Ramachandra Guha in The Telegraph:
“In a letter he wrote to the prime minister, the BJP leader, L.K. Advani, described the ongoing conflict in Kashmir as one between the ‘nationalists’ and the ‘separatists’. In truth, this was a dispute between two sets of communalists, one Hindu, the other Muslim.
“Ever since the expulsion of the Pandits in the early nineties, it has become difficult to see the popular movement in Kashmir in purely nationalist terms—at the very least, it must be termed ‘national-communal’. It took 15 years after their expulsion for Mirwaiz Maulvi Umer Farooq to visit a Pandit camp in Jammu. Meanwhile, the other leaders of the Hurriyat also wear their religion on their sleeve….
“The current movement in Jammu is no less communal. Its central focus has been around a pilgrimage sacred to Hindus alone. It has consistently and explicitly used Hindu idioms and symbols. It has been peopled and on occasion led by cadres of Hindu chauvinist organizations. It has encouraged attacks on innocent Muslims in the Jammu region.”
Read the full column: The fruit of taking sides
Also read: Eight reasons why we should just let Kashmir go
CHURUMURI POLL: Is an ‘economic blockade’ OK?
‘What Pakistan didn’t in 60 years, BJP has in six weeks’
CHANDAN MITRA: ‘Advocates of Azadi should be tried for treason’
PRATAP BHANU MEHTA: ‘Amarnath is about communalism not nationalism
churumuri 
From when is holding national flag and crying Vande Mataram become a symbol of hindu communalism??? Going by this logic, there will come a day when we will hear the demands of the Commie/islamic gang to abolish the practice of hoisting the national flag!!!
For a man accorded the status of an intellectual, the act of blocking the highway is the tipping point in the ongoing conflict. Where was he and his ilk when pandits were driven away from the valley??? Was it not a heinous act to be done????
I have always told this and again telling this.
Commies/sickularists/islamists/christians.. they are happy as long as they are committing all kinds of atrocities. when they are in majority, they say it is the voice of the majority and justify their deeds. When they are in minotiry, they say thier rights as a minority group is being trampled upon and hence they justify their deeds.
But the day the other party starts giving back to them in the same coin.. they cry, they whine, they whimper and run to US like a baby…
I am glad that the hindus in Kashmir and Orissa have started giving back to the communalists in their own coin. A day will come when it spreads to the rest of the country.
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Mr. Guha, you are a communalist too! A die hard fundamentalist one at that.
Only thing is yours is a different, elite community. You have got your own set of gods and godmen, whom you defend tooth and nail, you are no different from the people you criticise.
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It requires a very heavy load of ‘intellectualness’ to abuse an act of pilgrimage as ‘communal’. Look what the secular Nehruvian scholar decries: “The current movement in Jammu is no less communal. Its central focus has been around a pilgrimage sacred to Hindus alone.” If Hindus don’t fight their own cause who else will do it? Certainly not the Pope or Imam Bukhari.
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‘…expulsion of Pandits .. ‘
“EXPULSION”????? What, were they punished for some sin, mistake, a mass traffic violation? Oh, I get it, their fault, grave sin was they were Hindus, that too Brahmanas! Are you kidding me, Guha?
Here is the correct word for what they did to Hindus, you double talking, spinning fool. Here is the word-
“ETHNIC-CLEANSING”.
And according to you THAT makes the Kashmiris ‘communal’ just as Jammu Hindus are communal for asking land for Amaranatha yaatris?
So according to you,
ethnic cleansing = demanding land for the yaatris
Yes sir, we all shall nod our head vigorously!
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So what should Jammuites do to make the protest ‘secular’? Carry Chinese flags and the Chairman’s portrait may be? Will that make Guha happy?
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To be fair to Ram Guha. altho9ugh it took him many years, he recently admitted that the ethnic cleansing of the Pandits in 1989 was a grave blow to our ideals of secularism and civil society, on a scale similar to the Sikh riots of 1984. That coming from an intellectual is honesty. Ram Guha is no Suzanna Roy, thankfully. But this time he is simply parroting the claim of Yasin Malik and Kashmir Valley jihadis and their bootlickers, Amit Varma, Vir Sanghvi, Khushwant Singh, and Swmi Aiyar etc., The Jammu protests are not restricted to Hindu grievances, they are regional grievances and the Muslims of Jammu are one with their Hindu friends. It is a fact that Jammu the industrious and economically vibrant part of J&K – witha GDP that exceeds that of Pak-Oppressed-Kashmir, is treated like dirt and has proportionately less representation in the State Assembly.A Muslim leader of Jammu thunderously silenced a jihadophile of the Valley on TV.
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