EARLIER this week, RT News printed an article entitled “Operation Kashmir: Has Modi checkmated Pakistan?” The article discussed Indian Prime Minister Modi’s recent move to put Kashmir under stricter government control and what that could mean for the region’s future.
A key section of the article read: “Modi’s bet is that by corralling Kashmir under tighter central government control, he will marginalize the secessionist politicians there, open Kashmir up for the return of Hindu Kashmiri minorities who had been ethnically cleansed by jihadists in the late 1980s, and alter the demographic mix in Kashmir through settlement of Indians of all religious and ethnic backgrounds.”
The most interesting part of the article was the one about ‘Hindu Kashmiri minorities’ returning to Kashmir and demographically altering the region’s political alignment away from autonomous rule.
The keyword here is demographics.
There’s an old political saying: ‘demographics is destiny,’ and it strongly applies to this situation. For a long time, Kashmir has had its own laws and constitution. It even developed its own sense of identity, separate from the rest of India, helped in no small part by its proximity with Pakistan and its Muslim demographics. For a long time, India has had to accommodate the demographic realities of Kashmir by giving it a large amount of autonomy, but now it’s all coming to an end.
Kashmir’s autonomy is largely due to its Islamic population. Dilute the cultural-religious identity with Hindu and non-Islamic immigrants, and the desire for autonomy is diluted. This isn’t a new tactic. Leaders and governments have used immigration and population transfers as tools of public pacification since ancient days.
Populations can be weaponized. All you need to do is politicize them.
Modi’s recent moves have effectively ended India’s sensitive détente with the Kashmiris, and it’s very likely that Pakistan and the rest of the Islamic world will muster some kind of response in the not-so-distant future. Will this escalate into open war? Probably not. Will it increase tensions between the two countries? Almost certainly, and it’s only going to get more intense over time. Escalation begets retaliation, which leads to more retaliation up until the point one side backs down (or is put down).
Should the worst happen, and India and Pakistan decide to duke it out then they very likely will drag Russia, China, the US and the most of the Islamic world (all of which have their own problems in their own backyards) into the dumpster fire. And if Kashmir were to explode into renewed violence then the conflagration will very likely spread to the rest of the region, and all because of changing demographics./PN
