In the 12th episode of REASON, The New Indian show hosted by Editor-in-Chief Aarti Tikoo, senior journalist and author David Devadas, who has extensively covered Kashmir, discusses Pak-sponsored terrorism, “ethnic cleansing” of Kashmiri Pandits from the Valley, and the importance of Vivek Agnihotri’s movie ‘Kashmir Files’.
Devadas is the author of the critically-acclaimed book In Search of a Future which discusses the history of the Kashmir conflict from 1931 onwards.
He says the insurgency in the Kashmir valley in 1989-1990, during which Kashmiri Pandits were massacred, was a result of Islamic wave in several countries located geopolitically near India.
Speaking against the popular narrative that Governor Jagmohan was responsible for killing and mass exodus of the Pandits, Devadas says the top government official was sent to Kashmir at a time when a lot of things were going out of the hand.
He says the real turning point in the history of Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in the Valley in the 90s was the release of five terrorists in exchange for then chief minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed’s daughter Rubaiyya Sayeed in 1989.
He further argues that officials in police and civil administration had no understanding of the ground situation. They were only bothered about their own promotions, he claims.