|
After having
completed the Gujarat experiment successfully, the saffron communal brigade has
set it eyes upon Kashmir. Unsatisfied with what the Indian occupation forces are
already doing, the brigade wants to carry on its own version of the dance of
death and destruction in Kashmir. A fortnight ago, the godmother of the Hindu
communalist forces, the RSS, declared that it wants Kashmir divided into three
States on religious lines. It has demanded a separate Jammu State to be carved
out of the State of Jammu and Kashmir and to declare it as belonging to the
Hindus. A few days after this announcement the VHP President Ashok Singhal
declared that from the State of Jammu, all the Muslim population will have to
leave to make Jammu an entirely Hindu state. This open statement for creating a
state based on religion echoes the RSS agenda to make the whole of India a Hindu
Rashtra where nobody belonging to any other religion will be allowed to live and
practise one’s own religion. In Gujarat they demanded Muslim men to cut their
beards and asked the women to shun their traditional dress of Kameez Shalwar,
and Burqa and follow the Hindu cultural way of life. In Jammu, they demand that
the Muslims leave the "state" altogether. The utterings are ominous,
as they have come out of the mouths of holy saffron-saints who are out to
destroy every opponent, like Hitler.
The RSS declaration
that Jammu be made a Hindu state is not new. A few years back it launched the
Jammu and Kashmir National Front (JKNF) to demand the division of Kashmir on
communal lines in the name of safeguarding the interests of the Hindus. What is
new, is the ongoing state of readiness for war between India and Pakistan and
the increased international interest and pressure on both the countries to
‘solve’ the Kashmir problem. The RSS demand has given a new lease to the 50-year
old debate around the Dixon Plan, which is occasionally referred to whenever a
solution to the Kashmir problem is talked about. More than a year back the
Hurriyet Conference leader, Ali Shah Geelani, had stated to the press that the
Hurriyet was ready to accept any solution to the conflict "even if it means
division of the State." Seeing the dangerous repercussions of this thinking,
he later withdrew his statement.
Nevertheless, the
Dixon Plan continues to haunt those who don’t see a democratic solution to the
problem and time again fall back on the solution of the problem through communal
divide of the land which has its roots in the partition of India, based on the
Two Nation theory, which takes Hindus and Muslims as two distinct nations. The
phantom unleashed by the British colonialists’ on the sub-continent continues to
take a heavy toll of the common man in the form of Gujarats and mini Gujarats.
Whether the recent
demand of the RSS on Jammu directly flows out of the Dixon Plan is difficult to
affirm, as it vehemently advocates, "taking back" that part of Kashmir,
which is under the control of the government of Pakistan. But this is an
undeniable truth that the RSS and its vitriolic progeny want the whole of the
socio-political environment of the country and the sub-continent dangerously
vitiated through blown up communal feelings and carnages. Even if the
international pressure makes the two countries come to an agreement, it will
definitely have a dark shadow of the Dixon over it if not entirely a replay of
the Plan itself. It is difficult to entirely rule out a calculation on the part
of the RSS to not anticipate such a move in the long run. And as part of such a
calculation, to wrest control of the whole of the Jammu region, whose three
districts have a near majority of Muslim inhabitants, well in advance. It may
also be a part of the general communal agenda of the RSS. Both ways, it is time
that the conspiracy to enact another holocaust, which definitely will be on a
much greater scale than the Gujarat one, is exposed and measures taken in
advance to thwart it. We cannot expect a right solution to the Kashmir problem
given the reactionary and pro-imperialist character of both the neighbouring
states and because the forces that are active on the scene are led by the number
one enemy of the world people, the US imperialists, who brokered the deadly
"peace" agreement between the PLO and the Zionist State of Israel.
The Dixon Plan
In 1950, when the
Kashmir issue was hot on the agenda of the UN, Sir Owen Dixon, an eminent jurist
from Australia, was appointed by the Security Council as the UN Representative
on Kashmir. From July 20 to 24, he held a conference of the Prime ministers of
India and Pakistan, J Nehru and Liyakat Ali Khan, and formulated three plans for
placing the entire State of Jammu and Kashmir under one administration. The
single administration would alternatively be composed of a coalition of an
Indian-sponsored regime, the "Azad Kashmir Movement" and of "trusted persons
outside politics" or of the United Nations representatives. As a second step,
demilitarisation of Kashmir would begin on both sides of the ceasefire line. And
as a third step, a plebiscite would be held to decide whether Kashmir would join
India or Pakistan. Initially, both the parties agreed and then backed out on one
pretext or the other.
