As a member of the minority community from Jammu and Kashmir, I had to hear Farooq Abdullah’s words twice because I could not believe a man of his stature had said them. Speaking to workers in Baramulla, he claimed that Pakistan keeps our identity alive by raising Kashmir at international forums and that Islamabad is protecting us. Protecting us? Pakistan has given this land graves, grief and gunfire. It sent terrorists who drove minorities out of the Valley, orphaned our children (Hindus and Muslims alike) and left families afraid to live in their own homes. Too many in Jammu and Kashmir have cremated or buried their loved ones because of the violence Pakistan has fuelled. And look at how Pakistan treats the subjects of Jammu and Kashmir who live under its occupation. In Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK), people protesting for their rights have faced deadly violence. A local rights body counted 80 deaths by early August, while residents put the toll much higher. Does their suffering count for nothing? Is Pakistan’s international rhetoric more important than the lived reality of the people it claims to represent? Farooq saab is a veteran politician who knows exactly what Pakistan’s role in Jammu and Kashmir has meant. The question is: how long will he be allowed to make such statements without being held politically accountable? This is precisely the kind of politics that has allowed Kashmir’s entrenched political elite to use Pakistan’s hostility as leverage against New Delhi, while expecting no accountability for their own words. The Centre has often appeared content to treat him as a harmless veteran politician. But his words have consequences, particularly for those of us who have lived and are still living with the cost of Pakistan’s hostility. If the government still does not act against him, it should at least demand accountability from the National Conference leadership, including his son and Chief Minister Omar Abdullah. Jammu and Kashmir has bled enough. Its people deserve better than to hear the country responsible for so much of their suffering being praised as their protector.

Amruta Fadnavis’s singing and dance performances may not be everyone’s cup of tea. But why should that matter? And why should being the Chief Minister’s wife mean she cannot pursue her own interests? The trolling over her Garba remarks is equally misplaced. A wife is not obliged to mirror her husband’s politics, and a Chief Minister’s wife is not required to behave like a neighbourhood communal gatekeeper to prove her ideological credentials. We often talk about women’s independence, yet expect a politician’s wife to conform to his political image, as though she needs his permission to express herself. If anything, Devendra Fadnavis deserves credit for not stopping his wife from doing what she wants despite the criticism. The only legitimate grounds for questioning her activities in relation to her husband’s position would be if she were using his political influence, public funds or party funds to pursue them. Beyond that, people are free to disagree with her, but personal disapproval is not a political argument. And a wife does not have to be an extension of her husband’s worldview.

Notice how all the ISPR’s bootlicking lapdogs have suddenly turned against Iran after Asim Munir’s royal humiliation in Tehran on his last trip, where he went playing American errand boy, trying to manipulate markets at Washington’s behest. Nothing exposes these shameless propagandists better than watching them switch their masters’ enemies overnight.

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