Politics of State Autonomy and Regional Identity: Jammu and Kashmir

The demand of state autonomy has remained a highly contentious issue in Indian Politics right since the time when accession of Kashmir to the Indian federalism took place. This is a demand that often generate tension between Centre and the State. It is felt that the autonomy for the State may actually come to mean autonomy for Kashmir region only. It may not flow to the regional and sub-layered package of autonomy that extends beyond the State to the regional or sub-regional levels. Autonomy is needed to inspire confidence to the people, to make the system more democratic, to ensure speedier and balanced development and to make the administration accountable to the people and thus more efficient and above all, to evolve a composite and harmonious personality of the State. None of these can be achieved in the present unitary system of the state and by centralization of power and administration. A more federalized and bottom-up approach is needed to solve the problem of the State. This book is an attempt to examine the relationship of Kashmir identity with the Indian Union, the regional identity of Jammu and Ladakh with the State. This book on the one hand is the description of the relationship between the Centre and the State and on the other hand is the description of relationship between the three regions, namely Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. My prescription in deeply federal and decentralizing in nature.