Consensus in Kashmir
There has been a growing demand in the mainstream camp of Kashmir politics that New Delhi must see the reason and start the process to resolve the Kashmir dispute as they believe that without the addressing of political aspirations, there would be no peace in Kashmir or in South Kashmir. PDP recently after coming out of the power said that muscular policy will prove counter-productive and New Delhi should take string measures to address the Kashmir dispute without any further delay.
Opposition National Conference has been strongly advocating for peace and for dialogue with Kashmiri leadership and New Delhi. Both Farooq and Umar Abdullah have said many times in the past that New Delhi should address the political aspirations and without talking to Pakistan there can be no peace in Kashmir Valley. Congress in Centre after sitting in the opposition benches has always called for Kashmir dialogue, but they have forgotten the fact that they have failed to deliver on Kashmir when they were in power for a decade. They announced many measures to address Kashmir including the appointment of interlocutors to address the issue. When the interlocutors submitted the report to the Union Home Ministry, it was consigned to dust bin. Similarly, when National Conference with 2/3 majority in the State assembly passed Autonomy Resolution, even the much hyped Vajpayee Government, kept it in the files and never bothered even to discuss it either in the Cabinet meeting or in Parliament.
With bitter past of how New Delhi has handled Kashmir, National Conference and PDP have urged the Central Government to initiate process of dialogue and reconciliation not only with Kashmir, but also with Pakistan. So far Narindra Modi has been listening only to his NSA Chief Ajit Doval who has been advocating muscular and hard policy to deal with Kashmiris and their leadership especially the separatists.