Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years - Paperback

by A. Dulat (Author)

WITH A FOREWORD BY DR FAROOQ ABDULLAHSRINAGAR IN THE WINTER OF 1989 was an eerie ghost town witnessing the beginnings of a war dance. The dam burst the night boys from the separatist JKLF group were freed in exchange for the release of Rubaiya Sayeed, the Union home minister's daughter. As Farooq Abdullah had predicted, the government's caving in emboldened many Kashmiris into thinking that azaadi was possible. 'The price we will have to pay' were Farooq's prophetic words. Killings were almost a daily occurrence. Bomb explosions and firings took place close to the chief minister's residence in the most secure zone. Gun-toting youth in trucks were seen close to the cantonment. Kashmiris believed that they were on the verge of liberation.It was a long, slow haul to regaining control. From then to now, A.S. Dulat has had a continuous engagement with Kashmir. The initiatives launched by the Vajpayee government, in power from 1998 to 2004, were the high point of this constant effort to keep balance in a delicate state. As Vajpayee said, Kashmir was a problem that had to be solved.In this extraordinary memoir that reads like a thriller, Dulat gives a sweeping account of the difficulties, successes and near triumphs in the effort to bring back Kashmir from the brink. Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years paints an unforgettable portrait of politics in India's most beautiful but troubled state.

Author Biography

Amarjit Singh Dulat is a former head of the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW), India's external intelligence agency. After retirement, he was appointed adviser on Kashmir in the Prime Minister's Office and served there from January 2001 to May 2004. During this time, he accumulated a vast reservoir of goodwill with Kashmiris of all shades. As Jane's Intelligence Digest put it in 2001, 'Well known for his social skills, Dulat preferred dialogue to clandestine maneouvres.' In his heyday, Dulat was referred to as 'Mr Kashmir'.

Dulat was born in Sialkot, Punjab, in December 1940. After India's partition, his father Justice Shamsher Singh Dulat relocated his family to Delhi. After schooling in Delhi, Simla and Chandigarh, Dulat joined the Indian Police Service (IPS) in 1965, and then the Intelligence Bureau (IB) in 1969, where he served for almost thirty years. At the IB he headed the Kashmir Group during the turbulent 1990s till he joined and headed the R&AW.

He is the author of Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years (2015; co-authored with Aditya Sinha), The Spy Chronicles: R&AW, ISI and the Illusion of Peace (2018; co-authored with Lieutenant General Asad Durrani and Aditya Sinha) and A Life in the Shadows (2022).