A Changing, Evolving Discourse
Ajay K Mehra
SOCIAL DIVERSITY AND POLITICAL DIVERGENCE IN JAMMU AND KASHMIR: IDENTIFYING THE COMPLEXITY OF CONFLICT SITUATION AND THE FORMAT FOR ITS RESOLUTION by Rekha Chowdhary Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, 2023, 240 pp., INR 850
August 2023, volume 47, No 8

Even as I read and attempt to review this important work in an area that has fascinated me since the early 1990s, when movements for ‘autonomy’ and ‘sharing sovereignty’ began to emerge in the length and breadth of the country—not only in the mélange of ethnicity that India’s northeast is, but also West Bengal (Gorkhaland), Bihar (Jharkhand), Madhya Pradesh (Chhattisgarh), Uttar Pradesh (Uttarakhand) and many other ethnicities and regions began movements for a separate State.  All the above minus Gorkhaland plus Telangana are States now.  But the eruption in Jammu and Kashmir was special. 

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