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Binoo Joshi in Srinagar
The US-led attacks on Afghanistan and Pakistan's support for the action is forcing many Kashmiris to rethink their options.
As angry pro-Taleban protests gradually fade in the valley, there is a palpable urge among the people of the violence-wracked state to get out of the present situation and many eyes are focused on the Indian government.
The Indian role has become important as Kashmiris feel that Pakistan is watching its own interests and paying just "lip service" to their cause.
If Pakistan is governed by its national interest, so are Kashmiris, seems to be the refrain in the streets of Srinagar, summer capital of India's only Muslim-majority state.
Their disillusionment with Pakistan has become more pronounced after President Pervez Musharraf declared, "Pakistan's national interest comes first and everything else next to that."
Pakistan's support to the US-led strikes has not only angered the rebel groups, but also sowed doubts in the minds of the common people.
"If the Taleban that was mujahideen [holy warriors] till recently to Pakistan could be branded terrorists by it under US pressure, Pakistan could easily do the same to us," remarked Dukhtaran-e-Millat [Daughters of the Faith] chief Asiya Andrabi.
Andrabi has urged the Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistan-based extremist outfit that claimed responsibility for the October 1 car bomb attack on the Jammu & Kashmir assembly that left 38 people dead and 70 injured, "to teach a lesson to Musharraf who has become a party to the war against Islam to save his chair and please Americans".
The protests against the US strikes have been as much anti-US as anti-Pakistan. "One is striking and another is helping. How can we make a distinction between the two?" said Shahid Islam, a university student who has been participating in the protests.
"Let me be very honest," former All-Parties Hurriyat Conference chairman and Awami Action Committee chief Mirwaiz Umar Farooq said. "The situation is quite peculiar and it is the right time for the Government of India to take an initiative aimed at restoring peace by involving all the parties."
He hoped the president of Pakistan had not called Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee "out of [domestic] compulsions but with sincere intentions and I also hope that Vajpayee responds in the right spirit".
Indo-Asian News Service
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