He also suggested to
the Security Council that Kashmir be divided on religious lines making the river
Chenab as the boundary line, with the northern part of the river going to
Pakistan and the southern part going to India. This automatically accedes the
Muslim part to Pakistan with the Hindu part staying in India. The third option,
he suggested, could be the Muslim region going to Pakistan, Jammu region to
India and a plebiscite held in the valley only to decide its fate. In this way,
the ‘unfinished agenda of 1947’ was to be completed through the communal
partition of Kashmir.
According to British
Foreign Office files, declassified recently, the partition of Kashmir was again
discussed by the United States and Britain after India’s China War to urge India
and Pakistan to search for a partition solution. This was in the mid-60s. While
the United States supported the creation of an independent Kashmir valley,
Britain expressed fears that Russia and China would immediately exert "communist
influence" over the new sovereign state.
At that time, the
Soviet social imperialists were also against an independent Kashmir, fearing
that the US would hold sway there and use it as a base.
In between, India and
Pakistan fought two more wars in 1965 and 1971. Then a long winter ensued in
India-Pakistan relations after the Simla Agreement between Z Bhutto and Indira
Gandhi. The Simla Accord failed to solve the Kashmir problem and only made the
ceasefire line as a Line of Control.
After the emergence
of the Kashmir freedom struggle in the late eighties, the Indian armed forces
let loose a reign of terror, illegal liquidation of guerrilla forces, their
sympathisers and the common Muslim people. An iron hot summer set in, in the
mutual relations of both the neighbours, each accusing the other of violating
human rights and cross-border terrorism. In the meantime, Nawaz and Gujral, and
then Nawaz and Vajpayee met many times at international gatherings, discussing
Kashmir and coming to the conclusion that neither of the two could wrest the
whole of Kashmir through force of arms. They decided to arrive at a negotiated
settlement that might base on the Israeli-Palestinian Oslo model of
negotiations.
When the Kargil
episode was heading towards a flashpoint Nawaz and Vajpayee opened a secret
channel that later got exposed as the Niaz Naik Affair. A rediff.com journalist
recentry interviewwd Niaz Naik and brought out some facts of the whole affair.
The Kargil war remained a limited war between the two adversaries due to the
secret channel and pressure from the United States whose help Nawaz sought to
reign in his own military generals. At the secret channel talks, the Pakistani
representative Niaz Naik again opened up the Dixon Plan.
Their talks had
started with the following agreed note: both would move beyond the rigid
publicly-stated government positions on Kashmir. Mishra would not refer to
Kashmir as an integral part of India; Naik would
not mouth Pakistan’s demand for a plebiscite based on the 1948 UN resolution.
Naik rejected
Mishra’s suggestion that the Line of Control be converted into an international
border, as he was not there to legitimise "the status quo." Neither did he
accept an "increased autonomy within Kashmir through fairer elections"
because it was no alternative to the demand for a plebiscite. [The thing, which
again is being heard in a shrill voice now a days with elections round the
corner, in Indian occupied Kashmir.]
Naik, on his part,
offered the Owen Dixon Plan, which recommended the redrawing of regions of the
state as majority-Hindu, Buddhist or Muslim. But Mishra refused on the plea that
India could not afford to introduce the communal factor.
Finally, both
discussed the option championed by the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front: an
independent Kashmir. Both rejected the idea.
They had also
discussed the Irish and Swedish-Finnish models. In the end, Naik suggested the
Chenab River formula that makes the Chenab a boundary line between the two
neighbours to which Mishra agreed to look into in their forthcoming meetings as
neither had the required maps with him nor a breakup of the population figures
about Hindus and Muslims in the area.
Mishra still had many
more questions about Naik’s proposal, especially regarding the percentages of
the Hindu and Muslim population in the area. As having no concrete figures at
their secret parleys, where only both of them had met without any third person
knowing about it, except Nawaz and Vajpayee, both departed to meet again.
Later, Vajpayee the
RSS man, with bifurcation of J&K on his mind, told Mishra to continue the
discussion and arrive at a solution. But Naik’s visit got exposed, the limited
war happens and history sees the exit of Nawaz .
