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| Regional Councils for Jammu, Ladakh | | Dilip Takes on Separatists, Their Supporters | | Neha
JAMMU, July 16: Former chief interlocutor Dilip Padgaonkar has taken on Kashmiri separatists and their supporters for using "words and phrases" in their "speeches and writings", saying these consist largely of "euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness". He has quoted from George Orwell's essay on politics and the English language to make his point and expose Kashmiri separatists and their supporters, including reporters and commentators. He has even gone to the extent of saying that they are "making lies sound truthful and murder respectable".
What provoked Padgaonkar to take on Kashmiri separatists and their supporters was an essay - "Another missed opportunity" -- on the interlocutors' report written by a Kashmiri, which appeared in a leading national daily only the other day. The author of "Another missed opportunity", who is a known India-baiter and communalist of communalists, had lambasted the interlocutors and "rubbished" their report. His argument was that the interlocutors did not take cognizance of the "azadi" sentiment in Kashmir. Yet another argument of his was that the interlocutors did not appreciate the demands seeking restoration of pre-1953 political status. The essay "Another missed opportunity" also criticized the interlocutors for not recognizing the "fundamentals about Kashmir", "the basic reason for the political dispute" and "the fundamental political issue", as also for recommending Regional Councils for Jammu and Ladakh and upholding the 1994 Parliamentary resolution on Jammu & Kashmir. The upshot of the Kashmiri critic's critique was that the interlocutors have not recommended independence for the "disputed" Jammu & Kashmir from India.
Padgaonkar has defended himself and his two former colleagues and the report on Jammu & Kashmir and said what they have recommended is something that has the potential of resolving the issues facing different people inhabiting different regions of the State. He has said the interlocutors did recognize that there were issues which needed to be addressed, and that precisely was the reason that they suggested the setting up of a Constitutional committee charged with the responsibility of sorting out all the issues on a permanent basis. The BJP and several other organizations have opposed this suggestion, saying it is fraught with dangerous ramifications, as it has the potential of reversing the process of integration with India. Their opposition is genuine. The interlocutors have put forth suggestions which, if accepted, would surely accord legitimacy to the politics of separatism, based on fanaticism, and undo all that the nation has done in the State during the past 65 years.
However, the interlocutors do deserve some credit because they did recognize the aspirations and needs of the people of Jammu Pradesh and Ladakh and recommended Regional Councils for the State's different regions. It is a different story that the politically conscious people of Jammu and Ladakh have rejected this suggestion, saying the creation of Regional Councils within an autonomous Jammu & Kashmir would mean nothing for them; the proposed Regional Council, if established, would be a meaningless sham. They want a dispensation independent of Kashmir and on a purely regional, as opposed to religious, basis. They do not want their Pradesh to be divided into sub-regions on religious lines, as the interlocutors have suggested.
What has Padgaonkar said while taking on the author of "Another missed opportunity"? He has said: "The most disturbing comments in (the Kashmiri author's) article pertain to the recommendation in the interlocutors' report to devolve political, economic and administrative powers to the three regions in the State. He claims that such devolution will 'balkanize the State into three pieces along Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist lines'. Why? Because the interlocutors have 'totally disregarded the communal divide, especially within Jammu and Ladakh'. The interlocutors have done no such thing. They have first noted that people of different ethnic and religious backgrounds inhabit all three regions of the State. (This is not quite the case of the Valley after the forced exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits.) They then drew attention to the fact that in Jammu and Ladakh, there is a strong sentiment against the political establishment in the Valley for real or perceived discrimination against them. But they have also remarked that the Muslims of Kargil do not want a UT status for Ladakh (a demand of the Buddhists in Leh) and the Muslim-majority districts in Jammu do not want Jammu to become a separate State (a demand of a section of opinion in Jammu city and its environs). But both want that people at the regional, sub-regional and panchayat levels of governance should be vested with effective powers to realize their aspirations".
There is much which is questionable and provocative in what Padgaonkar has said while countering the author of "Another missed opportunity", but what he quoted from "another missed opportunity" only vindicated those in Jammu Pradesh and elsewhere who had repeatedly said that the Kashmiri leadership, Kashmiri opinion makers and the so-called civil society in Kashmir were rabidly opposed to the idea of the people of Jammu Pradesh and Ladakh obtaining a system of Government that ended the age-old discrimination with them and empowered them to manage their own affairs themselves in the manner they wanted.
It needs to be underlined that everyone who matters in Kashmir wants a dispensation that not only holds Jammu & Kashmir aloof from rest of the country, but also gives absolute power to Kashmiri leadership so that it could enslave and exploit the people of Jammu Pradesh and Ladakh. The problem is the failure of the Jammu leadership to call a spade a spade and fight for their constituencies in the manner Kashmiri leadership has been fighting for Kashmir and a particular religious sect. |
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