Involvement of people in the dispute resolution process is the most prominent feature of the India-Pakistan relations in recent years. The ongoing peace process is multidimensional involving multiple actors. Earlier the dialogue process was almost confined to the official level, whether it was between New Delhi-Islamabad, India-J&K or Pakistan-`Azad' Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan. But as the recent developments would indicate, especially after the opening of the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad route in April 2005, the major focus has gradually shifted to the people of the undivided Jammu and Kashmir. The opening of cross-border routes, the proposed e-mail-linking of passport offices in Srinagar-Muzaffarabad to ease travel, the increasing realisation of the need to fight disasters like earthquakes together, the prospects of other joint mechanisms—are all indicative of a government-backed people-centric process underway. The present article focuses on the ongoing peace process in Kashmir which involves not only India and Pakistan but also the people of both parts of Kashmir. Admitting the complexities involved in the whole exercise, the paper endeavours to portray the positive aspects of the peace process, which could possibly succeed in spite of hurdles. Most of the materials used in the paper are from author's field surveys in Jammu and Kashmir (in Poonch, Jammu, Srinagar, Kargil and Leh), and monitoring of the developments in the region from close quarters.

The end of 1990s witnessed many changes in the global scenario and they had obvious impact on the many long-standing conflicts around the world. End of the cold war led to perceptible transformation in the old patterns of interstate relations. Besides, the forces of globalisation and democracy added new dimensions to whole spectrum of relations. The conventional territorial boundaries and related disputes are challenged by increasing globalisation, trans-border cultural exchanges and popular acceptance of democratic means for conflict resolution. This trend is equally applicable to the Kashmir conflict, which is very complex owing to the involvement of multiple players—Indian, Pakistani, Kashmiri and international—and myriad diversities in the region. In the year 1998, both India and Pakistan had gone nuclear. In the succeeding year the Kargil crisis raised the spectrum of nuclear confrontation between the two arch enemies of South Asia. These developments and the decades long stalemate on the ground coupled with pressures from the international community (especially the US) led to the dialogue process currently underway.

The realities of hard and long experience—the hurting stalemate—made all the parties to the Kashmir dispute realise that the future of the subcontinent lies in peace, not in war. The last three years have set the trend of popular aversion to war, people have become sick and tired of the killings and destruction and have opted for peace, which obviously has a bearing on political leaders on both sides of the divide. Developments such as the start of bus service in 1999 from Amritsar to Lahore, the opening up of the Line of Control (LOC), and cooperation in the earthquake relief measures, are most suggestive about the things to come. In October 2003, India proposed ten confidence-building measures for improving people-to-people contact and communication by road, rail and sea between the two countries.