2 SOCIAL SCIENTIST of greater control by the state. While debates on the medieval and modern Indian state and society have generally reached out to a wider audience outside of the small circle of academic researchers involved in the debates, the same unfortunately cannot be said with regard to the ancient or early medieval periods. We are glad therefore to be able to bring to our readers through this article a flavour of the discussions taking place on ^hese vital questions among researchers of this period of Indian history. The article by Prakash Chandra traces the development of the national movement in Kashmir, highlighting the manner in which the tradition of secular nationalism gathered strength in that state, keeping at bay Muslim communalism and the appeal of the Pakistan movement. The strength of this secular tradition was demonstrated by the fact that even during the darkest days of the communal holocaust in the rest of India following Partition, Hindu-Muslim relations in Kashmir remained peaceful. It is the attempt of the ruling party at the Centre under pressure from Hindu communalism emanating from the ^North Indian Hindu mainland" to ride rough-shod over the regional-cultural aspirations of the Kashmiri community, that led to the emergence of separatist and anti-Indian sentiments among the people in the state and thus reversed the gains of the freedom struggle. The moral of the story according to the author therefore is that the arbitrary imposition of an aggressive pan-Indian nationalism creates the conditions, as it did in Kashmir and has done elsewhere subsequently, under which regional nationalism gets tranformed into secessionism and communalism; a necessary condition for the unity of this diverse country is an adequate cognition of, and respect for, the two levels at which national consciousness exists among the people. The period of the seventies was marked by a spate of'struggles by the common people to defend themselves against the burdens which intensifying crisis was imposing upon them, struggles against price-rise, for wage-increases for defence of civil liberties which were increasingly coming under threat burst forth all over the country. Women not only played a vital part in these struggles but also came forward in large numbers against sexual harassment social oppression and police atrocities. The role played by women in a variety of struggles in the period 1970-77 is documented in the article by Meera Velayudhan, which once again points to the tremendous reservoir of militancy that exists in this hitherto neglected sector of society.