Author: Hari Om
Publication: Vijayvaani.com
Date: October 8 2009
URL: http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplayArticle.aspx?id=856
People's Democratic Party leaders, including Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and his
daughter Mehbooba Mufti, have unleashed a no-holds-barred propaganda blitz
to enlist the people's support in favour of their self-rule doctrine. They
are seeking to convince everyone that self-rule doctrine not only has the
potential of defusing tensions between India and Pakistan, and ending the
ongoing violence in Kashmir and resolving the Kashmir issue, but it has also
the potential of ending regional tensions in the state as the doctrine has
inbuilt mechanism that prevents any region of the state from dominating and
exploiting another.
It can be said without any hesitation that
the self-rule doctrine is fundamentally bad, reactionary, retrograde and highly
injurious to the vital interests of India and its people in Jammu & Kashmir.
It is nothing but a replica of the two-nation theory that resulted into the
communal partition of India in 1947 and consumed millions of lives.
The self rule doctrine, like the greater autonomy
doctrine of the National Conference, means another charter of bondage as far
as the people of Jammu and Ladakh are concerned, recognition of communalism
and extremism, great concession to terrorists, ability of Pakistan to share
equal powers with India in Jammu and Kashmir, negation of all that the Indian
nation did during the past six decades to integrate the state into India and
dismember of balkanization of India.
It also means the emergence of a system under
which New Delhi would have no power whatsoever in the state. Self-rule, like
greater autonomy, means the state's independence and a return to the medieval
ages known for barbarism, oppression, intolerance, conversions and destruction
of Indian symbols of civilization.
This is no exaggeration. The implications
of self-rule suggest that there is no fundamental difference between what
People's Democratic Party leaders are advocating and what Islamabad is seeking
to achieve. I will quote verbatim what former Chief Minister Mufti Sayeed
(who led the Indian delegation to the United States in November 2006) said
at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Washington DC,
on November 12.
He said: "In all these circumstances
- Indian, Pakistani, international - the only view-point that has not unfortunately
been adequately highlighted is the people of Jammu & Kashmir (read Kashmiri
Muslims, especially Sunni Muslims). There is, of course, the argument for
the inclusion of the people of Jammu & Kashmir into the resolution process
to ensure that India and Pakistan do not walk away from the bilateral talks.
The problem is that the heterogeneity of views in Jammu and Kashmir has become
an easy excuse for their exclusion".
He further said: "Conceptually, the challenge
in Jammu & Kashmir is to integrate the region without disturbing the extent
of sovereign authority over delimited territorial space. There is no need
to negate the significance of the LoC as territorial divisions, but it is
imperative to negate its acquired and imputed manifestation of state competition
for power, prestige, or an imagined historical identity. The idea is to retain
the former and change the latter. Therein lies the key to the solution of
Jammu & Kashmir dispute." The meaning is clear. How ridiculous, provocative,
dangerous and unsettling is this formulation of the Mufti!
Mufti Sayeed did not stop here. He added:
"The operational challenge in Jammu and Kashmir is to establish innovative
institutional arrangements that have a political, economic and security character.
The two countries - India and Pakistan - have to resolve the very difficult
problem of 'domestic' integration within a split international political and
economic structure. Our basic premise is that the search for solution to the
issue of Jammu & Kashmir is the search for an inter-nation state, but
still has a supra-national basis. To put issue in analytical terms, we have
to find ways and means of 'sharing sovereignty' (with Pakistan). This makes
it 'more than alliance' (where alliance means that a group of nations forms
a selective agreement without the need of giving up relevant pieces of sovereignty).
In view of the past history, the stated positions and the emotional surcharge,
a one-point-one-time solution for resolution of the conflict is a near impossibility.
What is required is a sequence of measures, which would resolve the situation.
These initiatives need to be less dramatic and insightful. What is needed
is a practical step-by-step extrication of the state from the tragic muddle.
But it should not be a matter merely of atmospherics, either."
