The phone ring pierced through the unusual silence of the Srinagar night. I stretched my hand across to pick up the emergency landline next to my bed. “Is that Mr. Joseph?” a voice asked. As soon as I said ‘yes’, the caller disconnected. I rolled back under the blanket. The phone rang again. “Who is this?” another caller asked this time. As I rattled out my name, he disconnected the call. I sat up; it was obvious that something unusual was unfurling. In the Srinagar of 2001, when the nights belonged to the security forces and militants, such phone calls were unusual.
After a few more calls made to verify my identity, I was called to the gates of University of Kashmir next morning. The calls were a culmination of my efforts, lasting two months, to meet Abdul Majeed Dar, then chief commander of Hizbul Mujahideen, the Valley’s largest militant group that had dramatically declared and abandoned a ceasefire a few months before.
After a decade and half of fighting, Majeed Dar was in favour of a negotiated peaceful settlement involving India, Pakistan and the Kashmiri people. He wasn’t talking about anything beyond the historically stated position of New Delhi. As I switched off the recorder, he said how frustrated he was with India for not grasping the opportunity to bring peace to the Valley.
Ever since the Kashmir Valley erupted in violence in the late 1980s, there has never been a better moment for peace than those early days of the 21st century. Then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had reached out to Kashmir, Hizbul Mujahideen had a large number of members keen on peace, and a groundswell of support was palpable among ordinary Kashmiris.
However, K.C. Pant, the interlocutor for Kashmir, failed to find a breakthrough. A good part of the blame should lie with the Indian security establishment, which couldn’t appreciate its gains from the windfall of peace in Kashmir.
More than 16 years, thousands of deaths and countless rights violations later, Kashmir is yet again at a crucial juncture. New Delhi under Narendra Modi has made it clear that it is fighting a final battle. However, those who have seen through the fog of war would tell you that there is no final solution to Kashmir through bullets. A lasting peace will only flow from mature and just political negotiations.
By the time Majeed Dar figured out the power of peace, after being a pioneer in armed resistance for more than a decade, it was too late for him and Kashmir. A few months after I interviewed him, he was gunned down by rivals. In Kashmir far too many hate peace, too.