news details |
|
|
| What is common between Arunadhati Roy and Syed Geelani | | | Yash Bhasin | 10/28/2010 10:31:06 PM |
| There is hardly anything common between the booker prize winner Arunadhati Roy and hawkish Kashmiri separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani other than their common hatred for India’s unity and solidarity and their love for its disintegration. Here too while Geelani’s agenda is confined to Kashmir, that of Arunadhati Roy extends to whole of India with her support to the Moists in Bengal, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, parts of Bihar Orissa and Maharashtra as well as separatists in Nagaland, Tripura and other North East states.
Otherwise, the two stand poles apart in their outlook. While Arunadhati is ultra liberal in social outlook, crossing all barriers of permissiveness, Geelani is an extreme Islamic fundamentalist who abhors and preaches against modernity and liberal outlook of society. Arunadhati, who is lately rubbing shoulders with Islamic fundamentalists in Kashmir, pleading the cause of Geelani, Musarat Alam and Asiya Andrabi, is not unaware of the agenda of the latter to set up an Islamic state pf Kashmir, to be ruled under Shariat law, where free thinking, video and beauty parlours and even screening of movies and movement of women with veils and their working in offices and establishments with the men force is a sin and crime to be punished with inflicting of torture. In such a social and legal setup, Arunadhati and women of her ultra liberal attitude like her will be the first causality. They will be subjected to honour killing or hounded out of such a system.
Now, coming to the views expressed by Arunadhati, either at a seminar on “Azadi-The Only Way” held in New Delhi or the one in Srinagar on the subject “Wither Kashmir? Freedom or Enslavement” where she has shared the dais with and supported the viewpoint of Geelani and other separatists, her contention that Kashmir was never a part of India and that India is forcibly occupying Kashmir, besides being an act of treason is factually incorrect. Historically, Kashmir has been part of India from times immemorial as much as Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Delhi, Punjab or Himachal have been.
Referring to the period before the advent of British in India, the country was politically divided into various independent principalities and kingdoms. Yet the cultural unity bound them together and made all these independent political entities as a single whole distinct from other cultural streams. Before the advent of Islam Kashmir was an important centre of Hindu culture and religion. The evidence of this is still glaringly visible in the temple of Shankracharya in Srinagar city, Martand in Mutton and Kheer Bhawani besides other historical temples of Hindu Gods and Goddesses all over the valley. The abode of lord Shiva in high Himalayan mountains in South Kashmir, besides the ruins of monuments dating back to Mahabharata period are living specimens of Kashmir being a part of India. Despite the foreign invaders enslaving Kashmir, on several occasions, it sustained its Hindu ethos and cultural identity.
Even during the rule of Muslim kings in Kashmir and Islam taking sway over the valley it was the tolerant Sufi Islam which derived inspiration and had impact on it of Hindu rishis which dominated in Kashmir. With the British sway over India, Kashmir, which at that time, was under the overall rule of Sikh kingdom of Lahore, though later transferred to Raja Gulab Singh of Jammu, under Amritsar treaty of 1846, it continued to be overall part of British ruled India. The final authority and sovereignty wrested with the British government in India. Thus historically Kashmir has been always as much part of India as any other princely state in the country before its Independence in 1947. With the partition of India into India and Pakistan, all those princely which had not opted to join the newly created Pakistan were legally part of India, since the new government of India was the natural inheritor and heir of the British rule over the united India and Pakistan was a newly carved out nation out of it. However, with the signing of instrument of accession by the Maharaja of J&K, Hari Singh on October 26, 1947 and government of India accepting the same the next day the seal of J&K state to become a part of India was applied. The instrument of accession signed by Maharaja Hari Singh was the same which was signed by all other princely states which joined India in 1947.
The accession was unconditional and complete. There was no condition attached to it by the Maharaja, who under Indian Independence Act was the sole authority to take decision with regard to joining the state either with India or Pakistan. Nor any condition was put by lord Mountbatten who as Governor General of India accepted the accession on behalf of Indian government. The offer of rectification of the accession by the free will of the people was made later by Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru.
Piqued over wide criticism of her anti-India statements and demands of booking her and Geelani for sedition, Arunadhati says she pities the nation which stops the voice of a writer. What she has to say of all those who have pronounces death sentence to Sulman Rushdie for his book Satanic Verses and supporters of this punishment world over, which include Syed Geelani and other Kashmiri separatists, whose cause she has been pleading. She also complains that while the communal marauders are going scot-free, those pleading freedom of expression are threatened of imprisonment. What will she say about her comrades in arm whose cause she is pleading and who have hounded out over two lakh non-Muslims from Kashmir in worst ever ethnic cleansing and genocide
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
STOCK UPDATE |
|
|
 |
| BSE
Sensex |
 |
| NSE
Nifty |
|
|
| |
CRICKET UPDATE |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
