Two media groups, the Times of India Group and the Jang Group recently initiated a peace process between the two perennially antagonistic countries under the banner of “Aman ki Aasha”, (Hope for Peace). In a way, the media barons on the two sides are the appropriate persons to start the dialogue for peace. The war like situation and the feeling of enmity too has always been basically fanned by them. Whether it is the Kargil War, the Parliament attack or the recent Mumbai assaults, the fuel to the fire has always been added by the media especially the electronic one. On the other side too, Jihad to liberate Kashmir or to establish an Islamic State is promoted by the media. For past sometime, there have been many initiatives from the Civil Society to start a process for ushering in peace in the sub-continent. However, the process has been awfully slow and has always been derailed by the Warmongers who appear to be much stronger than the Peaceniks. The reason for this is that the Peaceniks do not have any substantial material interests other than bringing peace to this troubled land teeming with millions of deprived human beings. They aspire to live a life of peace with honour and care for the down trodden. On the contrary, the Warmongers have immense material interests in the continuation of hostilities. In fact, these people have a global reach as well as committed agents in all conflict areas. In a number of cases, they themselves create the conflict situations. The main problem with Peaceniks is their elitist approach. Lighting candles at the border and discussing problems in five star hotels are symbolic gestures which fail to reach their biggest constituency. The Peaceniks main resource is the common people on both sides of the divide. Most of them want peace and the basic amenities for a decent living. This constituency if tapped intelligently can virtually move the mountains. However, to energise and move the constituency of peace one requires a charismatic leader. For a long time one has not seen a peace loving charismatic leader in the sub-continent. The present day political leaders are in the field for money or power or both. Hardly any one stands for the common people. Politics has become a lucrative and a dynastic business dominated by virtual mafia dons! Honest, sincere, and peace loving people are rare to find.

While as the Peaceniks have to wait for a Gandhi to take rebirth, the Warmongers are busy reaping a rich harvest in the meantime. They have tremendous resources and access to the people wielding the levers of political power everywhere. Global sales of newer and lethal weapons are growing by leaps and bounds. The market is already in excess of a thousand billion dollars of which the Americans’ share is almost the half. The greatest Warmonger in history has been USA. Robert Gates, the US Defence Secretary recently made a suggestive war statement in India. He said that any violent incident like 26/11 will start a war between India and Pakistan. Is it being more loyal than the King or a deliberate instigation to keep the pot boiling? Most of the developed countries are vying with each other for selling these lethal weapon systems to the developing and under-developed countries for settling the conflicts generated in the first place by these very merchants of death! They always look for new war zones for testing their newly designed systems. The first Gulf War was a typical example of this testing range of the American laser guided weapons. They destroyed many countries and then took up most of contracts for rebuilding these! To generate the emotions of war and create hysteria, they have been financing most of the war movies including Rambo and Terminator series. The major chunk of the budgets of both the countries in the sub-continent is eaten up by their defence outlays. The social services and poverty alleviation get the least part of the budget, thanks to Warmongers. Added to this are the Weapons of Mass Destruction foolishly being prepared by both sides without even thinking that the use of these will mean the ultimate end of civilisation in this part of the world. Somehow they seem to be enamoured by the prospect of Mutually Assured Destruction. Even some Generals have been speaking of a cold start which in other words means surgical strikes under the threat of nuclear overhang. How can people be so naïve? Has any conflict in the sub-continent remained limited or confined? There are enough mad people to push the button when it comes to that and especially on the other side in the prevailing situation of free for all! Incidentally, quite a few former Generals are working as liaison officers of arms manufacturers for substantially fat salaries. The business of conflict has so many beneficiaries and vested interests that it is virtually impossible for the Peaceniks to make a dent in this global set up.

The tussle between the Peaceniks and Warmongers of the sub-continent has been going on from the very first day of the creation of these two states after the departure of the British colonialists. They had very cleverly left enough material for the two to be at each others throats for a long time. For keeping the conflict always alive, they chose poor Kashmiris. Rather, the Kashmiris themselves due to their stupidity became the canon fodder for the conflict. They have got stuck in the worst ever logjam with no escape. It has become a trilateral conflict. Between India and Pakistan and between Kashmiris and their two rival suitors. Somehow Kashmir has become the symbol of this ideological conflict. The two sides are trying to use Kashmiris as guinea pigs to prove the correctness of their respective ideology. On their part, Kashmiris are a confused lot not knowing what they really want? The main cause of that confusion has been their leaders pulling them in umpteen directions with the promise of providing them a place of honour and dignity. So far they have achieved neither honour nor dignity! One fails to understand why Kashmiris have to wait for these two belligerent countries becoming friends before their fate is settled? After all they are not the basic cause of their enmity. The malaise is deeper. Kashmir is only the symptom. One fact is crystal clear. Violence is not going to emancipate Kashmiris out of the logjam. Warmongers want violence to run the vicious cycle of conflict. Only way out is a strong constituency of Peaceniks within Kashmir as well as in the two countries which have been perpetually mistrusting each other. The best constituency in Kashmir are the common people who rose up en masse in a peaceful way during the Amarnath land transfer. There had been a paradigm shift in the attitude of the youth from violence to non-violence. However, the Warmongers did not cherish this change and labelled these peaceful marches as “Agitational Terrorism” and suppressed the same in a ruthless manner. It is but natural that any undue suppression of peaceful manifestation will get a violent reaction. It is a pity that instead of admitting this fact, it is alleged that young boys pelting stones are being paid by a neighbouring country. This has again resulted in violence gaining upper hand and may give rise to a renewed vicious circle of violence. There are only two choices. Common people are allowed to express their feelings peacefully even if it means a million people on the road. Ultimately, they too have to enter into a dialogue for realisation of these aspirations. In the alternative, suppression of peaceful protests makes resentment go underground and we are faced with yet another round of militancy. If that happens, the only beneficiaries as usual would be the Warmongers!