Kashmir is taking great leaps forward economically, socially, politically- Here’s how?

Washington: While the normalization of education, commerce and tourism in Kashmir valley thrives, it has left Pakistan with an embarrassment, exposing its lies and cynicism as the region under its illegal occupation remains hobbled by a moribund economy and suppressed by Jamaat-e-Islami extremism, said media reports. Kashmir is taking great leaps forward economically, socially, and politically. Michael Rubin, writing for The National Interest during his visit to Kashmir busted the Pakistani propaganda where Islamabad tries to put India in a bad light. Terming Kashmir an oasis of freedom for women, Rubin highlighted activities that are forbidden by the Taliban in Afghanistan after the takeover and in the state-sponsored extremism in Pakistan, which are freely carried out in the valley. He met a seventeen-year-old girl who badgered her father into allowing her to do karate. The journalists said that now the girl is a national gold medalist and competes in international tournaments.

"Her schoolmates and friends now demand similar freedom from their families," he recalled from his trip in his article. Militancy has been pushed back in the valley and there is a rise of liberalism. Women have started businesses or entered politics. In Ganderbal, the Sikh president of the local university showed off new athletic fields and preparations for a multi-university football, volleyball, table tennis, and kho-kho tournament. When he asked what kho-kho was, the president took him to a nearby court where two teams of young women were scrimmaging in the ancient Indian tag team sport. Education activities are flourishing in Kashmir. Today, in Kashmir not only do schools operate smoothly and without interruption, but new opportunities also exist as the Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institutes of Management open local branches to accommodate the hundreds of well-qualified Kashmiris, reported The National Interest. Business is another area which is witnessing a revival in Kashmir valley.

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Tourists not only from various parts of the country but also from Europe, Israel, and the United States have returned to Dal Lake and its famous houseboat hotels. Outside Ganderbal, a couple had purchased a plot of barren, rocky land and transformed it into a thriving eco-lodge and conference centre. Their neighbour also founded a fish farm. Today India spends more per capita on Jammu and Kashmir than it does in any other state. Saffron stores flourished, attracting business from the heavy traffic along the Srinagar to Jammu highway. Near Pulwama, where the 2019 Pakistan-sponsored suicide bombing killed many, new cricket bat factories dot the highway. All of this is a problem for Islamabad. Islamabad and the separatists and terrorist groups it sponsors may say bad about India but reality increasingly suggests otherwise. 

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The developments in Kashmir appear irreversible; no opposition successor to Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be able to set back the clock. Pakistani authorities have no legitimacy to their rule in any portion of Kashmir they illegally control. Will they double down on terrorism or will they recognize that peace, freedom, and tolerance are the way forward? the article concludes by asking.