Preparing for Prime Minister Narendra Modi

[Atithee]

Exactly where I am, Jay. Somehow, I’m unable to reconcile that given a choice, Kashmiri Muslim majority will want to be with Pakistan or independent. A part of me wanted to call their bluff by holding a plebiscite. Not sure what good it does to hold on a bleeding organ. The problem is that Punjab maybe next and the northeastern states may not be far behind.

I hope good sense prevails and Muslim majority in Kashmir sees this as a win for them rather than loss of identity or freedom. You don’t lose your identity, freedom, or religion by who is around you. The protectionist measures have only heaped misery on the Kashmiris except for the Abdullah and Mufti families. Tough ask, but I am hopeful.

[Omkara]

Kashmir wants independence, immediate removal of army from valley. They hate Indian army. They don't think they are a part of the country. Kashmiri kids find it tough to find houses on rent in rest of India. These are facts. Hope is that over next few generations these will change.

[jayakris]

The way copy-cat Pakistan responds to what we do, like in the nuclear tests, wouldn't Pakistan now take away the special status of at least the Gilgit-Baltistan area of POK (the true turban of India, to the north, through which the Karakoram highway goes)? There the people never wanted independence and always wanted to be with Pakistan without much of a doubt, if I'm not mistaken. And the real turban area has only less than 20 lakh people (out of 65 lakhs in POK) who have never had even much of historical allegiance with India anyway. I think Pakistan will just go ahead and integrate it with Pak at some point soon, because they know that there will never be any plebiscite or anything, so it serves no purpose for them to keep Gilgit-Baltistan under special status against even the people's will there.

Then the only issue is with "azad" Kashmir which is a much smaller strip around our Kashmir in our neck region (with 1/6th area of POK but 2.5 times the population of Gilgit-Baltistan). The people there do not want to join either country but if the Kashmir on the Indian side is a normal territory of India, I assume the "azad" kashmir people of POK will give up the hopes for any independence and join Pakistan. Basically the LOC border will become our border.

This is the final end to Pakistan's yapping about the UN resolutions on plebiscite (which always included a call for Pakistan to withdraw from "azad" Kashmir, and for INDIA to do the plebiscite for the whole area - because it was India who wrote the resolutions, after all, from 1948). I say, give up on the 45 lakhs people in that strip of land to the left side of our neck. That was nothing but a malignant tumor on the neck for us. We were unnecessarily adding a turban which was never really ours, though the romance about the turban is in a lot of people in India - and that is a big reason for our Kashmir feelings (when that is not even Kashmir!). We need to let it go. I say just finish it off, let go off the turban of India and call it the border. Let us go on with what matters for the rest of the country.

[jayakris]

By the way, I wish they had a sunset clause on the union territory status. Either a 25 year period or until in-migration to J&K reaches a certain fraction of the population which is the average of in-migrant population fraction in the rest of the Indian states with free cross-state migration since 1947.

[Varma]

Don't know what to say. Wanted that stupid article 370 to be gone. Not sure what is in store, though, so I am kinda silent. Want to celebrate but also not confident enough to do that....

Gotta say... Right or wrong, this PM just does stuff that a lot of us have always wanted, but never thought would be done. Have to give him credit for that. Sometimes it worries me too!

Exactly my thoughts! I wanted this to end for a long time, but when it finally did I am more skeptical as to whether it will do any good at all. I am also concerned about the abuse/revolt this might potentially cause.

- Varma

[prasen9]

As a matter of principle, I support federated autonomy for all states. I would only have changed the "special" treatment in Kashmir in that I would allow Indian citizens to buy land there. Breaking up Jammu, Kashmir, and Ladhakh is not a bad idea per se. I would want the Indian constitution and Indian laws to all apply to Kashmir but allow them to make laws for their own that are not inconsistent with the Indian laws. This is as long as it is part of India. And, practically, that seems to be what it will be for the foreseeable future.

