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| People of Jammu want Karan Singh to play the role of saviour | | |
MINCING NO WORDS
NEHA
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Mar 28: Congress veteran and former Union Minister Karan Singh never makes loose statements. Whenever he talks, he talks sense. He is one person from the state who is close to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and AICC president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi. He keeps company with them. Since he stays mostly in Delhi, he knows what is happening there and who is thinking what about Jammu and Kashmir, his own state. He is also one person who had as early as more than three decades ago suggested the merger of Jammu province with Himachal Pradesh. It is obvious that he had put forth this suggestion after taking into consideration the fact that the people of Jammu province had not got their due share in the state’s political and economic processes. In other words, he was of the view that the Kashmiri leadership had all through denied justice to the people of Jammu province. The fact is that Karan Singh had on a number of occasions in the past suggested that the solution of the “Kashmir problem” has to be such that also meets the needs and urges of the people of Jammu and Ladakh. He has always expressed the view that the state consists of three distinct regions and that this fact just cannot be ignored.
However, what he said yesterday in Jammu disappointed the people of the province, as they had been expecting an intervention of Karan Singh in the affairs of the state so that their case was represented at right quarters and they got not just justice, but also a dispensation that brings them closer to New Delhi. What did he say? He said: “People of the State (should) give careful consideration to forthcoming report by the Interlocutors before coming out with any reaction whatsoever...Although I am not aware of contents of the report but initiative by the Interlocutors deserves serious attention of everyone as it was after a long time that a hope has emerged about some kind of solution to the vexed issues faced by the people of the State…Many commissions were set-up in the past but none came out with any solution. Now, there is a possibility that report of the Interlocutors would reflect a solution.”
It appears that Karan Singh doesn’t know anything about the views of the interlocutors. The interlocutors have on several occasions more than one aired controversial views and put forth suggestions, including highly unsettling suggestions that Azadi/pre-1953 constitutional status for the state could be considered. The people of Jammu province, as also the people of Ladakh are vehemently opposed to these suggestions, as they believe, and very rightly, that acceptance of such suggestions would not only accord legitimacy to the politics of separatism, based on religious fanaticism and ultimately lead to the separation of the state from India, but would also enable the Kashmiri leadership to enslave the people of Jammu and Ladakh.
The people of Jammu and the people of Ladakh want Karan Singh to oppose such suggestions tooth and nail and not support them. But there are reasons to believe that good sense would ultimately prevail and he would ask the powers-that-be in New Delhi not to do anything that has the potential of provoking widespread protests in the Jammu and Ladakh. He belongs to Jammu and he is aware of the Jammu sentiment. That he is fully aware of what the people of Jammu and Ladakh stand could be seen from the fact that he had quit the position of chairman of the state autonomy committee respecting the same sentiment. It may be recalled that his appointment as chairman of the state autonomy committee had had shocked the people of Jammu province.
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