Srinagar
As India is heading towards the Lok Sabha elections and Kashmir is part of the ruling party campaign, an American survey centre PEW survey have found that 53 percent Indians believe the situation in Kashmir has gone worse in the last five years.
In its spring survey 2019, the research centre has also found that 55 percent of Indians say that Kashmir is a ‘very big problem’ and the majority believes that the Indian Government should use more military force in the area.
“Indians largely view Pakistan as a threat and believe the situation in Kashmir warrants more military force,” the survey points out. “The recent escalation in tensions between India and Pakistan after the Pulwama attack has turned the long-running territorial dispute over Kashmir into a potent campaign issue for Modi.”
A majority of the respondents, 58 per cent, believes Delhi should use more military force than it uses currently in dealing with tensions in the area.
In the Centre’s spring survey last year, 76 per cent of Indians had said that Pakistan is a major threat to their country, including 63 per cent who said it is a very serious threat. “This view was shared by people in rural areas and urban centers, supporters of both the prime minister’s BJP and the Congress party, as well as Indians across age groups.”
Additionally, 65 per cent said terrorism is a very big problem in India.
“In the aftermath of the violence in Pulwama, Indian social media platforms saw such an uptick in fictitious or purposely misleading stories related to the attack that the head of Facebook India’s Integrity Initiatives tweeted that he had never seen anything like this before,” the Fact Tank said in its report.
