Kashmir

An Affair of Continued Existence

A K Ganguly

• Publisher: VIJ Books (India) Pty Ltd
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9789388161428
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

"Kashmir has always been in the midst of geopolitical hullabaloo due to its pending UN Resolution and now the demand of 'Azadi' (Freedom) which became more pronounced after the inception of insurgency in the State in 1987-88. If we look into the issue, in reality, it is a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan, if the legality reason is applied then there is no doubt that India's stance is most legitimate. The people of Kashmir have invited the 'Jihad' into Indian Kashmir Region and declared 'Azadi' as a war of freedom through the Pakistan sponsored militancy and radicalisation of the society on communal lines by the militant organisations and separatists.In the present environment, the stakeholders are at a tangent and it is mainly because the main stakeholder, the people of Kashmir are uncertain and confused, the total population is not part of the 'Azadi' (freedom) thus there is vagueness and the vision of 'Azadi' (freedom) is very blurred. The other stakeholders are either taking advantage of the people's sentiments or going by their own agenda of self-interest or lack the will to take initiatives to resolve the Kashmir issue which meets their personal ends.In this book, the chapters are based on the stakeholders and their participation in the Kashmir embroil. The basic contents are based on the issues that have made Kashmir an affair of continued existence by various stakeholders, the creation of an environment of stalemate and prevailing status quo without any changes, none of the stakeholders are ready to budge or lose their turf. Written in a simple and lucid manner, the narratives made interesting with historical facts, quotations and factual as prevailing in Kashmir."

Chapter – IV

The State

“Kashmir is perhaps the most difficult of all these problems between India and Pakistan. We should also remember that Kashmir is not a thing to be bandied between India and Pakistan but it has a soul of its own and an individuality of its own. Nothing can be done without the goodwill and consent of the people of Kashmir.”

— J. L. Nehru,
First PM of India

The fact that Maharaja Hari Singh of Jammu & Kashmir was indecisive when British had given option to all Princely States to either join India or Pakistan, he was flirting with the idea of remaining independent. The option was given by the British, well before partition with the likely date being 14 August. Had the Maharaja acceded to Pakistan, India would have not been left with any option. Pakistan did not worry about Kashmir, in the words of Jinnah a “blank cheque in the pocket”. It was Nehru who had paternal affiliation with the State and had the desire to get it acceded to India, he used his influence and approached the Viceroy Lord Mountbatten to hold the Maharaja declaring independence, however all the attempts failed. As the decision was pending the Maharaja asked both India and Pakistan to sign Standstill Agreement, which would have allowed the Maharaja to decide on the options and final decision was taken by him. Pakistan signed the agreement with Maharaja but Nehru did not do so, this shocked Pakistan. On declaration of independence to India and Pakistan, the issue of Kashmir was hanging as the Maharaja did not commit and this uncertainty and the fear of India taking the initiative made Pakistan to use armed tribesmen (Irregulars) to annex Kashmir by force, as Pakistan was signatory to the Standstill Agreement it could not employ its regular army, rest is history which we all know.

It is Nehru who made Jammu & Kashmir part of India by making the Maharaja sign the Accession Instrument. Sheikh Abdullah played an important part in the complete game plan. Nehru had telegrammed to Prime Minister of Pakistan immediately on accession “Kashmir’s accession to India was accepted by us at the request of the Maharaja’s government and the most numerously representative popular organization in the state which is predominantly Muslim. Even then it was accepted on condition that as soon as law and order had been restored, the people of Kashmir would decide the question of accession. It is open to them to accede to either Dominion then,” this was indicative of the intention being fair and the issue of the accession of the Princely State was left to the self determination of the people of Jammu & Kashmir, moreover the sequence of event which followed was due to the aggressive actions by Pakistan and non cooperation of the people of Kashmir to the Pakistani’s attempt of forced annexation of Jammu & Kashmir. The situation created by Pakistan neither got stabilised nor Pakistan vacated the occupied Jammu & Kashmir thus neither plebiscite nor people’s will got determined. Jammu & Kashmir today stands divided as Indian side and Pakistan occupied.

