THE armed struggle by Muslim separatists for an independent homeland in Kashmir has claimed more than 13,000 lives since December 1989 and is nowhere near settlement.
India's 49-year-old dispute over Kashmir with Pakistan, which occupied a third of the area in 1947 and seeks the rest, is also a major problem.
Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state, has been under federal rule since mid-1990, after the elected government was dismissed when armed separatists launched a campaign for independence.
The separatists are said to be backed by Pakistan and get their arms from across the border.
The presence of more than 175,000 troops and the rising death toll has proved an embarrassment to India's Prime Minister, P. V. Narasimha Rao, who wants to project an image of stability.
State elections in Kashmir were last held in 1987 and won by the local National Conference in an alliance with Mr Rao's Congress (I) party, amid allegations of widespread rigging, which sparked the separatist movement.