I would be fine with Kashmir being an independent country after a free plebiscite. Or parts of J&K (must be contiguous like our states were formed on the basis of linguistic variance) where there is a majority opinion to be a free country. That is Jammu and Ladhakh may stay in India while Kashmir is free. I am against colonization of anybody. But, I do not think India will give up occupying Kashmir in my lifetime. So discussing that is pointless.

Atithee, if the army is breathing down your neck everyday and checking you 10 times when you travel for an hour, people will naturally be against the army. That is why most Kashmiri youth are against India. A plebiscite in the Kashmir area will vote for independence now. If India somehow manages to normalize things and work on economic development of Kashmir and makes it easy to live there freely and move around without the army checking your pantry, then people may come around and want to stay in India. But that will at least take a decade or two of imaginative policy of reconciliation. That starts with goodwill gestures such as withdrawing the army (but fortifying the border and the intelliegence agencies). None of this is going to happen.

[Sin Hombre]

What about the Kashmiri Pandits who were driven out of Kashmir by Islamists? Do they not have a say?

India should just copy China and have people mass emigrate into Kashmir and move the young kids from there away from toxic influence. Inhumane but needed.

[prasen9]

The Kashmiri Pandits who were driven out should be given a vote in a plebiscite.

[Rajiv]

Unfortunately and sadly the genesis of this problem , and creators of the Kashmir crisis are the  Pandits themselves. Untill 1947,the Pandits were the ruling class, intelegensia , thinkers, and held important post's and wielded maximium power in conducting the affairs of the state, And to protect their domain ,in the early 1900's they  launched a movement called "Kashmir for Kashmiris", movement.
The Dogra King in order to placate and please them, promulgated series of laws which prevented outsiders from comming into Kashmir and  later these laws got firmly entrenched in the system and which later after Independence morphed in article 370 and 35A.

Infact the King's Prime Minister Ram Chandra Kak a firm beliver of this doctrine(and with dangerous Pak leanings) strongly opposed accession to India and wanted Kashmir to be kept autonmous, non aligned ,independent and followed it well after Aug 1947

It was only when Jinnah with the help of Afghan tribals launched an attack on Kashmir and reached  upto Srinagar, and matters getting out of hand, a desperate Hari Singh turned to India for help and agreed  for immediate unequivocal accession.
Nehru however still steadfastly refused his offer and insisted on a Precondition of sacking of the PM Ram Chandra Kak as  he and the entire Congress  held the PM as man responsible for the crises and the one who didnt follow in a way, the rest of the Princely states in India had agreed upon and he was the man who couldn't be trusted upon by the Indian Congress.

When matters really got out of hand with rampant, unabated, looting, rapes, and unthinkable atrocities than after numerous rounds of negotiations  between the King, Mountbatten and Nehru, , the PM Ram Chandra Kak was eventually sacked and than only did India agreed to   sign the accesion treaty,   Once the treaty was in place the Indian Army moved in to drive the Afghan tribals out. Another intresting story of why Jinnah had to resort to using the Afghan  maureders , was due to the fact that the complete rank and file of Pak army comprising majority of British and Hindu officers refused to take part directly in this nefarious plan.

So if a plebiscite was held just after independence,  it possibly might have created a different scenario for India  , But  today the realities are different and hypothetically speaking now if it were ever to be   held  there is no way the Present  Pandits would even remotely consider the path set by their forefather's.

[PKBasu]

Gilgit was annexed on October 31st 1947 (four days after Kashmir's accession) via a coup undertaken by the Gilgit Scouts, who were commanded by a Britisher, Major Brown, who was reporting to a Lt. Col. Bacon who had been transferred cleverly from Gilgit to Khyber in NWFP in August 1947, so that the reporting line was to Pakistan. The British-commanded Gilgit Scouts calmly surrounded the house of Gilgit resident/governor, Ghansara Singh, shot his bodyguards and "arrested" him, and then informed Peshawar that Gilgit had acceded to Pakistan. India didn't raise an international stink about this beheading of India's turban (a highly strategic region) four days after Kashmir's legal accession to India.