Is bifurcation the
only solution in the arsenal of reactionary bourgeois politicians? No, it is not
the only one. Even trifurcation has been suggested and discussed upon and all
the options remain open for them. Dixon said that let the Hindu part join India
and the Muslim part join Pakistan and a plebiscite be held only in the valley
area. Many others have suggested that let the valley become an independent
country if the people there wish so, with Jammu and Ladakh joining India and
Gilgit and Baltistan and some other parts remaining with Pakistan, on the same
lines is the Andorra model
The Andorra Model
Detaching all other
regions from the valley is what the Andorra Option for solution of the Kashmir
problem is being called. This model is being suggested by the Kashmir Study
Group, which is organised by a US based Kashmiri businessman. "It involves
the reconstitution of a part of Jammu and Kashmir as a sovereign entity,
in the same way as Andorra, with free access to and from for both of its larger
neighbours. The part of the state which was to be reconstituted would be
determined through an internationally supervised agreement involving the
Kashmiri people, India and Pakistan."
It calls for a porous
demilitarised zone with the potential for both sides to exercise a limited
measure of control over the entire Kashmir region. Andorra, a tiny state lying
between France and Spain has from itself carved out chunks by France and Spain
and then left on the map as a non-entity in Europe. The Andorra Model also calls
for a division (trifurcation) of the state when reconstituting a
part of it.
How the history will
treat the Kashmir question remains to be seen but many an ominous signs looms
large.
While India has
always tried to keep the question of the Jammu region and that of the Buddhist
Leh area in Ladakh alive in its armoury by declaring no to "internal
democratisation" (meaning more regional autonomy for these areas as being
demanded by Abdullah’s National Conference premising on the theses that J&K is
an inalienable part of India) of the IoK so that some day the state on this side
of the line of control is divided into three parts, the same is being done on
the other side of the Line. Pakistan has declared, Baltistan and Gilgit, the
northern-most areas of the pre-47 Jammu and Kashmir State as a separate province
of Pakistan flouting the historical legitimacy of the "disputed land." In India,
we see the Indian state encouraging Buddhists living in Ladakh to demand Union
Territory status. The RSS wants Jammu to be declared a separate province of the
Indian Union, and Panun Kashmiris (the displaced Kashmiri Pandits) are demanding
an area in the Chenab Valley as another Union Territory for their
rehabilitation. All this, accompanied with the talk of completing the unfinished
agenda of the 1947 partition, is debilitating and overshadowing the national
question of Kashmir. Regional, sub-national and religious issues are only being
taken up to thwart the right to self-determination issue and not out of some
serious concern. These questions remain to be addressed to, but in the overall
context of the right to self-determination and not in contravention to it. With
Gilgit, Baltistan, Jammu and Ladakh gone or not-negotiable, what remains behind
of the original legal State of Jammu and Kashmir except the valley? What is it,
if not a caricature of any plebiscite (the will of the people) or the right to
self-determination or independence?
Kashmir has been put
on a platter on the dining table, to be sliced and gobbled up by various vested
political interests. Central to all this is the reactionary approach of
addressing the question on exclusively religious lines in the argumentative
realm. The finishing of the unfinished agenda of Nineteen Forty-seven by
communalist approach of the neighbours is playing havoc with the life and land
of this "paradise of earth." And, the latest dangerous development on this score
has happened in the person of the demand by RSS fascists. They are preparing the
ground for a major holocaust on the scale of 1947, that may pale Gujarat. The
threat to the lakhs of Muslims residing in the Jammu region to leave, is a step
toward this direction, a call to the Hindu population to call up the communal
Jinn and transform themselves into beasts as has been witnessed in Gujarat.
There are sane voices
on both sides of the LoC calling for a right solution of the problem. Many
independent people, journalists, intellectuals, activists and commoners are
against the usurpation of their land by others. People on both sides of the LoC
oppose any such solution that calls for bifurcation, trifurcation or any other
furcation of the Land of Kashmir in the name of bringing peace, and stand for a
separate, independent, democratic country. This solution is being scornfully
rejected by the powers that be and the vested interests, but this is the only
and most feasible solution for Kashmir that does not call for its division on
communal lines and can save Kashmir and the larger parts of India from the
prospects of a communal holocaust. It is time, as it is never too late for a
right initiative, to take up cudgels and stand on guard and take on the rising
tide of the communalist, anti-Kashmir, and anti-people forces. There is no other
way out, no other alternative and no other correct solution.
|
