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Shabir Shah coming for talks

By Our Special Correspondent

New Delhi Aug. 27. The leader of the Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party, Shabir Shah, arrives here tomorrow for a formal dialogue with the Kashmir Committee. The dialogue is likely to last over the next few days. The All-Party Hurriyat Conference has already announced in Srinagar that its leaders would be going to New Delhi next week in response to an invitation from the Kashmir Committee for a "structured dialogue.''

Today, the committee chairman, Ram Jethmalani, had a meeting with the Defence Minister, George Fernandes, amid indications that the panel now had been "recognised'' by the Prime Minister's Office as a potentially helpful forum.

The Kashmir Committee is believed to have come to a conclusion that a "resolution'' of the Kashmir problem had to be premised on both sides eschewing extreme positions. That, according to Ashok Bhan, committee convener, means that the separatist camp must disabuse itself of the "plebiscite'' option and the so-called "nationalist'' camp must jettison the irresponsible talk of abrogation of Article 370. Mr. Bhan who has been the pointman for interaction with the Kashmiri separatist leaders, believes that there is a realisation even among the Hurriyat leaders that if "peace'' is to have a chance, then "violence'' must end. It has been Mr. Bhan's endeavour over the months to tell his separatist interlocutors that violent means and militant outfits have run their course, and therefore it is incumbent upon all to explore the dialogue route.

The Kashmir Committee has, therefore, taken heart from the willingness of Mr. Shah and the Hurriyat chairman, Abdul Gani Bhat, to engage with the panel, even though the committee could not persuade the Centre to postpone the elections in Jammu and Kashmir. There is the realisation that the talks have to be de-linked from the election process.

For now, the committee's strategy seems to be to prevent the problem from getting aggravated on account of what it perceives as a collusion between the National Conference and the Bharatiya Janata Party.

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