As for the story of Kashmir's accession, there is no doubt that Hari Singh was hesitating between India and Pakistan, partly because of his PM Ram Chander Kak's advice. The latter was trying to negotiate a good deal for himself with Pakistan, because Mountbatten had strongly hinted to Hari Singh in June 1947 (during a 5-day visit) that he should accede to Pakistan (and India wouldn't object if he did). Patel wasn't interested in interfering either, until Junagadh suddenly acceded to Pakistan (and the latter encouraged and accepted it); here was a Gujarati kingdom with an overwhelmingly Hindu populace but a Muslim nawab. (One of the residents of Junagadh, by the way, was cricketer Hanif Mohammed and his family). Once this had happened, Patel first organised a plebiscite in Junagadh, and then established telegraph and telephone lines between Indian Punjab and Jammu. Then he had Kak replaced as PM of Kashmir by Mehr Chand Mahajan (a senior judge in Punjab, who had also served on the Radcliffe Boundary Commission) by early-September 1947.

The replacement of Kak was a signal that Hari Singh was veering away from his former PM's advice to join Pakistan -- and this is what led Jinnah to, first, foment trouble among the Muslims of the western region (Muzaffarabad and Mirpur) and then send in the Pakistan army, disguised as Pathan tribesmen, commanded by one of the senior-most Pakistani officers in the Pak Army, Col (later Maj Gen) Akbar Khan, on October 10th 1947. During the previous few weeks, Mahajan had declared a general amnesty (and hence released Sheikh Abdullah), but Nehru began to pressure Hari Singh to appoint Abdullah his PM -- which was the only reason why Hari Singh was hesitant about joining India. Patel and Nehru had several raging rows over this, because Patel felt it was pointless to foist Abdullah on a reluctant Hari Singh BEFORE the accession (he was at least amenable to persuading Hari Singh to accept Abdullah sometime after the accession was complete).

In the initial days, Kashmir's own State Forces tried to fend off the Pakistani troops and "irregulars", but rapidly lost territory. Hari Singh approached India just as the Pakistani forces were getting close to Srinagar. (Meanwhile, India had commandeered almost all commercial aircraft in the country to send supplies into Kashmir, with the first plane piloted by India's ace pilot Biju Patnaik -- but otherwise refused to allow Indian troops to come to Hari Singh's aid unless he acceded). On 27th October 1947, Hari Singh signed the Instrument of Accession to India. A side-letter written by Mountbatten mentioned that once "Kashmir...soil has been cleared of invaders, the question of the state's accession should be settled by reference to the people". This was not part of the Instrument of Accession, but just a personal letter from the Governor General of India to the Maharaja of Kashmir, and this is the basis of Pakistan's subsequent claims.

Article 370 of the Constitution was a TEMPORARY feature, allowing Kashmir to have its own constituent assembly. No other State that acceded to India was given any such concessions, although the Instrument of Accession (like for other States) initially handed only Currency, Foreign Affairs and Communications over to the government of India. Kashmir's accession too was unconditional (in that currency, foreign affairs and communications were given over to India without conditions). But Kashmir's constituent assembly was to decide what powers it would hand over to India, and which ones it would keep as the state's prerogative. The unfortunate reality is that Nehru handed this right over not to the ruler of Kashmir, not to its people, but to just one man, Sheikh Abdullah, who stuffed the Constituent Assembly of Kashmir exclusively with his own representatives (all 75 members were members of the National Conference, although Abdullah hated Jammu and its Dogras and Sikhs, and the feeling was mutual).

