Aparita

The Globe and Mail, [10/11/2002]

 

NEW DELHI — He had been considered the prince who would be king, but in his school days, Omar Abdullah was consistently known as a student who could do better.

Although Mr. Abdullah, now 32, has a sterling reputation and has received little but praise for his work as India’s deputy minister of external affairs, the scion of Kashmir’s oldest dynasty definitely underachieved in the state’s violence-plagued elections, held over the past month but finalized yesterday.

Mr. Abdullah’s National Conference party lost its majority, and he lost both his seat and his hopes of becoming Kashmir’s next chief minister, a post previously held by both his father and grandfather, who founded the movement in 1939. Neither man had ever lost an election in Kashmir, and their party dominated the state government for 50 years.

“Our party is weak, and we need to find out why,” Mr. Abdullah said yesterday. “We have to find out why so many of our ministers lost.”

Mr. Abdullah’s woes were an embarrassment for his family reputation and for Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, an ally whose party also lost seats yesterday. But analysts and foreign observers, including the U.S. government, said the results represented a positive conclusion to the Kashmir voting, which took place amid militant attacks that killed hundreds of people and independent reports of electoral irregularities.

“Abdullah’s defeat is a major development,” said Pran Chopra, a political analyst with the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research. “But it’s not as important as the fact that most of the seats have been won by political parties and groups which are against militancy, against Pakistan and not against the continued accession of the state to India.”

Since none of the major opposition parties is sympathetic to the Islamic militants who have fought since 1989 to wrest the Muslim-majority region from Hindu-majority India, no significant policy changes are expected. The rejection of the National Conference was seen rather as an expression of Kashmir’s exhaustion with militancy, death, poverty and what is seen as the party’s arrogance.

Mr. Abdullah was considered a good bet to change that and promised yesterday to help the other parties “solve the difficulties of the state.” But he also reaffirmed that his party will resign itself to an introspective period of opposition, remaining out of the expected coalition government even though it will have the most seats in the state assembly, 28 out of 87.

“The National Conference will be in election mode,” he said in an interview yesterday. “I am sure that new elections will come soon, as coalition governments haven’t fared well in the past, and we will prepare for that.”

The young leader graciously called the vote a “free and fair process” that was “a victory for the people and democracy.”

Indeed, despite the loss of his own seat, the Kashmir election process has affirmed that Mr. Abdullah enjoys popularity unlike that of any other Indian politician of his age.

“Of his generation of politicians, Omar is without question the freshest and most interesting,” said Dileep Padgaonkar, executive managing editor of the Times of India. “He has impressed his colleagues in the government, in the parliament and the Indian public at large with his moderate views. He’s very secular in his views and deeply committed to India.”

The consensus on the younger Mr. Abdullah is that he’s intelligent, articulate, a straight talker and good-looking to boot — a refreshing change from other Kashmiri politicians and the Indian political scene as a whole.

“He’s seen as a man of ideas. He has impressed people with his hard work, administrative acumen and swift grasp of issues,” Mr. Padgaonkar added.

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