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| Any surrender before blackmail of hooligans will set bad precedents | | | Early Times Special Correspondent
Jammu | June 27
News Analysis
The National Conference President, Omer Abdullah and the PDP leader, Muzaffar Hussain Baig, who is Deputy Chief Minister in Azad led coalition government, after meeting the new State Governor, N N Vohra, who is also the Ex Officio Chairman of Shri Amarnath Shrine Board, have sought to convey the impression that Mr. Vohra, as Chairman of the SASB may himself surrender the 800 kanals of land to the government, which has been a bone of contention, leading to communal unrest and violence in Kashmir, in order to defuse the present volcanic situation developed in the valley. Any such action on the part of the state Governor and Chairman of SASB will be construed as an abject surrender before hooliganism, violence and communal passions roused by some Islamic fundamentalists and secessionists in Kashmir, with their equal fallout in reverse in Jammu.
Any surrender before the blackmail and dictates of anti national elements, whose ultimate objective has been to create theocratic Islamic state of Kashmir as a sovereign country or to merge with Islamic state of Pakistan, will only provide boost and encouragement to their movement for secession from India. They will not stop at it and raise further demands, keeping the administration and the people at large in the state at ransom, by creating more communal frenzy, to achieve their ultimate objective, as a one go or step by step. Any such solution to defuse the prevailing situation of unrest, religious divide and hatred, will be a remedy worse than the disease.
Similarly, any surrender before the blackmail of a coalition partner in the state government the PDP, who is motivated by vote bank politics in joining the bandwagon of the secessionists and Islamic fundamentalists, holding threats of pulling out from the Congress led coalition government in the state, with a view to keep the coalition intact, and similarly surrender before the opposition National Conference, equally guided by vote bank politics, in supporting the Kashmir secessionists and Islamic fundamentalists, will be morally wrong, setting in motion wrong precedents with dangerous portents for the future. Moreover any retracing of the step taken by the out gone state Governor and Chairman SASB, in all the good faith to promote Hindu pilgrimage in overwhelming Muslim majority Kashmir, as a means to strengthen traditional communal brotherhood as well as boost the economy of the state, with Kashmiri Muslims being the main beneficiaries, will apply the seal of conformation about all sorts of charges leveled against him by the Kashmiri secessionists and religious fundamentalists, who have launched a vicious campaign against Gen. S K Sinha dubbing him as a Hindu fundamentalist. The successor to an high constitutional position has some moral responsibility towards his predecessor, to not let him down in any way.
N N Vohra, in his capacity as the Chairman of a Hindu religious body, duly constituted by an act of state legislature, with an avowed objective of regulating, managing and promoting the Hindu pilgrimage, has the primary responsibility towards the promotion of the pilgrimage. In case of any surrender by him under some political compulsion before the elements intrinsically hostile to the pilgrimage, N N Vohra will lose the moral right to head the autonomous institution. By doing so, he may win the goodwill and even temporary applause of the elements, who are opposing the promotion of Hindu yatra in Kashmir, under one pretext or the other. This may stand him in good stead to build a rapport with the anti India elements, secessionists and Islamic fundamentalists in Kashmir as well as with the political organizations who have upped their ante at present against the pilgrimage. But in the process besides losing the goodwill and sympathy of the nationalists in general and Hindus in the state as well as in the country as a whole, in particular, Mr. Vohra will be setting a bad precedent. The same will be neither in the interest of permanent or long run communal harmony in the state nor in the interest of India's cause in Kashmir, which as a governor of the state, representative of the President of India, Mr. Vohra is assigned to discharge.
Whether a constitutional head of the state and even the Chief Minister should head religious institutions, of any religious community in a secular state and whether their working in these capacities does not violate the spirit of secularism is a question which needs be given thorough and dispassionate consideration in a cool and dispassionate atmosphere. |
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