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| For the information of controversial interlocutor Padgaonkar | | | RUSTAM
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Oct 27: The period between August 1953 and 1975 witnessed New Delhi and the Government of J&K working in unison. During this period, which can be legitimately described as a period of the state’s greater political and constitutional integration into India, J&K was brought under the purview of hundreds of Central laws. The jurisdiction of the Central institutions like the Supreme Court, Comptroller and Auditor-General and Election Commission was extended. The state was brought at par with other states of the Union in terms of head of the state and head of the government. Besides, the state was brought under the jurisdiction of several Central Schedules and Entries. The process of the political and constitutional integration was quite smooth, with the people of the state, including the people of Kashmir, accepting these changes cheerfully; leave aside a few disgruntled and pro-Pakistan elements here and there. They were there in the state right since 1846, when the state came into being. The attitude of the common masses was positive because they saw in these changes their genuine empowerment.
Things were quite normal in Kashmir, but, then, suddenly the political establishment in New Delhi sprang a big surprise and reached an agreement with the same Sheikh Abdullah who it had got arrested in 1953 on the charge of sedition. The agreement resulted in the collapse the Congress government and transfer of the state power to the Sheikh. That a national party would abdicate power in favour of the controversial Sheikh Abdullah was nothing what the manifestation of the bungling instinct of New Delhi. Not just this, the political establishment empowered the otherwise deflated Sheikh to review the Central laws and recommend withdrawal of those Central laws he deemed harmful to the state’s special status and the so-called Kashmir’s distinct identity. The ungrateful Sheikh did set up a high-powered committee for the purpose. The committee members were vertically divided into two groups, the chairman of the committee holding a different view and others an altogether a different view. The Sheikh went by the recommendations as contained in the report submitted by the chairman, who also happened to be the Deputy Chief Minister. This exposed the Sheikh’s duplicity in the sense that he was a votary of greater autonomy, bordering on virtual sovereignty.
The most significant aspect was that the Sheikh, instead of seeking withdrawal of any of the Central laws from the state, brought the state under the ambit of more Central laws. His son Farooq Abdullah, who succeeded him, did the same. He also brought the state under the purview of more Central laws, including POTA.
In between, the Indian political establishment not only withdrew support to the Sheikh Abdullah-led government leading to fresh assembly elections in 1977 and dismissed the government of Farooq Abdullah. New Delhi took these steps in order to rein in the Sheikh and his son, who had adopted threatening postures. New Delhi had, it may be recalled, described both the Sheikh and his son as a threat to national security. It should also be noted that between 1977 and 1999, the state remained under the Governor’s rule at least thrice. Everything was done to bring things under control and neutralize the influence of the NC, which had become thoroughly unpopular because of its misdeeds. The NC leadership had proved by its words and actions that its bottom-line is secession and that it believed in double-speak. It wanted to enjoy the loaves and fishes of office and at the same time it held the people of Kashmir aloof by spewing venom on New Delhi and playing with their religious sensitivities. Such was the nature of their lust for power and pelf that they rigged wholesale the 1987 assembly elections – a fact that is too well-known.
So much so, the failed and unpopular Farooq Abdullah once urged the Kashmiri youth to go to Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir to undergo arms training. The fact of the matter is that he and others of his ilk did all that they could to vitiate the atmosphere in Kashmir giving a religious orientation to everything. They did all this to divert the people’s attentions away from the real issues in order to remain in the center-stage, with the gullible and innocent people of Kashmir walking into their trap and, instead of taking on the real culprits, directed their ire against New Delhi.
Kashmir entered a violent phase in the real sense of the term in 1987 after it witnessed wholesale rigging, with New Delhi and Election Commission of India not taking any cognizance of the subversion and murder of democracy. The situation became so volatile that Farooq Abdullah resigned in January 1990. Thereafter, the state remained under Governor’s/President’s rule for more than six years. The early January 1990 witnessed in Kashmir a dance of death and destruction and communal violence on an unprecedented scale, with the miniscule minority of Kashmiri Hindus quitting their homes and hearths and becoming refugees in their own motherland. Ever since then, Kashmiri leaders of all shades of opinion have been demanding separation from India. Their bottom-line has been secession. They have been preaching two-nation theory and painting the Indian nation black and barbarous in their desperate bid to hide their own failures and misdeeds.
In between, Dr Farooq Abdullah again formed the government in the state in October 1996. It was expected that he would fail to deliver and become unpopular because of his style of functioning and it actually happened. He tried to divert the attention of the angry people away from his own misdeeds and appointed an autonomy committee. The autonomy committee came out with a report in April 1999. It recommended wholesale withdrawal of the Central laws and semi-independence for the state overlooking the fact that the people of Jammu and Ladakh and displaced Kashmiri Hindus, who constitute nearly half of the state’s population and occupy nearly 89 per cent of the state’s land area were vehemently opposed to what the autonomy committee advocated. It needs to be underlined that the non-Muslims in the state constitute almost half of the state’s population. There number is approximately 4.5 million.
The autonomy committee report suppressed more than what it revealed. The members of the autonomy committee tried to mislead the Indian nation and New Delhi by suppressing certain hard facts. For example, it didn’t mention in their lengthy report the 1975 Indira-Sheikh Abdullah accord under which the Sheikh had become the Chief Minister. It also didn’t refer to the appointment of committee during the regime of Sheikh Abdullah that had submitted two contradictory reports on the Central laws, which were extended after August 1953. Nor did the members of the autonomy committee refer to the attitude of Sheikh Abdullah to those two reports. Not only this, the members of the autonomy committee also did not refer to those Central laws that had been introduced in the state during the NC-led successive governments in the state. On the contrary, the autonomy committee report accused New Delhi of eroding the internal autonomy of the state by bringing the state under the purview of the Central laws. In other words, the members of the autonomy committee brought a report based on falsehood. It was designed to hoodwink the Indian nation and the Government of India and make it grant concessions leading up to the establishment of a local oligarchy in the state. (To be continued) |
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