The Kashmir Series, Part 3: Former J&K CM Mehbooba Mufti on alienation in Valley, talks with Pakistan, and more

Former J&K chief minister Mehbooba Mufti talks of the growing alienation of the people in Kashmir, tells Centre to stop issuing diktats and changing goalposts for restoration of statehood and wants the dialogue between India and Pakistan resumed.

August 5, 2021, marked two years since the Union government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi took the radical step of ending the ambiguity over the status of Jammu and Kashmir. It did so by abrogating Article 370 and bifurcating the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two new Union Territories consisting of Jammu and Kashmir as one entity and Ladakh as another. The Modi government's decision radically altered the Kashmir chessboard both nationally and internationally. To get an assessment of the mood in Kashmir and whether the Modi government's game-plan was working, last month India Today's Group Editorial Director (Publishing) Raj Chengappa travelled across the Valley interviewing a cross-section of prominent individuals and ordinary citizens.