so much financial as an issue of smooth transition from bread-earners status to one living off pensions or at best, part-time earners. More importantly, they need emotional succour to get over the feel of fish out of water after the final handshakes. 

The normative approach for enlightened managements is to put would-be retirees through workshops and counselling sessions covering the whole gamut of life style changes required to cope with challenges and threats of an retired existence - from aspects of financial security, time management , dietary habits, health care and medical security, to drop in self-esteem arising from loss of halo of an IP ( important person) on turning a PIP ( previously important person).In short, an attuning of mind to seek happiness ignoring the balding head at the top. 

By some fortuity or more likely, the prayers of well-wishers I had managed to acquire an executive tag, and an entitlement to participate, with spouse, in one such program before the ‘final’ adieu. It’s a formal structured program that the bank conducts for all its soon-to-superannuate executives to mentally prepare them for an existence outside its portals.

It was three days of quintessential learning, cogitation, self-exploration and emotional reorientation. From financial and wealth management in an inflationary world to desired behavioural readjustments in family and social relationships, to coping with ageing and mortality, a bouquet of knowledge gaps were plugged. In essence, we returned with a self-administered ‘wellness kit’ in our mental baggage, besides extravagant gifts of some great utilitarian retirement tips.

Our physical comforts too were well taken care of. We wallowed in luxury for its duration in 5-star accommodation, gormandized on multi-cuisine delicacies, exotic snacks, took sight-seeing trips, watched light and sound laser shows et al, all paid for plus some out-of-pocket allowance to boot. (the proverbial fattening of a sheep before the kill?) What more could one want!

Sadly, you can take a horse to water but can't make it drink. For instance, an early morning hour-long regimen of variously twisting one’s body and limbs and contorting of nostrils in asanas and pranayamas was highly recommended. Trainers saw to it that we got it right. But it was too big an ask for my badly abused body. Quite naturally, after a few frail attempts at flaying arms and legs I chickened out. Equally, quite naturally the trainers gave up on me early on and advised me to settle for an hour of daily brisk morning walk. And I didn't fail them, doing five rounds of the outer perimeter of Pataliputra Stadium every day without fail. Then in one of those quirky turn of events, the housemaid preponed her chore timing to early morning. Quite naturally, the duty of opening the gates and keeping vigil over her fell on me. The morning walk unobtrusively dropped out of daily itinerary. 

The dietician advised- just one regular meal in a day against the normal three. But that seemed to belittle my recent gastronomic sacrifices – abjuring non-veg food, mutton in particular that I loved, and cigarettes. Wasn't that sufficient abstinence, the mind rebelled. Besides, one doesn't forsake a new found love just like that – my new fondness for vegetarianism. Further, without being accused of hedonism, one can legitimately ask, what is the point of living if one can’t eat, drink and make merry at will ? Life in any case is ephemeral. So, its three meals as usual.

However, we came off rather well in matters relating to financial security, the forty years of grounding in taking 'risk-free’ risks came in handy. I already had my three buckets for financial comfort worked out- 'essentials' bucket for necessities of life, 'lifestyle' bucket for pursuit of dreams, and lastly, 'nest egg' bucket to provide for emergencies especially, medical ones.

But retirement is not only about retirement planning but also about retirement living. I learnt this truism, as they say, on the streets. The lessons came from dealing with the grey areas in the middle bucket, the dreams; in particular, the two prickly questions - 'why dream' and 'whose dreams'. 

The program’s wellness kit spoke of pursuing one’s dreams in the abundance of leisure time occasioned by retirement but after we had settled in our nest and had a go at dreams, a doubt sprouted. If you haven't dreamt for the better part of your life why day-dream now? Does one have any chutzpah left in the kitty for flights of fancy? After much one-way debates the wellness kit prevailed and my wife affirmed that for a fulfilling retired life we do need to fill in on unfulfilled dreams. The epilogue of our life story has to be inked differently, not merely a corollary to earlier chapters; to put it figuratively, written in the language of 3 Ds-  Doughnut, Drinks and Dreams.

The 'Whose dreams' thing proves more intractable. The program had no time slot for this one. Yet the issue is as old as the hills. As Adam Smith in his classic 'Wealth of Nations' puts it with utmost economy of words, it’s really a question of ‘double coincidence of wants '. Let me explain. I have a lust for travel, my wife thinks it wasteful. She would rather spend money on the likes of Amitabh Bachan cavorting on the silver screen, I, contrastingly, on if-not-that-then-this basis, would prefer buying books. So, the money in the middle bucket lies unspent for want of ‘double coincidence of dreams’. That precisely is the 'whose dreams' problem, a knotty one of identifying shared dreams.

Come to think of it, a host of other post teething issues remain unresolved. Maybe someday I will share these too. But rest assured it would only strengthen the narrative that 'wellness kits' of transition programs, at best, plug knowledge gaps. Humans and their relationships are too complex to be encapsulated in a one size fits formulation for happily retired living. When one actually gets down to the grind of living a relatively secluded life on one’s own that mantras for happy living, so to say, evolve. And the mantras need to pass muster in the chrysalis phase, the first two years  of second innings. Otherwise, there is a real risk of inertia seeping in to perpetuate a less than happy state of existence. Waiting too long for things to work themselves out is really not a viable option, but a surrender.

So, we do wonder, why is our own taking so long? Was the process not well begun? So, let's go back in time. The pre-retiree training was held at Agra, the place that still echoes Shah Jahan's eternal love for Mumtaz Mahal. What I believe is the most beauteous monument in the world, Taj Mahal, still stands tall and erect in glorious testimony of it, an internationally acclaimed symbol of love. 

However, the obverse side of this romantic tale has two dark spots. When you are touching sixty, Cupid isn't the same hero that he was, say, 40 years earlier. Taj looks a lot less bewitching to retirees. Further, on the banks of Yamuna opposite the Taj Mahal is the cruel reminder of the tragic denouement of emperor's love - the fort where he was confined by his son, Aurangzeb, to spend the rest of his life gazing wistfully at Taj through jharokhas on the rooftop. Even by the less exacting standards of civil conduct of the age, the emperor wasn’t too happily retired. And to add to the negativity of the place is its mental asylum. God forbid anyone ever needing it.

My rites of passage to happy retirement may have to include shaking off the shadows of Agra. 

But let's end on a happy note - the moorabas of Agra. If I can think of one other reason why Mughals chose Agra as their capital, it must be moorabas. Soft, juicy with pulpy innards, not too sweet, all in all just heavenly. Agra is the place for the sweet toothed!