Mehbooba Mufti can only hope that tension in NIT-Srinagar is not a sign of things to come

On April 4, when Mehbooba Mufti became the first woman chief minister of politically volatile Jammu and Kashmir, her council of ministers took the oath in five languages reflecting not only the diversity in her team but also the daunting task of managing the Bharatiya Janata Party-Peoples Democratic Party (BJP-PDP) alli- ance of convenience.

The first salvo came the very next day, from a university cam- pus, reminding everyone of the fault lines in J&K. As India went down to West Indies in the semis of the T20 World Cup, Kashmiri students at the National Institute of Technology (NIT) in Srinagar cheered the defeat. Expectedly, this infuriated students from the rest of India who took out a march hoisting the national flag and raising ‘ Bharat Mata Ki Jai ’ slogans. Tension rose, a brawl erupted and police clamped down on the campus.

Agenda of Alliance
The sparks flew as far as New Delhi and the BJP government at Centre, which has taken an aggressive posturing on issues involving Indian nationalism, had to react. The ministry of home affairs (MHA) and the ministry of human resources development (MHRD) duly swung into action, to the utter chagrin of their newly-minted partner chief minister Mehbooba. “Rushing in a team from HRD ministry coupled with CRPF replacing police speaks volumes about New Delhi’s confidence in Mehbooba Mufti,” former J&K chief minister Omar Abdullah tweeted.

The re-launch of the coalition government after almost three months of desperate political wandering since Mufti Mohammad Sayeed passed away has seen the PDP treading a seem ingly dictated soft line. Although BJP believes little has changed. “This is the same alliance with a gap of three months.

Only change in the ground situation is that Mufti sahab passed away. There was a need for a new person to take over and more or less that has happened,” BJP general secretary Ram Madhav told ET Magazine . In 2015, Madhav had drafted the Agenda of Alliance — a common minimum program between PDP and BJP — along with PDP’s Haseeb Drabu. The biggest challenge for Mehbooba Mufti is to explain the ‘intangible’ assurances ostensibly made by prime minister Naren- dra Modi, which nudged her into forming the government with BJP again.

People in J&K have exceptionally long memories and, just a few weeks ago, she had used the phrase “burning fingers” to de- scribe an alliance with BJP. So just what brought back this coalition of ‘north-pole, south-pole’ to- gether again? Mehbooba, while addressing her party workers and legislators in Jammu, stated that genuine political, economic and security concerns of the people of J&K are an issue, which goes beyond power politics and requires decisive political will at various levels.

BJP, for its part, is clear on what it brings to the table, and what it does not. “This is not an ideological or political alliance. This is a governance alliance and we will deliver on good governance,” BJP’s Nirmal Singh, deputy chief minister, told ET Magazine .

All is Not well
For Mehbooba, the big question now is whether the coalition part- ner will allow her to implement any big political initiatives, which she has been vocal about but which may not be a topmost of priorities in the BJP-PDP’s Agenda for Alliance. “It is too early to judge her. I hope we get the best out of this decision,” a senior PDP legislator told ET Magazine on condition of anonymity. The oath-taking ceremony once again exposed the cracks within the top PDP leadership as Altaf Bukhari, one of the finest performing ministers under Mufti Sayeed, was dropped from the new cabinet.

Tariq Hamid Karra, PDP founder member and senior parliamentarian, once again openly expressed his unhappiness about three top PDP leaders, for their alleged role in failure of the 10-month BJP-PDP government under Mufti. Clearly, all is not well within the party, too.

The Challenges Ahead
“Internal politics happens in every party. We are dealing with hu- man beings, not robots. The basic bonding is there,” says Naem Akhtar, J&K’s education minister and a senior PDP member. The re-launch of the coalition, Akhtar said, should be seen through the prism of assurances that came from the floor of Parliament and resolutions of the BJP by Arun Jaitley.

“This should put fears of the voters of both the parties to rest,” he said. The new-look team of Mehbooba sees governance and se- curity as the biggest immediate challenges that need to be ad- dressed. Governor NN Vohra has set a high benchmark for governance during his three- month tenure, which by default comes as a standing challenge for Mehbooba. “We have to build the right atmosphere of trust.

Militancy and the degree of alienation among youth are challenges for us,” said Akhtar. The latter challenge may be the most immediate, and perhaps the biggest at a time when the Kashmir University Students’ Union has termed the NIT incident “a crafted episode”, and reckons that “Kashmiris are not safe even in their homeland.”