Author: Ajay Chrungoo
Publication: Vijayvaani.com
Date: September 30, 2010
URL: http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplayArticle.aspx?id=1435
At the Muthi refugee camp in Jammu, a refugee-activist Bhushan Lal folded
his hands before Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram and asked a simple question:
'Sir, when a not very educated person like me can understand that Azadi, Autonomy
and Pakistan are all one and the same, why does this realisation elude such
knowledgeable persons like you?'
The all-party delegation to Jammu & Kashmir
maintained an embarrassed silence. Bhushan Lal then escorted them around the
camp, showing the pathetic conditions in which Pandits driven out of the Kashmir
Valley two decades ago, continued to live even after two long decades. Successive
governments had failed to provide even basic human necessities, on the specious
plea that this would give the refugees a stake in remaining in the camps,
and not returning to the Valley when the State Government desired to show
the international community that it had achieved the return of the exiled
community. Inspecting one of the one-room tenements, CPI-M MP Sitaram Yechury
asked: 'what, is there no bathroom here?'
Pointing to a photograph on the wall, Bhushan
Lal said: 'Sir, when the Prime Minister came here two years ago, he promised
this Mataji a two-room apartment with an attached toilet; but Mataji is now
a photo on the wall (deceased) and there is still no toilet.'
Some migrants broke down and wept at the plight
they had been reduced to - rendered homeless, hopeless, invisible and voiceless
in their own land by the pitiless intolerance of Islamic resurgence in the
Valley, coupled with the mindless obeisance of secular India to Islamic intransigence.
They told the delegation that they were utterly in despair in the land of
their birth, in the civilisational frontier they had struggled so zealously
to preserve despite the vicissitudes of centuries.
If the plight of the migrants was sad, the
local Hindus of Jammu, and the Kashmiri Hindus who had managed to rehabilitate
themselves in Jammu, fared no better. As has been noted by other writers as
well, the delegation found no time for the miniscule Hindu community in the
Valley (just 2500 persons in all); the beleaguered Sikh community in the Valley
or in Jammu city; the Hindu refugees from Pakistan and Occupied Kashmir who
came in 1947, in 1948, in 1965 and 1971, and have been denied statehood and
many basic human rights in the State.
Even organised Hindu groups like Panun Kashmir
were initially ignored, and it was only after the national print and electronic
media began flashing the news that minorities were being ignored by the delegation
that - perhaps at a nudge from New Delhi - we were told that we would be heard
late at night on Sept. 21, 2010. After some deliberation, a four member delegation
comprising Dr. Agnishekhar, Sh. Shailendra Aima, Sh. Sanjay Raina and Dr.
Ajay Chrungoo met the visiting Parliamentarians to present an alternative
paradigm to the MPs who had hitherto heard only one side of the story.
We informed the all-party delegation that
first and foremost, there was an urgent imperative that the Government of
India appreciated the truth that there were two separate paradigms operating
in the Kashmir Valley - one was that of the separatists and the other was
that of the patriots. The Hindus of Kashmir comprised the patriotic constituency
of India, but this section found its voice muffled and strangulated by those
who had arms and violence at their command.
The Hindus of Kashmir, we told the parliamentarians,
want desperately to live in a Union Territory located to the north and east
of the Jhelum river, without the menace of Article 370, and under the full
bounty of the Indian Constitution. It was high time, therefore, that the Government
of India initiated a dialogue at the highest level with Panun Kashmir for
the creation of a Union Territory in the Kashmir Valley for the resettlement
of the four lakh exiled Kashmiris.
This homeland (Panun Kashmir) was the only
way to reverse the genocide of the Kashmiri Hindus in all the decades since
independence, and particularly the gruesome killings, rapes and persecutions
and threats that led to the mass Exodus in the bitter winter of 1990. This
was also the only way to defeat the communalism and separatism that has destroyed
the cultural pluralism that the separatists pretend still exists, while the
Valley has been rendered unlivable for virtually all citizens.
