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| BJP adopts tough stand, snubs interlocutors | | | NEHA
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Dec 25: The upshot of the BJP was "complete political and constitutional integration of J&K into India and abrogation of Article 370." In other words, it said that complete political and constitutional integration of J&K into India is not possible so long as Article 370 remains part of the Indian Constitution. The BJP was absolutely right.
Article 370 has indeed caused more harm. It has acted as a high wall between the state and the rest of the country and it has been holding the state aloof from the national mainstream. In fact, it has made invidious and unjust distinctions between the state and other states of the Union. For example, under this Article, the state enjoys absolute legislative powers; it exercises residuary powers; it has the right to have a separate constitution and a separate flag; no Central law is automatically applicable to the state as is the case with other states of the Union; central laws can be extended to the state only if the state government gives its concurrence or the state legislature agrees; it has undermined the cardinal principles of accountability and transparency; it has conferred on the state a status that impinges upon the fundamental rights of the people; it has accorded respectability to the politics of communalism and separatism and given legitimacy to the two-nation theory; it has enabled the vested interests in the state to propagate falsehood and influence the opinion of gullible people of Kashmir that removal of Article 370 from the Indian statute book would enable other Indians to buy immovable property in the state and obtain jobs under the J&K government, which is not true; Article 370 has only empowered the Kashmiri leadership to perpetrate injustice after injustice on and exploit to the hilt Jammu and Ladakh, press and persecute the non-Muslim minorities in the state and manipulate everything in favour of Kashmir and the people of Kashmir belonging to a one particular religious sect; and it is this Article that has weakened the Indian position in the eyes of the international community or helped the Kashmiri separatists and Pakistan to convey an impression across the globe that J&K is a disputed territory or its political future has yet to be decided by taking into consideration the will of the people (read Kashmiris belonging to one particular religious sect).
Not just this, Article 370 has been misused and exploited by the Kashmiri leaders and their henchmen in Jammu to deprive the refugees from West Pakistan of their citizenship rights; it has worked against the refugees from Pakistan occupied Jammu and Kashmir; it has denied the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes those special rights and privileges that are available to the similar underprivileged social groups in other parts of the country; and it has prevented the big business houses in the country to invest in the state, thus creating an environment that only accentuates unemployment problem, particularly in the Jammu province where the rate of unemployment is as high as over 69 per cent. The fact of the matter is that Article 370 has only created problems for the common people and furthered the cause of the Kashmiri separatists and their mentor Pakistan and enabled the Kashmiri leadership to destroy Jammu and Ladakh politically, culturally, socially and economically.
The demand of the BJP that Article 370 should be abrogated and the state be integrated fully into India needs to be viewed in this context. The BJP demand is well-founded and it needs to be supported by one and all. However, the question to be asked is: Will the BJP stick to what it said on Thursday, as also on Friday? The question needs to be asked for at least two reasons. One is that the BJP had forgotten Article 370 when it ruled the country from 1998 to 2004. The other is that the BJP veteran and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had declared in Tangmarg, Kashmir, that Article 370 shall ever remain part of the Indian Constitution. (Concluded) |
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