In the early hours of Thursday 30th of January 2014 the BBC broadcast HARDtalk, an excellent interview by Stephen Sackur. He was talking with Omar Abdullah, the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, about the State’s varied situation since Partition in 1947, the turbulent so-called ‘troubles’ since 1990 and the future of the State and it’s status in India, given that the BJP is likely to be the ruling party in forthcoming elections. They also discussed the possibility of a permanent solution with Pakistan and internal militancy. After visiting Kashmir for the first time in 2013 now that the UK Foreign Office says that limited parts are safe for UK tourists, I was struck by the State’s obvious beauty and astonished by chilling events over the last 25 years which were largely unreported in the West. The Chief Minister comes over as a sincere, highly committed and a very intelligent politician. However it is always difficult to know what is really happening especially when some say that the Chief Minister has changed his agenda in recent years. The truth is particularly elusive in this part of the world. I commend this programme strongly. For UK viewers it should be available on iPlayer for about 25 days and for others it may be possible to see it on BBC News or BBC World. I have also found this YouTube post.  I would welcome any comments.