Omar Abdullah
| Photo Credit: -PTI

J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s remarks on the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) triggered a fresh debate on the power projects and poor electricity scenario in the Union Territory (UT) on Wednesday (November 13m 2024).  

“The IWT on river-rich Jammu & Kashmir restricts its ability to harness its huge hydel power potential primarily due to storage constraints. J&K pays a heavy price in peak winter months when power generation hits low, creating hardships for its people,” said Mr. Abdullah while speaking at a conference of Power Ministers of States and UTs on Tuesday (November 12, 2024). 

Highlighting the “limiting clauses in the Treaty that restricts J&K from realising its full hydel potential by only permitting run-of-the-river projects”, Mr. Abdullah said J&K was compelled to rely on power imports from other States, “ which adversely impacts its economy”.

“To address this, J&K would require special compensation from the Centre, including viability gap funding and equity assistance, to harness its untapped hydro-energy potential,” he added.

Referring to Mr. Abdullah’s remarks that the IWT hinders J&K’s power capacity, former J&K Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti said there was no doubt that the Treaty has a negative impact on Kashmir “but the BJP narrative, of late, wants to make it an issue. Such issues can spark tension. Any tension between India and Pakistan will have a cost for the people of J&K”.

She asked Mr. Abdullah “to raise real questions”. “Does the power already generated belong to us? J&K generates electricity and is controlled by the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC). NC founder Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah handed over the Salal project and Dr. Farooq Abdullah handed over seven power projects to the NHPC. Our focus should be return of power projects,” Ms. Mufti said.

The former J&K CM said the BJP in 2014 had agreed to hand over at least two power projects to J&K. “The Rangarajan Committee also recommended it or the Centre should compensate us. Our electricity goes to the NHPC,” she added.

J&K Peoples Conference president Sajad Lone also criticised Mr. Abdullah’s reference to Treaty and termed it as “right-wing gibberish intended to appease the ruling-party BJP”.

“I propose dividing J&K’s water resources into two categories, with category I including resources available for hydropower generation within treaty limits, and category II comprising those restricted by specific treaty parameters. We have not harnessed even 20% of our potential. And what we have harnessed is mostly owned by the NHPC,” Mr. Lone said.

He said the projects controlled by the NHPC were among its most profitable, “yet J&K remains a net power importer”. “We should have been net exporters of power,” he said.

He asked Mr. Abdullah to advocate for J&K’s water rights and “prioritise the category I resources in discussions with the BJP-led Centre”.

“Once we achieve excellence in category I, we can always move to category II and demand our rights or compensation for adhering to a treaty signed without our consent,” he added.

According to the treaty, signed between India and Pakistan in 1960, India has the right over the run-of-the-river water over the three rivers flowing through J&K and complete rights over the waters flowing through the three rivers in Punjab.

“It’s good these people are in jail,” a fruit seller shared his frustration, keeping his shop open despite a lowered shutter in response to the lockdown called on by the separatists. The year was 2019, precisely a month after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government announced the abrogation of Article 370, and “these people” in question were the leaders of Jammu & Kashmir’s regional parties: the Jammu & Kashmir National Conference (JKNC) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). Five years later, these very people are not just out of jail, but some of them are also set to form the government in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. 

The world can draw an essential lesson from what has transpired in Jammu & Kashmir in the last five years. And this lesson has nothing to do with the polling outcome. Despite the previous unstable assembly (the BJP opted out of the ruling PDP-led coalition), the geopolitical turmoil in the aftermath of the abrogation of Article 370, and the controversy around delimitation, Jammu & Kashmir chose democracy yet again.

Democracy As A Lived Reality

When an insurgency or an armed conflict continues for too long, democracy is the first to fall. Increased securitisation of a conflict-ridden space undermines democracy not just as a political philosophy concept but also as an everyday lived reality. Political alienation is often the beginning and the end of a conflict. It is also the means and the end of most insurgencies. Secessionists in Jammu & Kashmir, therefore, leaned on boycotts of political processes in the region. These boycotts were successful in forging a sense of identity, delinked from New Delhi, in a section of Jammu & Kashmir’s population.

Jammu & Kashmir’s voter turnout in 2024 has fallen marginally short of 2014. Still, considering the political and security volatility during the past decade, the political remapping of the region, and the trends from the 2024 general election turnout, the absolute figure of 63.88% is a big round of applause for Indian democracy. Not only were the calls for boycotting the elections negligible, but voters also didn’t even think twice before ignoring them. The pre-poll sentiment in Jammu & Kashmir was defined by buoyancy and optimism.

Reigniting Faith

Participation in electoral processes should not be seen as an indicator of peace in Jammu & Kashmir or any other conflict-riddled region. Democracy does not suit all, and efforts to derail it are the strongest whenever it appears to work and emerge as a choice. For peace, the synergy of formal institutions is a prerequisite. The BJP has done well to reignite people’s faith in at least one of them: electoral polity. Jammu & Kashmir, under the governor’s rule for six years, grabbed this chance to assert itself and make its voice heard in New Delhi. The JKNC-Congress alliance has trumped religious extremism-driven parties on the one hand and heavy-handed nationalism on the other.

After almost a decade of aggressive and kinetic strategy in dealing with the hardliners in J&K, this is a perfect moment for the Indian establishment to rethink its attitudes towards conflict resolution. The temptation to discard democracy as a defunct system is at its highest during an armed conflict. But this is also the time when democracy can shine the brightest. A rights-based approach to conflict resolution may appear counter-intuitive, but this is the only lasting solution. The rejection of the right to vote by a dissatisfied bunch of people as a means of their political expression can be the first sign of trouble. The converse is also true.

This Is True ‘Normalcy’

The BJP may not feel warm and fuzzy about the assembly poll results, but New Delhi has all the reasons to rejoice. This is what ‘normalcy’, an oft-touted catchword of the current dispensation, looks and feels like. This almost violence-free election is the festive bonus that everyone hoped for, but nobody could have been sure of it. Reams will be written about the “success” of this election within the security paradigm. However, the real success is allowing the decriers of democracy to come into the fold. After long periods of violence and quasi-violence directed primarily against the Indian state, this election is an affirmation of the core principles of participatory democracy. 

No political system, even the good old democracy, can and should be treated as the panacea for all ills. At best, democracy can achieve an environment where people who are affected by policies feel like stakeholders. This precludes compulsive resistance and fosters a sense of ownership. Jammu & Kashmir’s ‘problem’ is both a function and an origin of political alienation and disempowerment. Increased participation on the population’s part and more open-mindedness on the part of the establishment during political processes help create a secure environment that doesn’t rely solely on securitisation.

What and how Jammu & Kashmir’s political arena will look like with a government in place after six years of Governor’s rule remains to be seen. For now, these lessons of democracy are for all to see and emulate. 

(Nishtha Gautam is a Delhi-based author and academic.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author