The current crisis in Kashmir is similar to the situation in Palestine. In both places, teenagers have been throwing stones and they are the ones who are mostly getting killed. In both places, the army and the ruling regime is saying that the kids are a front for terrorists and other enemies of the state. And the long-term effects in both countries are likely to be the same.
In Kashmir, an entire generation of thinkers, scholars, political activists, including those who think that terrorism has done more harm than good to Kashmir, have been moved and deeply saddened by the cruelty and the surplus violence that our politicians and army have produced. Even the central leadership seems embarrassed; they know that it has been a case of overkill but cannot say so openly. I am pretty sure that there are many in India who are unable to express their bitterness publicly, as the dissenting scholars in Israel are doing, though the world press is having a field day, comparing India with Israel. Reportedly, the pellet bullets that have blinded more than fifty...