He further said in Washington DC: "At
a practical level, it should be obvious that the Jammu & Kashmir issue
cannot be solved exclusively on an inter-state level (i.e., within India or
within Pakistan). It requires a combination of intra-state (across India and
Pakistan) and inter-state (within Jammu & Kashmir and cross-Line of Control)
measures. Thus, it would seem prudent to advocate a three-step approach to
the resolution of the issue - introducing fundamental principles of a solution,
which would reduce uncertainty and provide a 'road-map.' Creating a dual power-sharing
arrangement which would be based on equal relationship between the people
of Jammu and Kashmir… and combining this power-sharing arrangement with
regional and national integration."
Mufti told CSIS: "Our aim is not to discuss
the complexities of history and geo-politics, but, instead, to shift focus
to more practical issue. It is argued that the solution of the Jammu &
Kashmir issue must be built on three essential elements: (1) introduction
of clearly defined fundamental principles on which the solution must be based;
(2) creation of a proper system of integration between arrangements; and (3)
combining of this arrangement into the framework of Indian and Pakistan polity…
This approach, which is underlying the concept of self-rule, is the only way
that could eliminate the sources of ethno-territorial conflicts, entrenched
in the traditional notions of sovereignty, self-determination, national and
ethnic borders".
The resolution on self-rule adopted by the
People's Democratic Party Executive Committee, held under Mufti Sayeed, in
Jammu on February 11, 2007, also says the same thing and demands withdrawal
of the Indian Constitution from Jammu & Kashmir.
In this regard, the resolution said: "People's
Democratic Party recognizes that the people of the state (reads Kashmiri Muslims),
unlike other states, which acceded with the Union of India, were assured and
promised internal sovereignty and self-rule by allowing the state to have
its own constituent assembly, its own constitution and flag and a vast degree
of self-governance (read semi-independence). This was reflected in Article
370 of the Constitution of India. Unfortunately, this Article, which was meant
to be a bridge between the Union of India and the State of Jammu and Kashmir,
has been used as one way window to undermine the internal sovereignty of the
state and subvert the ideal of self-governance promised to the people of the
state. The successive governments of Jammu & Kashmir, unfortunately, were
parties to this subversion of self-rule of the people of the state. Consequently,
many aberrations have taken place in the originally conceived and devised
constitutional arrangement with the Union of India. In particular, self-rule
was denied to people, by depriving them (of) the opportunity to freely express
their political verdict or by thwarting their verdict when given…People's
Democratic Party resolves to correct these distortions and aberrations that
have crept in self-rule, as part of its comprehensive formula to resolve the
Kashmir issue."
The resolution, among several other controversial
and provocative things, also said: "The use of force is no substitute
for a policy of engagement and dialogue. Armed forces are meant for extraordinary
situations and crisis. They are not meant to find solutions to political problems.
People's Democratic Party has, in a previous resolution, called upon the Government
of India to reduce the strength of armed forces, engaged in anti-militancy
operations…The local police battalions can be raised to meet the challenge
of internal security and to fight militants…The Armed Forces Special
Powers Act should be withdrawn as conditions have substantially improved in
the state and resort to use of this legislation is proving counter-productive
and detrimental to the peace process and dialogue…"
The message of the People's Democratic Party
leaders is loud and clear. The message is that it wants a dispensation that
is outside the Indian constitutional framework, with India and Pakistan sharing
sovereignty in Jammu and Kashmir, plus the state's demilitarization. This
is unacceptable. What is needed is that all right-thinking people and the
authorities in New Delhi must combat the pernicious self-rule doctrine.
Not just this, the greater autonomy doctrine
of the National Conference, with which the Congress is sharing power in the
state and at the Centre, has also to be combated because the implication of
the autonomy concept and self-rule doctrine are the same. The only difference
is that while the National Conference calls it internal autonomy, the People's
Democratic Party calls it internal sovereignty.
We are a secular country. We just can't afford
to endorse such dubious, communal and unsettling formulations as are being
put forth by the Kashmir-based parties.
- The author is Chair Professor, Gulab Singh
Chair, Jammu University, Jammu
