Srinagar, April 6 -- Kashmir has never suffered from a shortage of intelligence. It has suffered from a surplus of clever (read cunning) people who knew exactly what was wrong - and chose to do nothing about it.

For decades, the narrative has been carefully curated. Blame Delhi. Blame Pakistan (only when it becomes unavoidably important). Blame history. Blame conflict. Blame everyone except the one class that had the education, access, networks, and power to actually change things - the elite. The drawing-room patriots. The seminar circuit intellectuals. The file-pushing bureaucrats. The profit-first businessmen. The legacy politicians. The pimps of a common Kashmiri's blood.

The uncomfortable truth is this: Kashmir did not decay in spi...