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19 views3 pages

Dawn Article of The Day-1

Article of dawn

Uploaded by

Hasnain shabbir
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Will not talking usher in peace?

Jawed Naqvi Published September 10, 2024

INDIA’S home minister says there can’t be any talks with Pakistan until peace comes to Jammu and
Kashmir first.

It’s not clear if he was posturing as politicians often do or stating it as conviction common with India’s
right-wing nationalists. The backdrop to the comments is the three-phase assembly elections scheduled
in Jammu and Kashmir from Sept 18, which Home Minister Amit Shah is keen to win for his party.

Not talking to Pakistan till peace returns to violence-wracked Kashmir makes for a strange argument to
keep aloof from an important, in fact, a critical neighbour. It’s particularly strange coming from a country
that purports to be working for peace in a distant conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

How could there be peace without talking to key stakeholders in the European theatre? It’s interesting
nevertheless that India flaunts an appetite for resolving disputes abroad (not excluding Sri Lanka and the
Maldives) while rejecting friendly offers from world capitals to help in its perpetually troubled ties with
Pakistan.

Of course, there are those in India’s ruling pack that believe there’s nothing to talk to Pakistan about. The
only dispute, they say, is India’s claim on Azad Kashmir, which the Rao government had formalised
through a parliamentary resolution in the 1990s. Even that claim needs talks, right? Or, as some ardent
nationalists dream, the army would do the job. It’s this kind of alarming rubbish that former US secretary
of state Mike Pompeo referred to in his memoirs. He got a midnight call about a crisis that broke out in
2019 between India and Pakistan. Pompeo called it a terrifying stand-off between nuclear neighbours.

Wrecking the special status of Kashmir has long been a key quest for Hindutva groups.

To stay with the argument, could Russia and Ukraine sort out their differences without addressing the
interests of the Russian-speaking population of Donbas? Could the people of Donbas find peace without
reference to the warring sides? Apart from the tautological infirmity in Shah’s logic, there is grudging
admission of a resounding failure wrought on hapless Kashmiris and, in fact, on the entire country. Team
Modi had overreached its capacity to resolve burning domestic problems.

Step back a bit. When Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrecked India’s economy on Nov 8, 2016, with his
disastrous move to demonetise 80 per cent of the country’s currency, he took the plea that it would rein
in terrorism. One could quibble over Modi’s definition of terrorism, but that is what he said. People for
better or worse agreed to heed the claim at the time, and they obviously suffered for it. Their suffering
hadn’t ended, however, when Modi wrecked the state of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019, claiming
that breaking it up and removing its special status guaranteed by the Indian constitution was another
means towards ending terrorism.

Five years after heaping misery on the people, and after countless innocent lives were lost, people
maimed and jailed, Shah indicated last week that he still hadn’t succeeded in bringing peace to the
region. Reports quoted him as telling BJP workers in Jammu that terrorism, a description for armed
resistance against Indian rule, was only 70pc tamed in 10 years of Modi rule, whatever the faux statistics
mean.

Shah also said that the special status could never again be restored to the state, and described
opposition statements that all Kashmiri parties would work towards that end as vacuous. Assembly
elections are being held in Jammu and Kashmir together with state polls in BJP-ruled Haryana, abutting
Delhi. Elections in Jharkhand and BJP-ruled Maharashtra are also pending. The dismantled state of
Jammu and Kashmir is currently only a union territory, in the way that Delhi is. J&K wasn’t. The Modi
government says it is committed to restoring statehood to J&K but without the special rights, and sans
the region of Ladakh, which was detached from it in the Aug 2019 move.

Most Kashmiri parties in the electoral fray are keen to see the feeble attempt at restoring democracy in
the state as a potential harbinger of peace to end their exacerbated suffering under Modi’s rule. If Shah
has his way, he will install a BJP-led government in the Muslim-majority region. It would serve no
intrinsic purpose though since the BJP is already ruling Kashmir with the help of its hand-picked
lieutenant governor, a veritable viceroy representing Delhi. But the symbolism of a win would help the
ruling party score brownie points in the face of possible defeat in the other state polls.

The way the chips are stacked, a BJP victory could yet be the outcome in J&K. The Congress has aligned
with the National Conference of former chief minister Farooq Abdullah, but another member of the
India-wide opposition alliance, the PDP of Mehbooba Mufti, is going on its own. On the other hand, a
party set up by the jailed and newly elected MP Engineer Rashid is leading the charge against the BJP.

In the multi-cornered melee, the BJP could emerge as the single largest party, and the lieutenant
governor would be well within his rights to invite it to form government. The visuals of a Hindu
nationalist party ruling predominantly Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir would lend a degree of heft
to the celebrations in 2025 of 100 years of the foundation of the RSS. Wrecking the special status of
Kashmir has long been a key quest for Hindutva groups.
Given the state of affairs, what kind of relationship could one foresee for India with Pakistan in the near
or distant future? When Jinnah was asked about Pakistan’s equation with India, he cited Canada and the
United States as examples to follow. As for Gandhi, he was preparing to visit Pakistan on a peace mission
when he was laid low by Hindutva conspirators whose sympathisers are ideologically connected with the
party ruling India today. How shall we then contemplate peace ahead?

• Posturing - (‫ )اطوار دکھانا‬- Adopting a false or exaggerated behavior.


• Conviction - (‫ )یقین‬- A firmly held belief.
• Tautological - (‫ )لفظی دہراو‬- Repeating the same thing in different words.
• Demonetise - (‫ )کرنسی کی قانونی حیثیت ختم کرنا‬- To strip a currency of its legal status.
• Harbinger - (‫ )پیش خیمہ‬- An indicator or signal of what is to come.
• Vacuous - (‫ )خالی‬- Lacking intelligence or substance.

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