Informist, Wednesday, Sep 18, 2024

By Kuldeep Singh

SRINAGAR - Six years of "babudom", or bureaucratic rule, have led to widespread corruption in Jammu and Kashmir and the people are "fed up", according to Iltija Mehbooba Mufti, a leader of the Jammu and Kashmir People's Democratic Party.

Mufti, the daughter of party president and former chief minister of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir Mehbooba Mufti, is making her political debut in the ongoing assembly polls and is contesting from Bijbehara, polling for which is underway today.

"Babudom wali wo jo bimari hai (the disease of bureaucracy)...where there is corruption at an all-time high. They extort money from people, they extort bribes, and people are fed up of that. Our unemployment has surged up to 39%. No recruitment in the government sector has happened because... of corruption," Mufti told Informist in an interview.

"How is a person supposed to run his home and pay a bribe to an officer? It's hard. We never had poverty in Kashmir before. Now you are seeing poverty seeping in gradually," she added.

Following are the edited excerpts of the interview:

Q. It's your maiden election. What are the issues that have been shared with you by the people during your campaigning?

A. People are very disillusioned and they feel very disempowered because there has been a very clear concerted effort on Delhi's part to disempower them. So, every policy decision that's taken in Delhi essentially disinherits them from one thing or the other. We have also seen how people who are employed by the government have been laid off on absolutely trivial grounds: something that they posted on Facebook, something about their third or fourth cousin being related to a militant who surrendered 30 years ago.

...In India, whenever there's an election, it's a carnival atmosphere. But here, if you see, it's very subdued because people here have lost so much and I don't think an election really is going to restore their confidence or trust. But where it helps is the fact that we have seen 'babudom' for the past six years. Hopefully, we'll put an end to that now with elected representatives.

Q. Is this the reason why people are now coming out to vote?

A. Yes, because they are fed up. You don't even have a government here, you have bureaucrats. Babudum wali wo jo bimari hai (the disease of bureaucracy)…where there is corruption at an all-time high. They extort money from people, they extort bribes, and people are fed up of that. Our unemployment has surged up to 39%. No recruitment in the government sector has happened because... of corruption. So, people are fed up. They want their own elected representatives, who they can go to. They can knock on their doors and get redressal for their grievances.

How is a person supposed to run his home and pay a bribe to an officer? It's hard. We never had poverty in Kashmir before. Now you are seeing poverty seeping in gradually.

Q. The PDP won three seats in Kashmir in 2014, but after the alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2015, it lost all three seats in 2019 as well as 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Can you comment on that?

A. If you follow our trajectory after 2019, you don't see the invisible hand of the government, but I do... Most of the defections were engineered and they happened because Delhi orchestrated it. So all our MLAs (Members of Legislative Assembly) left not because we had an alliance with the BJP but because they were made to leave. And that's why the party has taken a jolt, which I agree.

I am entering at a time when we are going through an incredibly difficult period. But having said that, ups and downs are there in every political party's trajectory. If you look at BJP in the 1980s, they had about two Members of Parliament. And you look at them now, they won term after term. So in politics, what goes up must come down. For somebody to be in opposition, someone else has to be in power. So it's a cycle and I am not the least bit scared by it.

Q. Do you think the independents backed by Jamaat-e-Islami and Engineer Rashid's party will eat into PDP's vote share?

A. No, absolutely not. I think everybody has their own space in Kashmir and I am not the kind of politician who will dub them as agents or proxies because they eat into my vote bank. We all earn our victories or defeats on our own merit or the lack of merit. So if they are participating, why not? When National Conference rigged the election in 1987 and when they criminalised the Jamaat, you see the kind of turn Jammu-Kashmir's history took. It was a very turbulent term and one that plunged us into conflict. So I think if Jamaat or Engineer Saab want to participate, why not?

Q. After the abrogation of Article 370, the government claimed militancy reduced in Jammu and Kashmir. What is the reason that militancy is increasing in Jammu?

A. (When) you largely have a muscular policy...by keeping a gun on your shoulder, you won't be able to achieve anything normal. Fear has a very short shelf life. At some point, people stop feeling scared as well. It's a very natural human reaction. So their claims are obviously not grounded in facts.

You never had militancy in Jammu, Rajouri, Doda, Poonch. You see a revival – not just revival – you have never seen militancy there before. You have seen civilians being targeted. You see non-civilians here being targeted. So many of our soldiers have lost their lives. So there's no semblance of normalcy. We just have BJP's propaganda, which is being perpetuated on all levels. But it's not taking off, that propaganda.

Q. Is restoration of Article 370 or special status to Jammu and Kashmir on your agenda? How are you going to work towards it considering it's only Parliament that can restore it and Kashmir has just three members in Parliament?

A. Of course, it is. When the farm laws came, everybody said it was the gospel truth and there was no way the Modi government would revoke those laws. But then we saw what happened. The entire country was convulsed with protests – peaceful protests. We haven't had a chance yet to express ourselves democratically. After these elections, and inshallah, when I become an MLA, I am also going to speak on the floor of the assembly and our agenda is not just restoration of (Article) 370, but it is also the larger resolution of the issue: peace with dignity, reconciliation, and dialogue. So we are not just focusing on the binaries of having 370 or not. Of course, we are going to push for the restoration peacefully, but for us it's also the larger issue of Jammu and Kashmir.

Q. What is your assessment of the economy of Jammu and Kashmir?

A. It's awful, whether it's horticulture, willow industry, or the walnut industry. We saw how the tax barriers were removed on American walnuts last year. The willow industry is also suffering. Horticulture is also (suffering) because they wanted to promote Adani apples, they deliberately kept our apples waiting on the highway for days and they rotted. So we have seen how our local economy has taken a hit. Unemployment, we are the highest in all of the country. The unemployment rate here is about 39%.

Q. How would you address the high unemployment rate?

A. We hope to fill up government positions, because since 2019 none of the recruitment on government jobs here has happened. It is all tainted by corruption. So we intend to fill those positions.

We are also going to do something for entrepreneurs and hopefully, inshallah, if we come into government, we will have schemes for youngsters, for unemployed youngsters. Mufti sahab (former chief minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed) had a self-help group for engineers. That's just an example. So that's what we intend to do.

Q. Could you join the NC in a post-poll alliance?

A. That question will be best answered by Ms Mufti (Mehbooba Mufti). But I think PDP will definitely play an instrumental role in deciding who forms the government. And it will be a non-BJP government. End

Edited by Vandana Hingorani

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