Towards the end of yet another playful inning vis-Ã -vis the CBM series, India seems crawling back to the pavilion. As the history stands witness, there is nothing astonishing for such a posture of New Delhi. It has been doing so ever since the United Nations gave a pragmatic verdict on the Kashmir Issue. Not once but more than a dozen times. And that too, with one-voice. The decree was for holding of a free, fair and impartial plebiscite in the Himalayan State of Jammu & Kashmir–”under the aegis of the world body. At the outset, India accepted it. Yet, with the passage of time, started backing out from its commitments.
This Machiavellian course was, initially set off by the signatory to the accord–”the then Indian Prime Minister Pundit JL Nehru. And was ‘pursued’ by his successors with awful egoism, irrespective of their party links or leanings. At times, the Indian leadership came out with ‘consent for the solution’ of the Kashmir issue and just within days, it took an abrupt head-over-heels. Phrased in other words, a somersault. Of such a hoax, the newest gambit by India is the charge of ‘violation’ of the cease-fire along Line of Control (LoC) by Pakistan. It’s totally baseless.
As a matter of fact, this allegation was inflicted, within a couple of days after President Pervez Musharraf told a delegation of Kashmiri leaders–”a truth. As media reports say; the President hinted that there would be no more confidence-building-measures [CBMs] with India until the Muzaffarabad-Srinagar bus service begins. Overtly, such a realistic avowal made New Delhi rulers upset, as their (Indians) fraudulent designs stood exposed to the world, disseminating the factuality that whatever India has been saying on the subject was nothing more than a subterfuge.
The resumption of this bus service would allow Kashmiris to move across the LoC without a passport or visa. But India wouldn’t ‘like’ to set such a course in motion –” least uptight to allow the divided innocent families intermingle, even on humanitarian grounds. This, therefore means that India is not in a mood to solve the Kashmir dispute through amity or dialogue and instead wants to keep its illegal and illegitimate and illicit occupation of a part of the State, at gunpoint.
But, with hope and optimism, as we move in the direction of CBMs, it is only helpful that we quietly clear the cobwebs that are a legacy of the past. The rut is the myth about the Line of Control. Pragmatically, this line has no political import or status whatsoever, with no validity or relevance to any future dispensation.
As was pointed out by us earlier, amidst a clear-cut message, beamed by the President of Pakistan with a focus on realism that there can’t be any relationship with India on any facet sans the settlement of the core issue of Kashmir [which made New Delhi ‘disturb’ as a truthful voice once again emerged literally devastating the deceiving mentality of the Indian headship], a need for India to bend before the Atlas voice for peace in South Asia has become all the more essential.
Nonetheless, if there is agreement on the basics of a solution to the Kashmir dispute, progress in search of a final settlement would be smooth and steady, if not exactly swift. In fact, any insistence on haste would be manifestly imprudent. Amid this perception India must bring a serious commitment to bear on the negotiations.
Although we cannot presume at this moment what exactly the solution would be, yet we do know that only a fair solution, in line with the UN resolutions and the aspirations of the Kashmiris will be sustainable. As an immediate step, initiating the Muzaffarabad-Srinagar bus service as well as the sincere support of all parties concerned is must.
In this context, of all concerned are, first and foremost, the people of the State of Jammu and Kashmir. What all the parties concerned can agree upon straightaway is that whatever the solution, it has to be one that is seen by all concerned as just, fair and equitable to all. And when placed in the parameters of the principles set out above, the Line of Control ceases to have any relevance whatsoever. It has not been drawn by the Kashmiri people.
Virtually, both Pakistan and India have, in so many ways, expressed inability to maintain the inviolability of the Line of Control. India stands self-confessed as unable even to mount an effective guard on this so-called Line, though it has almost 800,000-plus fully armed troops deployed in IHK.
Once we settle down to talk earnestly about a future solution of the core dispute–”Kashmir, the Line of Control would simply fade out of all reckoning. That would be the moment to address surpassingly delicate and sensitive issues, intertwined with which is the peace of almost a billion and a half populace in this subcontinent, South Asia. In fact, the Line of Control is no line; it controls nothing of significance or substance.
Not only that a resolution –” still preserved in the top index of the UN makes it crystal clear that no bar–”whatsoever can be imposed on Kashmiris’ mobility, as they were compelled by the India-backed ruthless and tyrannical Dogra ruler Hari Singh to leave their ancestral abode in 1947 and in a few follow-up years, eventually taking refuge in Pakistan.
The salient ‘Cease-fire Line Tor Do’ (break the cease-fire line) movement by the apex Kashmiri Leader, late Ch Ghulam Abbas in 1958 (in Sikandar Mirza’s regime) is still known to all the worldover, which literally jolted the corridors of power in New Delhi as India have had no bona fide way to stop it, specifically in view of the already aired global voice from the UN podium.
The only and best course left for India is to bow before the ground realities by eschewing its typical rhetoric like the so-called ‘integral part’ as such a polluted mindset of New Delhi has not only been rejected by Pakistan time and again but simultaneously has been endorsed by every sagacious nation the worldover.
Above all such vicious alleges of India have no significance before the focal party the Kashmiris, who have never accepted a Line in any silhouette may it be a Cease-fire Line or a Line of Control. They are right in their outlook as the UN commitments on Kashmir fully endorse this veracity as clear as the coherent and translucent as the waters of River Jhelum with a basis of flickering helix-like Spring of Vaeri Nag, flanking the eye-catching and charismatic Srinagar. Hence, they [Kashmiris] cannot be kept away from each other any more.
To have a mode of interaction in meaningful way is their birth right. Thus India would be inviting new problems for itself by obstructing the interaction between the people of the Jammu and Kashmir State any more. Simultaneously, Kashmiris determination shall have to be accepted as an image of their mood as an exact truth as their kick against the Indian belligerence will continue to swell till the time the despotic manacles are splintered for all times to come.
If India persists with its arrogance, every facet, if at all has been achieved so far through CBMs shall get eroded, taking the overall scenario back to the pavilion!