Nehru had to submit to demand of special status to Indian Jammu & Kashmir and conditional self determination to obtain the accession, the Pakistan’s actions of invasion and capture of the acceded State using irregulars ‘Kabali’ (tribesmen) supported by Regular Army was vehemently opposed by the people of Kashmir, the atrocities and arson committed by the tribesmen on the people went against Pakistan. The Indian Armed Forces were making good headway in pushing the invaders and recapturing the lost territories. Nehru brought United Nations Organisation (UNO) into the scene on the advice of Lord Mountbatten, to cement his grip on valley and declaring Pakistan as the aggressor. He wanted to take Kashmir with International will, leaving no scope of any argument or claim for Pakistan. However, when the UN passed resolution on Jammu & Kashmir’s self-determination, he changed the tone and let the issue linger in spite of assurance by Sheikh Abdullah to get the plebiscite and self determination with nearly 75 percent people of Jammu & Kashmir including the occupied areas voting in favour of India. At that point of time Sheikh Abdullah had very good hold on the people of Kashmir and their trust and faith. As the years passed and the condition as per the UN Resolution was not adhered both by India and Pakistan, the fate of Jammu & Kashmir thus was kept in the state of inertness. Now, as of today we have come to a state of ‘status quo’ with none of the parties ready to budge thus making the UN Resolution of 1948 redundant. The issue has become bilateral and in no way third party involvement can bring any change in the state of the status quo, therefore the issue will remain and be the cause of contention between India and Pakistan.

Both Pakistan and India have given an autonomous status to their part of Jammu & Kashmir, from the Indian perspective the status is under its National Constitution through Article 370 and 35 A, whereas in Pakistan it is under the Federal Administrative Resolutions which are not that comprehensive and neither part of National Constitutional Acts, but control is in the hands of the Government of Pakistan which has the power to overrule any resolutions, amendments or incorporation of any laws and provisions by the State (Pakistan Occupied Kashmir) Assemblies.

In this chapter my endeavour is to bring out the issues which are concerned with Indian State of Jammu & Kashmir and carry out analysis of state of affairs in the present scenario and what are the ways ahead to get the people onboard for a solution, where we have blundered and what all must not be repeated and how to make governance people friendly? Lot has been written about the legacy of the state politics and governance, about Article 370 and 35A, about dynasty rule and the political systems. But at the cost of repetition it is worth mentioning certain facts which have bearing on the present day politics and the grievances of the people.

Like Indian freedom struggle Sheikh Abdullah was leading the freedom movement in Kashmir against the Dogra Rulers who were alleged to have been tyrannical towards Kashmiri people. Sheikh Abdullah came to limelight in 1930’s and soon became the leader of the masses. He was the member of Muslim Conference founded by Mirwaiz Yusuf Shah but later changed it as National Conference in 1942, people followed him blindly. He launched the Quit Kashmir Movement in 1942, giving the call to Dogra Rulers to leave Kashmir. When India achieved Independence in 1947, the Princely State of Jammu & Kashmir was independent and Maharaja (the King) of Jammu & Kashmir had desired that it must remain independent of India and Pakistan. Maharja Hari Singh, acceded to India when he felt that the situation was becoming untenable due to invasion of Pakistani tribesmen but he stuck to his demand of autonomy to the State with certain preconditions, among which self determination by the people of Jammu & Kashmir was one of the condition once normalisation of the situation in the State was obtained, Sheikh Abdullah was instrumental in supporting the accession to India.

Sheikh Abdullah was the first “Prime Minister”. He was dismissed from the position on 8 August 1953 and Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad was appointed as the new Prime Minister by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the Prime Minister of India, Bakshi Ghulam was in power for 10 years. This is seen as the first betrayal by the Indian Government towards Kashmiri people. The expressions ‘Sadar-i-Riyasat’ and ‘Prime Minister’ were replaced with the terms ‘Governor’ and ‘Chief Minister’ in 1965, this the people felt as an insult to the position of their leader and downgrading the power equation. In 1971, the declaration of Bangladesh’s independence was proclaimed on 26 March by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and subsequently the War broke out between India and Pakistan in December 1971, which culminated with liberation of Bangladesh. This turn of event, had shaken Sheikh Abdullah, he realised that for political survival there is need to stop pursuing confrontational politics and opt for reconciliation. Critics of Sheikh hold the view that he gave up the cherished goal of plebiscite for gaining Chief Minister’s chair. He started talks with the then Prime Minister Mrs Indira Gandhi for normalising the situation in the region and had a accord called ‘1975 Indira–Sheikh Accord’, the important outcome was of giving up the demand for plebiscite in lieu of people being given the right to self-rule by a democratically elected Government as envisaged under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution. Sheikh Abdullah again became the Chief Minister of the state following the Indira-Sheikh Accord and remained in the position for 2 years followed by Governors Rule and in 1977 again got re-elected and was Chief Minister till his death on 8 September 1982.

