Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) has erupted in a wave of protest against the regime in Islamabad, fuelled by economic hardship, long-standing political grievances, and a felt sense among its people that promises of autonomy, dignity, and good governance have been betrayed.

Pakistan administers PoK illegally and poorly. Over decades, the region has seen how local aspirations—for self-rule, for fair representation, for relief from poverty and neglect—often clashed with the political imperatives of Islamabad and with the insensitivity of a Pakistani administrative and security establishment that treats the area largely as a subordinate or buffer territory rather than a truly self-governing polity.

In PoK, grievances have long been of two kinds: the political/institutional and the socio-economic. Politically, PoK’s institutions have typically remained under strong influence of Pakistan’s central government (military and intelligence bureaucracies among them). The people of PoK have periodically demanded greater powers, more control over their own revenues, more say in appointments, and genuine autonomy. On the socio-economic front, the region lags behind in infrastructure, suffers from energy shortages and weak public services, and often bears the brunt of policy neglect, especially when Pakistan itself is in crisis.

What is new in recent flare-ups is the combination of economic desperation, the visibility of demands (for self-rule, self-government, and........

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