Freedom of speech and expression is the bedrock of democracy; and literature is one of its time honoured pillars, giving a voice to diverse viewpoints. That the Indian government should ban 25 books by international and domestic authors that focus on Jammu and Kashmir is clearly contrary to the Indian constitution which upholds those freedoms. That it chose to do so on the sixth anniversary marking the abrogation of Article 370 of the constitution – which had formerly safeguarded Jammu and Kashmir’s autonomous status within the Indian Union – is baffling.For the past six years, the official Indian position has been that the situation in the valley of Kashmir as part of the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, is normalising, that tourists are returning and – with the exception of the brutal terrorist attack in Pahalgam in April this year – that terrorism was declining; furthermore, with roads and railways being constructed assisting connectivity, that development was progressing and the longstanding policy of winning ‘hearts and minds’ was succeeding.So, what has prompted this unforeseen ban – adding to nearly 40 other books which, post 1947, have been banned throughout India, including V.S. Naipaul’s An Area of Darkness (banned nationwide in 1964 ‘for its negative portrayal of India and its people’) and Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses (banned in 1988 for its ‘blasphemous’ content)?This latest action is all the more incongruous because most of the banned books – now ‘forfeited’, to use the J&K administration’s curious phrase – have been in circulation for decades, including my own, Kashmir in Conflict. Most are by respected authors (some of whom are now dead), whose work has been highly acclaimed worldwide in academic fora. What has made the Indian government so insecure that its attention has been drawn to these books now rather than even in the height of insurgency in the 1990s, or at any other time since?Take the case of Muhammad Yusuf Saraf’s Kashmiris Fight for Freedom: it was published in two volumes in the 1970s; the narrative of the first volume outlines events in the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir from 1819-1946 and is part of J&K’s historical archive; the second volume focuses on events from 1947-1978, and while it may recount the partisan viewpoint of a Muslim Kashmiri born in Baramulla in 1923 (who later became an advocate of the Supreme Court of Azad J&K (POK)), this book likewise has an important place in J&K’s history.So too does The Kashmir Dispute 1947-2010 by the late A.G. Noorani. As a former advocate of the Supreme Court of India, a leading constitutional expert and political commentator, the body of the narrative is a collection of articles he had written from 1964 in which he has quoted directly from contemporary sources, which speak for themselves, thereby enabling readers to make up their own minds about the complexities of the dispute.Australian political scientist Christopher Snedden’s highly acclaimed Independent Kashmir, on the other hand, examines the concept of an independent state and provides an important narrative, describing J&K’s history as well as the resilient spirit of the Kashmiris. Yet again, while the Indian government might not approve of the direction his argument takes, it is surely instructive to know more about a subject which has been hotly debated since the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, when, for a brief period, the state was independent.Also read: ‘Burning Knowledge’: My Book Is Among Those Banned by the Jammu & Kashmir AdministrationWithout that insight, how can future generations ever understand the difficulties of fulfilling the Indian government’s objective of integrating Jammu and Kashmir?The banning of Indian author Sumantra Bose’s books, Contested Lands and Kashmir at the Crossroads: Inside a 21st Century Conflict is also unexpected. Educated in the United States, he is descended from the well-known family of Subhas Chandra Bose (who, notwithstanding – or perhaps because of – his defection to the Japanese fighting imperial Britain during the Second World War, has now become a national Indian hero). After 20 years of teaching at the London School of Economics, Bose is currently working as professor of international and comparative studies at Krea University in Andhra Pradesh. Having focused since 1993 on the challenges faced in Jammu and Kashmir, like other scholars and academics who have an interest in seeing an end to the conflict, his main objective through the book has been ‘to identify pathways to peace so that all violence ends’.None of these books or the others on the proscribed list promote, as has been alleged “[a] culture of grievance, victimhood and terrorist heroism.” They merely elucidate why it may have developed.My own book Kashmir in Conflict – first published in hardback in 1996 as Kashmir in the Crossfire, and now in its 5th edition in paperback – does not, as is alleged of all the banned books, ‘glorify terrorism’. It explains disaffection. It does not distort history, it provides an account through multiple voices of why the dispute arose, why it has not been resolved and why, to achieve peace and stability in the region, dialogue among the protagonists is essential.Victoria Schofield during one of her visits to Kashmir in 2019. Photo: By arrangement.What is also concerning is the repercussions for those authors who live permanently in India, like Anuradha Bhasin, daughter of veteran journalist, Ved Bhasin, and author of A Dismantled State: The untold Story of Kashmir after Article 370, or the celebrated writer, Arundhati Roy, author of Azadi, Freedom, Fascism, Fiction, who are more accessible to the long arm of Indian legislation, which threatens imprisonment for allegedly promoting ‘secessionism’. Granted that Roy is renowned for being a fierce critic of the Indian government, but for a democracy to function effectively, the opposition must always have a voice.All governments worldwide will talk about the need to protect the national interest. Numerous governments have, at some time in their history, banned certain books. But they have inevitably found that the ban backfires, the books go underground and there is an even greater thirst for uncensored knowledge.And so, as bookstores in the valley of Kashmir are raided, one must inevitably ask: does such action, redolent of the Nazis’ book burning in the 1930s, promote that national interest or does it merely make the nation more divided?Victoria Schofield is a British author, biographer and historian.