It went rapidly downhill from there. Once Nehru realized that Sheikh Abdullah was using the powers given to him to expand the definition of Kashmir's autonomy (and effectively seeking to make the state independent), he had him arrested in 1953 -- a few weeks after Nehru and Abdullah had conspired to trap and kill Syama Prasad Mookerjee (India's first industry minister, who had resigned from Cabinet over the Nehru-Liaquat Pact that allowed East Pakistani expulsions of non-Muslims to go unpunished, then founded the Jana Sangh on 21st October 1951, and began agitating for the restoration of Jammu's rights in J&K). Abdullah remained in Indian prisons for the next 11 years -- until released a few months before Nehru's death, to try and bring about a negotiated solution for Kashmir. After Nehru's death, he was imprisoned again until 1972 (released only after the Shimla Accord). So Nehru's Kashmir policy was an abject and total failure, and the "temporary" Article 370 was breached very early on by Nehru himself, with Kashmir's constituent assembly being disbanded in 1957, rendering that article almost meaningless -- except that it gave Kashmir governments the right to keep making laws that deprived other Indians from having any rights in Kashmir (as well as Jammu and Ladakh).

The end to Article 370 is definitely a good thing for India, but managing its international ramifications will be a challenge. Getting away from being a soft Nehruvian state is a big advance for India nonetheless.

[PKBasu]

The abrogation of 370 (and the even more egregious 35A, which decreed that non-Kashmiris couldn't own land there, and that Kashmiri women would lose their rights to Kashmir residency -- including property rights -- if they married non-Kashmiris) means that Jammu will regain a lot of the clout it lost to Kashmir in the past. This will be a good thing in the medium-term, and will enable the new UT to be remade as a normal Indian state. The Kashmir Valley is a small part of the state (union territory), albeit the most populated part. Jammu is also a very beautiful region, and Ladakh breathtakingly so. We lost about 40% of Ladakh in 1957 when China's PLA built a road through it without Nehru even waking up to what was going on; the road had been built over a 6 year period!

[Sin Hombre]

The end to Article 370 is definitely a good thing for India, but managing its international ramifications will be a challenge. Getting away from being a soft Nehruvian state is a big advance for India nonetheless.

India are clearly losing the information war online, why's that?

The only good thing is outside of Paki-dominated places like England and Khalistan-supporting Canada, rest of the world media including in the US are more focused on the events in HK.

[Rajiv]

, rest of the world media including in the US are more focused on the events in HK.

Surprising one of the greatest revolutions in the world is taking place and nobody seemed to have commented barring this small reference..
Watched it at close quarters, been at ground zero and seen it unfold from first rally over 2 months ago to the present day situation.
This movement which has catalysed and galvanised each and every sections of the society now has a life of its own. There is element of fear in the air as the Police overnight has been transformed into PLA Unit and taking direct orders from Beijing and one of the many examples of Beijing's direct control over Police was an appalling incident 3 weeks ago , someone (and nobody knows who is that someone) hired Triads to brutally attack the peaceful protesters and bludgeoned them with sticks and rods and this mayhem continued unabated for 1 hour and while this was happening over 10,000 emergency calls to 999 were made , but not a single policeman came , and only arrived after the Triads had finished their job, Not responding to Emergency call has never happened in Hongkong and when one of the last Few remaining a very Senior Civil Servant of the Colonial Era Mathew Cheung apologised to the public , he was quickly chided and reprimanded by the various Police Unions and eventually had to back down, and till today we are awaiting an independent inquiry into that incident ,When one travels to China ,one has to erase all the watts app messages as phones of travellers arriving from HongKong are routinely checked randomly and a simple forwarded message or Photos related to the Protests can land one in trouble. Life has changed overnight in Hong Kong.

[jayakris]

The end to Article 370 is definitely a good thing for India, but managing its international ramifications will be a challenge. Getting away from being a soft Nehruvian state is a big advance for India nonetheless.

India are clearly losing the information war online, why's that?

India has always lost the information war on Pakistan, but never really the diplomatic war. It will be tougher this time, as China has already written to the UNSC, but I think we will again handle it. What the hell is the UN going to do to India? Nothing. When a country has to handle its matter, you handle it. The others can go take a hike.

[arjun2761]

I doubt if China is going to be able to do too much other than make some noise. India is a significant market for the Chinese and they would be stupid to risk the business relationship when they are also in a trade war with the US. Pakistan is a geopolitical ally for China but is otherwise a mostly useless country...