Hoisting the Tricolour in Kashmir: Search for the fifty-seventh inch

By unfurling the Tricolour in all the panchayats in the Kashmir valley, PM Modi may be seeking to bury the embarrassment of 1992 under a national celebration

The idea of hoisting the tricolour in the Kashmir valley must be seared in the mind of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He can probably never forget the embarrassment of January 26, 1992 when he accompanied Murli Manohar Joshi, then the president of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), to hoist the tricolour at Srinagar’s Lal Chowk. He was the coordinator of the 15,000 km long Rashtirya Ekta Yatra (national unity march) led by Joshi from Kanyakumari to Kashmir to hoist the tricolour in Srinagar.

Photographs of that winter morning morning show Joshi fidgeting with the national flag he had brought with