In this context, we expressed our outrage
and dismay over the manner in which a section of the all party delegation
went out of its way to appease the separatist elements behind the vicious
stone-pelting that is injuring the security forces and citizenry in the current
unrest, and were also responsible for the genocide and religious cleansing
of Hindus, which forced us out of our beloved vale.
All the variants shades of separatism in the
Kashmir Valley, we emphasised, are a negation of Indian secularism, of the
Charter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and were, above all,
destructive of the Fundamental Rights of all citizens. The separatist movement
in Kashmir Valley is fundamentally regressive and must be deprived of liberal
legitimacy if we are to retain a united India.
Unfortunately, Muslim separatism and communalism
have not been challenged ideologically or politically by the Indian State,
and this addled the thinking of the entire population. To begin with, the
separatists have fed the people with historical distortions and outright lies,
which have resulted in the handing over of Kashmiri Muslims, especially the
youth, to Taliban-style indoctrination.
What is important to remember is that Kashmir
was never a Muslim preserve and always, through all the vicissitudes of its
painful history, upheld the continuity and integrity of Indian civilization.
Kheer Bhavani, Vaishno Devi, Raghunath Mandir, Amarnath, and the now lost
Sharada Peeth, are proud symbols of a vibrant people who stood for the Sanskrit
civilisation even when it was being beheaded in the hundreds and thousands.
Legend says there was a time when there were only 11 Pandit families in Srinagar
- so intense was the victimization of our people by an intolerant invading
ethos.
The demands for Greater Autonomy, Self Rule,
Independence or merger with Pakistan are ideologically one and the same, and
mutually complement each other. This needs to be understood in New Delhi so
that the complementary relationship between these strands of separatism is
decisively destroyed, or the space for democracy, equality and nation-building
will never be created in Kashmir.
Alienation in Kashmir is because, and only
because, of the communalism ruling the roost over the minds of Kashmiri Muslims.
It must be understood, we informed the parliamentarians, that it is a complete
lie that the Indian State made and broke promises to the Muslims of Kashmir.
The truth is that the Partition of India envisaged
partition of British India and not the Princely States, and this position
was insisted upon by Jinnah and the Muslim League. Thus, when Maharaja Hari
Singh acceded to India, the Accession was full and final and unconditional,
at par with the accession by other states, and not open to any mischief or
debate.
It is true that Mr Jawaharlal Nehru did promise
to elicit the opinion of the people of Jammu & Kashmir about the Accession
following Pakistan's challenging the same by force and by diplomacy at the
United Nations, but this was subject to the basic condition that the invading
forces would be totally withdrawn from Kashmir. As that condition was never
fulfilled by Pakistan to this day, the corresponding condition cannot be executed
unilaterally by India. This is poor logic, and bad in international law.
Further, it may be recalled that the Indian
government held a plebiscite in Junagarh, Gujarat, only after the Indian Government
was fully in-charge of the area, and this same principle was to operate in
Kashmir as well.
It must also be asserted forcefully that at
the time of Accession, neither Nehru nor any other Indian leader gave any
assurances to the National Conference leaders regarding the future constitutional
structure of the State. Nor did any NC leader ask for any assurances for a
special autonomous constitutional status for the State. Article 370 was a
mistaken act of generosity on the part of the fledgling Republic, and needs
to be undone, so that all citizens of Kashmir can enjoy unfettered Fundamental
and other rights enjoyed by other Indian citizens and denied to Kashmiris
precisely because of Article 370.
Panun Kashmir categorically asserted that
no promises were made to Kashmiri Muslims by Government of India in 1952 when
the Delhi Agreement was drawn up or when the Presidential Order of 1954 was
proclaimed. There were no promises made in 1975 and no promises made afterwards.
Hence the Government of India needed to clarify its position on the poison
being fed to the populace by historical distortions of unfulfilled promises
and not succumb to pressure to base its future policy towards J&K on such
false premises.
- The author is chairman, Panun Kashmir