State of Affairs of State Politics

Irony is that nearly every Chief Minister’s rule was followed by Governors Rule ranging from 1 to 6 years, fall of the party and the Chief Minister was due to the anti- incumbency factor, political engineering, increased terrorist activities and failure to control the Pakistan sponsored militancy, misrule, no confidence motions and breakaways. The situation is typical in Jammu & Kashmir; the Legislative Assembly was initially composed of 100 members, later increased to 111 by the Constitution of Jammu & Kashmir (Twentieth Amendment) Act of 1988. Out of these 111 seats, 24 seats are designated for the territorial constituencies of the State that were occupied by Pakistan in 1947-48. This was done to claim the whole of Jammu & Kashmir, being one part of one entity, Pakistan on its own had created the State Assemblies for Azad Jammu & Kashmir and the Northern Areas under its own resolutions. These 24 seats of Pakistan occupied Jammu & Kashmir as per section 48 of the State Constitution remain officially vacant and are not taken into account for reckoning the total membership of the Indian Jammu & Kashmir Assembly when deciding on the majority factor, for government formation. Thus the total contested seats of the assembly presently are 87, out of which the Kashmir Region has 46 seats, Jammu Region has 37 seats and Ladakh Region has 4 seats. If we add the Jammu and Ladakh seats it does not equal the Kashmir seats. To get absolute majority i.e. 50 percent of the total 87 seats which comes to 44 seats, any Kashmir based political party who gets 46 seats of the Kashmir region thus can claim the majority and form the government, this singularity factor has kept the Kashmiri Muslims in political advantage.

The regional parties which have base in the Kashmir Valley have always formed the government due to the advantage of the seats and getting into alliance with the National Parties like Congress or of late BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party). The political inclinations both at State and National level was always towards Kashmir which alienated the people of Jammu and Ladakh Regions, political parochialism was very much evident which was Kashmir centric and having Kashmiri Muslim domination, thus Jammu and Ladakh have always suffered when it came to State administration and development. The party divide is also very peculiar, the Valley has predominantly influence of National Conference (NC), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the Indian National Congress with maximum Kashmiri Muslim participation, whereas in the Hindu belt of Jammu the predominant parties had been the regional Jammu & Kashmir National Panthers Party and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who have zero or literally no influence in Kashmir, in the Ladakh Region the dominant party has been Indian National Congress but of late Bharatiya Janata Party has made an entry, here the factor of appeasement of a particular community does not exist. In fact the politics of Jammu & Kashmir has mostly witnessed single party Muslim dominance since its accession to India. The obvious reason is that the maximum number of constituencies whether it is for State Assembly or Indian Parliament is in Kashmir region, thus the political parties of Kashmir Valley have always dominated. The party in power have always had parochial outlook and have been Srinagar centric, as for Jammu and Ladakh was concerned the priorities were always after Kashmir region.

Since 1988 the Hindu Regional and National parties have not been able to establish the foot hold in the Kashmir Region, the fundamentalist terror organisation has ensured that other than the Muslim dominated parties others are not allowed to have or create space for themselves in political functioning, such cadres either were eliminated or kidnapped or made to withdraw after life threat. Political cleansing by the terrorist is one of the ways of creating fear among the non Muslim Regional Parties or the National Parties who attempt to enter politics in the Valley. Thus polity of Jammu & Kashmir is divided, fractured and has their own interest of concern. This partisan politics has been cause of grievances of the people of Jammu & Kashmir. Tenet of the State politics has been dynastic by nature, as there is lack of quality leadership, only in case of Indian Congress where person other than dynastic nominee was selected as the head of the ruling party but the coalition partner had dynastic head. In case of All Parties Hurriyat Conference the conglomeration of separatist ideology parties where the leadership has been found wanting and pro Pakistan biased, it has been literally removed from the political turf of Indian Jammu & Kashmir, the party being configuration of fundamentalist oriented Kashmir based parties has not been able to give a combine front neither it could get into the foray of the Indian political field. Thus people of Kashmir are seeing the facade of uncertain politics which lacks astuteness, is self centred and with highly provincial sentiments, thus instability in the political ethics and attitude result in lack of confidence of the people of Jammu & Kashmir. Moreover there is no competitive political existence, as the parties are very limited and highly provincial, do not want to venture out of the known turf and the existing comfort zone.

Another major issue is none of the parties in power were ever able to link the State with the main land India and this created fi...