Fire on the Mountain - Srinigar, Kashmir, Jan. 29, 2010

[Backdated]
Travel log:
A river of fire ran down a wooded Himalayan hillside above Dal Lake in Srinagar.
The plume of smoke made an exclamation point across a ridge that needs no emphasis.
The fire brought streamers of black charcoal raining down over the city. Even the locals looked up in disgusted wonderment.
"He is a crazy guy," said a man selling food on the roadside by Dal Lake.
The "he" the man referred to sets fires illegally on the foothills and runs. Later he collects his bounty of charcoal to sell.
"Twenty, 25 years ago these mountains used to be beautiful," the vendor said.
They are still quite impressive.
The snowless Himalayan foothills frame Dal Lake, the center of Srinagar's tourism industry.
Houseboats with English names sit just across from the walkway with its streetlamps by the lake. Ferrymen call out and follow foreigners to offer rides across or around the lake on their brightly colored gondolas called 'shikaras.'
Small, but well-kept hotels and restaurants sit opposite the lakeshore on Boulevard Road.
Tourism is a major source of income for the, at times, war torn state of Jammu & Kashmir.
Still, the place looks distinctly more wealthy than other parts of India.
The poverty, begging, smog and crumbling structures in the major cities of Mumbai and Delhi are not found in Srinagar. Streets and sidewalks are in good order, buildings have a fresh coat of paint. Some people even live in single-family homes. There is a large police and paramilitary presence; and aside from fairly frequent spools of barbed wire, the place can look a bit like Long Island.
Especially in the majority Muslim Kashmir Valley, the government pumps in a lot of money to appease calls for independence or even a desire for full Pakistani rule, Indian security experts say.
Money comes from the Muslim world as well, in order to help the Kashmiris stuck under Indian rule in Indian-administered Kashmir.
"They're twisting both," said a former Central Reserve Police officer.
The influx of cash leaves Kashmir one of the most war torn and one of the most well-off regions on the country.
Violence occasionally breaks out, usually surrounding nervy relations between protesters and security officers. Officers also touch off conflict as they cordon off houses and begin searches for militants in hiding.
Mostly Kashmiris are interested in independence, but there are too many barriers.
There is first a contented feeling among the people. The surroundings are pleasant and aside from occasional shootouts, life is good.
The Indian security apparatus also believes that Kashmiris understand that a greater Pakistani influence would likely be counter-productive.
Pakistan's unstable government is not even able to control all of its own territory and could do nothing to benefit the people of Kashmir, they say.
There is also no provision in the Indian constitution to allow for states to just walk away, said Rajendra Kumar, additional director general of police intelligence in J&K.
"How can you allow this?" he asked, adding that other Indian states may begin their own calls for independence.
Plus, China creates another problem.
China helped build and for practical purposes controls the Karakoram Highway from China to Pakistan through Pakistani-administered Kashmir.
Rajendra said that China has claimed that if the status of Kashmir changes, they will deal with the new government. What kind of deal Beijing intends to make is unclear.
India's security community increasingly feels surrounded by China.
The economic rival to the east has made news with incursions across the Line of Actual Control on the mountainous Chinese border on the other side of Jammu & Kashmir state on the Siachin Glacier. China has built naval ports in Gwardar, Pakistan and to the south in Hambantota, Sri Lanka. On Dec. 16, local Maoists took over Katmandu, Nepal.
India, the world's largest democracy, founded on peace, has fires to put out in its own backyard, but like the other great democracies, the US, UK, France; we are learning that democracies are a challenge to protect.