Abstract
The displacement of the Hindu minority of the Kashmir valley, better known as the Kashmiri Pandits, has long been an issue of contention. From a period beginning in late 1989 until the end of 1990, the vast majority of this minority fled the valley and remade lives to varying degrees of success and failure in cities such as Jammu and New Delhi. This chapter explores the political location of the Kashmiri Pandits in relation to politics of the Kashmir Valley and the Indian state. While most reports situate the Pandits in the field of Hindu nationalist politics in India, this is a partial view. The chapter will first consider how the Pandits have related to politics in Jammu and Kashmir before and after 1989–1990 and then proceed to discuss the relationship between the Pandits and the Indian state and polity, in its liberal and Hindu nationalist forms. Hence, this chapter will demonstrate how the political location of the Kashmiri Pandits is shaped by Kashmiri, Indian Liberal and Hindu Nationalist politics.
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Acknowledgements
I wish to thank the editors and anonymous reviewers for their comments on an earlier draft. I have also benefited from discussions with Anmol Tikoo and Ajay Raina. I take responsibility for the final argument and any shortcomings that remain.
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Datta, A. (2023). The Blank Space Between Nationalisms: Locating the Kashmiri Pandits in Liberal and Hindu Nationalist Politics in Relation to Kashmir and India. In: Duschinski, H., Bhan, M., Robinson, C.d. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of New Directions in Kashmir Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28520-2_22
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28520-2_22
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