Opinion Beyond the bullet

The Tral attack is yet another pointer that peace in Kashmir can’t be won with the gun alone

The grenade attack in Tral town in south Kashmir that killed two people on Thursday was a despicable act. Thirty others were injured when the grenade was thrown at the motorcade of Naeem Akhtar, the state minister for public works, who was leaving after visiting the area. As the minister said, those behind the attack are neither friends of Kashmir nor Islam.

The attack has come at a time when the government was making some attempt to address two concerns: One, the huge governance deficit in the state; and two, the political leadership’s bunker mentality that has served to cut it off from the people, leaving a political vacuum on the ground that militants have occupied. Earlier in the week, Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti spent a day in Pulwama, reaching out to the local populace and listening to their complaints and grievances. Akhtar was likewise in Tral to take stock of public works, and there was a huge response to his visit too, in a place that no politician has visited since the July 2016 killing of the local boy-turned Hizbul Mujahideen commander, Burhan Wani. It is said the grenade was intended for the minister. Clearly, the perpetrators are fearful of political activity or any attempt by the government to attend to the needs of the people.

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The Hizbul Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Toiba were quick to disown the attack because it killed two passersby. Would either have claimed ownership had the victims been different? Counter-factual aside, this attack, and another in which a Sashastra Seema Bal officer was killed in Banihal along the Jammu-Srinagar highway the previous night, show that while the police, army and other security forces have been soldiering on against militants, eliminating many top leaders, militancy cannot be removed by the gun alone. The security forces, working as they are among an alienated population, know this only too well. Which is why BJP general secretary, Ram Madhav’s remarks in Srinagar that the “doors are open” for talks with “everybody”, and that there would be no preconditions provide some hope. Read along with the prime minister’s Independence Day “goli aur gaali sey nahin, galey milney sey” statement, and Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s conciliatory remarks during his visit to the Valley, there finally seems to be realisation that without dialogue, the situation in Kashmir can only worsen. The Centre must now act on its stated intentions.