Barely a few days after the Union home minister extended the Centre’s ‘hand of friendship’ to the youth of Kashmir, pleading with them to take an active role in dousing the fire of militancy, the Narendra Modi government has applied the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act — it is usually put in force to thwart terrorists — against students of two medical institutions in Kashmir for celebrating Pakistan’s victory over India in a recent cricketing contest. This is exactly the kind of provocative behaviour that restive elements have employed as bait. Unfortunately, India’s current rulers are only too eager to fall for it. The gains, presumably, are mutual. For Kashmir’s mischief-mongers, including extremists and lobbies sympathetic to them, India’s iron hand approach is profitable since it alienates large parts of the civilian population from the State. As for the Bharatiya Janata Party, it believes that unleashing the might of the State against a Muslim-majority province brings ready electoral benefits in other parts of India. The resultant civilian anomie and a dangerous political drift in the former state are of little concern to the party. The point made by the former chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti, merits examination in this context. Instead of being baited by hollow acts of provocation — a few pro-Pakistan slogans are unlikely to weaken Kashmir’s willing, historical embrace of India — the Centre must engage with representative stakeholders to identify and then eliminate the conditions that are the root cause of the incitement. But that would take an ideological somersault that the BJP is unwilling to perform.

What is worrying is that the BJP and Kashmir’s provocateurs get away with this trick. This is indicative of the larger challenge confronting the Republic. Years of patient indoctrination as well as failures of liberal politics have resulted in the creation of a shrill nationalism that has, indeed, turned out to be the proverbial Tebbit test for patriotism. Be it the disproportionate show of strength in Kashmir or the vicious trolling of an Indian Muslim cricketer, each act is consistent with the larger polarization that the BJP has engineered across the nation’s body politic. A number of sporting personalities have condemned the targeted humiliation of Mohammed Shami but the Board of Control for Cricket in India was not among them. Does the BCCI’s pusillanimity have anything to do with its present office-holders? It is this kind of timidity, from influential institutions as well as civilians in general, that has veered India to the edge of a precipice.