There is only one perpetrator, Hamas. It is a terrorist organisation. It is obscene to argue that until the Palestinian question is solved, anybody has the right to use terrorism as an instrument of policy, argues Shekhar Gupta.
The new PDP chief will have to work hard to keep everyone in the state happy.
The indifference, apathy and inaction in Kashmir by the governments both at the Centre and the state has added to a rush by the young people to become the masters of their own destiny, says Seema Mustafa.
'Now you have a full clampdown and a huge security blanket. How long are you going to maintain that? The moment you lift it, all that suppressed protest and anger will come out.'
'How can Kashmir be demilitarised if the terrorist threat remains and Pakistan continues to incite elements in Kashmir to keep the internal situation unstable?' asks former foreign secretary Kanwal Sibal.
'The ISI doesn't trust the Kashmiris. They hate them...' 'We can never take Kashmir for granted, so there is that element of unpredictability. Anything can happen anytime.' 'The next chief minister will still be from the Valley. Even if a BJP chief minister or a BJP chosen candidate comes, he will be from the Valley. And he will be a Muslim.' A S Dulat, the former R&AW chief, on why he is perplexed by the BJP's Mission 44 plan for the J&K assembly election.
'We are certainly disappointed by our inability to win a single seat in the valley... We will analyse what led to this kind of dismal -- in terms of seats -- non-performance by the BJP.' 'I certainly don't want to attribute any religious or so-called communal reasons for it; for the simple reason, that even in Ladakh, a Buddhist majority area, we failed to win seats.' BJP General Secretary Ram Madhav, the man in charge of the party's election campaign in J&K, discusses the verdict with Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com