Finally an Editorial in the Rising Kashmir with a bit of common sense and a whole lot of truth!
Hartal won’t do
APHC’s strike calls are never turned down, now is the time to review the old tool of resistance
Chairman of one of the factions of Hurriyat Conference Syed Ali Geelani has extended the ongoing strike for two more days. The announcement came at the height of expectations that normal life would resume from Thursday, though the popular concern for the heinous crime committed in Shopian remains firm. In the current phase of Kashmir struggle that started off in 1989, Kashmiris have always been responding to the calls for strikes and shutdowns. There has been a hectic debate within newspaper columns and between academicians around the question whether Hartal as a tool of resistance is any longer relevant.
There are views and counterviews. Dominant view pegs on the argument that shutting down of businesses and other routines practices does not inflict as much a cost on the state government as it does inflict on the common masses. Hartal, as has been highlighted in these lines earlier, used to be a communist mode of resistance against the wealthy factory owners. General strikes, back then, would halt the production thus causing massive loss to the factory owner. This goes without saying who is at loss when a Hartal is observed in Kashmir. Of course not the bureaucrats or wealthy businessmen, but the common masses. Both the factions of Hurriyat Conference and the forces outside its ambit should give a serious thought to this view. To say that is not to object to the cause APHC is espousing. But it is a genuine popular reaction to a mode of resistance that is harming the public interest rather than the interest of the state.
Take for example the recurrent strikes during summer. It is common knowledge that Kashmir, owing to inclement weather conditions and poor access to outside markets, remains landlocked for more than six months. The summer is always seen as promise of earning for a variety of sectors including tourism.
Then there is education sector. This is the only season when Schools and Colleges and University campuses function. True, the Hurriyat Conference leaders are being debarred from all other democratic means, but that does not require to be handled through an action that harms public interest. APHC’s calls are rarely refused. People honor their calls and halt their businesses to show solidarity with the cause APHC shares with them. But, if the Hartal becomes a norm, as it has now, this support-base should not be expected to remain intact.
Hurriyat leadership would do well by reviewing its strategy of expression. It’s being heard on variety of media; TV, Radio and newspapers. People show solidarity when there is an occasion. The leadership will have to rethink on whether it needs Hartal in its primitive communist model, or it should modify this tool of resistance and synchronize it with the current needs and challenges.
The simple conclusion is this: Hartal won’t do!