ABSTRACT
A spectre of potential threats to core values, mostly constructed in India for political use both internally and externally, are embodied in the mirage of Islamisation, Jihadism, terrorism etc., and Kashmir is projected as an extension of these and other factors. India's responses to the perceived/constructed threats have gradually led to the alienation of the local populations in Kashmir. As in other so-called ethnic and religious conflicts, causal ramifications behind the Kashmir conflict involve the same structure, in which Kashmiri and Indian nationalisms augmented with politicised interpretation of religion, e.g. Hindutva, feed each other. These causal factors can be grouped into five basic categories: (1) economic deprivation, inadequate living conditions and poverty, (2) repressive political systems and, in particular, the exclusion of certain ethnically defined groups from the political process, (3) destruction, depletion or excessive exploitation of resources, including natural resources, and far-reaching changes in the natural environment (such as climate change), (4) cognitive dissonance and (5) a perceived threat to the group identity, a factor which can often for all practical purposes be reduced to a combination of the first four.
