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| Pakistan fighting for water, not Kashmiri Muslims | | | RUSTAM
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, May 12: Islamabad consistently says that it would continue to extend political, moral and diplomatic support to the Kashmiri Muslims who have been carrying on "freedom struggle" since 1947. It also consistently says that it would accept only that solution to the Kashmir problem that is acceptable to the Muslims of the Valley. In other words, Islamabad has been consistently seeking to convey an impression that it is a well-wisher of Kashmiri Muslims and that its ultimate objective is to obtain for them a political system that is of them, by them and for them. But the fact is that Islamabad is not committed to what it has been saying.
Actually, Islamabad is interested in the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab waters and not in the people of Kashmir. Its very survival depends on the state waters. Islamabad's real objective is to grab all the three rivers - Indus, Jhelum and Chenab - in order to meet its own needs, as also to pacify the people of Sindh, North West Frontier Province and Baluchistan, who are up in arms against the Punjabis saying they have established their monopoly over the water Pakistan has been getting from India since 1960 under the Indus Water Treaty. The water issue is very important for the people of Sindh, Baluchistan and North West Frontier province.
The Punjabi-dominated Pakistani establishment and Army know it and that's the reason the Pakistani government set up commissions from time to time to resolve water disputes, but with no result. Two such commissions were the Akhtar Hussein Commission (1968) and the Fazle Akbar Commission (1970). In 1991, an accord was also negotiated, called the Indus Water Apportionment Accords. The Chief Ministers of Punjab, Sindh, Baluchistan ad North West Frontier Province signed it on March 16, 1991 at Karachi at the behest of Nawaz Sharif's Islamic Democratic Alliance, which was in majority in all four provinces. The Chief Minister of Sindh, Baluchistan and North West Frontier Province signed the accord much against their wishes as it was biased in favour of Punjab.
As per the accord, Punjab was to get 55.95 MAF, Sindh 48.76 MAF, North West Frontier Province 5.78 MAF and Baluchistan 3.87 MAF out of a total of the estimated 114.35 MAF. This accord virtually collapsed in 1994, when the people of Sindh, Baluchistan and North West Frontier Province suffered owing to the non-availability of adequate water. Ever since then, struggle has been going on in these provinces over the water issue. It is to surmount this problem that Islamabad has been focusing its attention more on the Jammu and Kashmir waters. It has been consistently accusing New Delhi of violating the Indus water Treaty and putting pressure on it so that it gets water to the extent it wants. Ironically, neither the Kashmiri leaders not the Kashmir-based media have highlighted this issue. Instead, they have been overtly and covertly supporting Islamabad ignoring its real intentions.
Interestingly, the gullible and emotional Kashmiri Muslims have, it seems, walked into the Pakistani trap overlooking the miserable plight of their co-religionists in the Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. No Kashmiri leader has at any point of time during all these 63 years of Pakistan's illegal occupation of the Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir and strategic Gilgit-Baltistan region educated the Muslims of Kashmir about the pathetic situation in which their co-religionists have been leading their life. Significantly, the Kashmir-based media, which otherwise comments on each and every issue concerning Kashmir and the life of the Valley Muslims, too, has seldom reflected on the miserable plight of the Muslims inhabiting Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.
It appears the Kashmiri leaders and the Kashmir-based media persons have been deliberately keeping the Muslims of Kashmir in the dark about the state of affairs as it prevails in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. Had the Kashmiri leaders and the Kashmir-based media informed the Kashmiri Muslims about the prevailing situation in these occupied areas, the Kashmiri Muslims would have come on the roads to protest against those who have been demanding merger of Kashmir into Pakistan or who have been recommending India-Pakistan joint-management mechanism as a viable solution to the Kashmir problem. The Kashmiri Muslims would have certainly isolated Geelanis and Andrabis who have been preparing the ground for the Kashmir's merger with Pakistan ever since the state's accession to India in October 1947. (To be continued)
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