Also, there can be little argument that the Kashmir disaster is being seen as the new government’s first serious attempt at crisis management. The Prime Minister has responded promptly, declaring the floods a “national tragedy”. (This while also managing to be photographed air-dropping rations to those stranded in the floods.) The army has swung into action with an efficiency only they are capable of, triggering off debates on whether Kashmiris are being “grateful enough” after a rescue team was allegedly stone-pelted. There is a very strong sub-text to this line of discourse, considering the Bharatiya Janata Party’s stance on the Kashmir conflict. Is it being seen as an opportune occasion to position the Army, which doesn’t exactly share very cordial relations with the people of the state, as a friendly entity? An organisation which, in spite of innumerable stones and rebuffs, wants to mend bridges that have been created as a result of two decades of distrust (and allegedly innumerable killings and rapes). Or is this a well-timed exercise by a conservative government (and a media armed with a newly discovered-jingoism) to mainstream-ise local sentiments? Closer to Kashmir, the 2010 disastrous cloudburst in Leh didn’t garner even a fraction of this interest. Could it be because we’re not competing with Pakistan for their attention?