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| Advani right when he holds Nehru responsible for K problem | | Contempt For Jammu | | Rustam
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, June 28: If the role played by Nehru created problems for India in Jammu and Kashmir, the role played by his daughter Indira Gandhi was no better. In fact, she committed several blunders. She committed an unpardonable in 1971, when the chivalrous Indian Army inflicted a crushing defeat on Pakistan. This was perhaps the first victory of India in the real sense of the term. The nature of the victory could be determined from the facts that Bangladesh emerged out of Pakistan as a sovereign state and over 90,000 Pakistani soldiers, including generals, surrendered before the victorious Indian Army. She could have solved the Kashmir issue once and for all, but she squandered the opportunity at Shimla in 1972 with the defeated Zulfikar Ali Bhutto inflicting a humiliating defeat on Indira Gandhi at the negotiating table. In other words, she converted the splendid victory of the Army on the battlefield into a humiliating diplomatic defeat at the negotiating table. She not only released the prisoners of war but she also made Pakistan a party to the "Kashmir dispute." Hitherto, India used to call Pakistan an aggressor.
Indira Gandhi committed two more blunders in 1947-1975. In 1974, she entered into an accord with the "deflated" Sheikh Abdullah, a votary of plebiscite and an independent Kashmir. She entered into an accord ignoring the fact that her father had not only removed Sheikh Abdullah from the office of Prime Minister on August 9, 1953 but had also got him arrested the same day to save Kashmir for India. Sheikh Abdullah remained behind the bars for years. Nehru had taken these extreme steps on the ground that Sheikh Abdullah had been hobnobbing with the United States and some other Western countries and conspiring against India to accomplish his goal: Establishment of independent Kashmir. Nehru defended the action saying action was needed in the "national interest."
Not content with all this, Indira Gandhi handed over the state power to Sheikh Abdullah in February 1975. Hers' was a mind-boggling decision in the sense that she ordered the Congress-led government in the state to abdicate state power in favour of Sheikh Abdullah, who at that time headed the Plebiscite Front and was neither a member of the legislative assembly nor a member of the legislative council. Indira Gandhi took this decision much against the wishes of the local Congress leadership. Besides, she defended the transfer of power to the votary of autonomy, bordering on virtual sovereignty, saying she took the decision in the "larger national interest." (Sonia Gandhi, too, had handed over the state power to the PDP in 2002 in what she had called the "national interest" overlooking the fact that the number of Congress MLAs was more as compared to the PDP, votary of self-rule or votary of quasi-independence. She also appointed Omar Abdullah as Chief Minister in January 2009 in the "national interest.") Besides, Indira Gandhi, like Nehru, had no regard whatever for the people of Jammu province and Ladakhis.
Hence, what Advani wrote the other day about Nehru and Indira Gandhi needs to be viewed in the context of the blunders they committed from time to time, thus creating what is termed as "Kashmir problem." However, to write all is not to suggest that the attitude of the BJP towards Kashmir and Pakistan is different from that of the Congress. It is not different. When the BJP was in power at the centre, it had also sought to compromise the Indian position in the state. So much so that it had agreed to divide the state on communal lines, grant "maximum possible autonomy to Kashmir and its adjoining areas" and render the borders irrelevant. It needs to be noted that BJP says one thing when out of power and acts differently when in power. The fact of the matter is that the Congress and the BJP are the two sides of one and the same coin. (Concluded) |
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