Author: Arvind Lavakare
Publication: BJP Today
Date: September 1-15, 2001
Your magazine's August 1-15, 2001
issue was notable for publishing a copy of the original Instrument of Accession
as signed by the Maharaja of J&K on 26th October 1947 and its acceptance
on the next day by the Governor General of the then Dominion of India.
It is probably the first time ever that any publication anywhere in the
world has published that most invaluable document supporting India's position
on J&K. My heartiest compliments to you for seizing that initiative.
The next mission which you must accomplish is to make a copy of that document
on first-class glazed paper and distribute it to (i) each and every of
the 540-odd Members of the Indian Parliament (ii) the Editor of each and
every publication in India (iii) the Editor of each and every publication
in Pakistan as well as the rest of the world (iv) each and every member
of policy makers in the USA, UK, France, Germany, Japan, Russia, etc. etc
(v) each and every member of the leftist Jawaharlal Nehru University and
such other organisations as have all along been septic about the J&K
accession to India.
You must also be complimented for
publishing the UN Resolution of August 13, 1948 so that readers understand
that plebiscite in J&K was subject to certain conditions which Pakistan
has not implemented till today. However, that resolution was not accepted
by Pakistan. It was only the supplementary resolution of January 5, 1949
that was officially accepted by Pakistan and which you should have published
to make the picture complete. The basic difference in the two resolutions
was that while the one of August 13, 1948 was aimed at determining merely
"the future status of J&K ... in accordance with the Will of the people"
(thus permitting the choice of independence apart from accession to India
or to Pakistan), the resolution of January 5, 1949 limited the choice of
the people of J&K only to accession to either India or Pakistan, thereby
exposing Pak's opposition to an independent J&K.
Thank you also for publishing the
Indian Parliament's Resolution of February 22, 1994 since many commentators
found it missing from their records. At the same time, kindly allow me
to inform readers that, as Rajinder Sachar, a former Chief Justice of Delhi,
has pointed out, Parliamentary Resolutions are not statutes and therefore
do not have any legal validity; moreover, Sachar may be right when he also
pointed out that a Parliamentary Resolution lapses when the tenure of that
particular Parliament ends. In fact, there are instances of Parliament
of today not observing the resolution of an earlier Parliament. A classical
example of that is the Lok Sabha Resolution of November 21, 1964 which
agreed that "In future the House should be adjourned only when it was necessary
in order to enable members to take part in the funeral of a sitting member
irrespective of whether the deceased held office of a minister." As we
know, that resolution is being violated every now and then.
Hence to use that Resolution of
February 22, 1994 to prove that "Jammu and Kashmir is and shall be an integral
part of India" is not at all a legally sustainable argument, especially
because today's Parliament is empowered to change it. In fact, the only
legal, constitutional document in support of our stand on J&K is the
Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir, 1957. Section 3 of that Constitution
says "The State of Jammu and Kashmir is and shall be an integral part of
the Union of India". Moreover, that Constitution's Section 147, which deals
with Amendments, prohibits the amendment of Section 3. It is therefore
greatly regrettable, almost a tragedy, that none of our ministers, spokesmen,
newspaper "experts" and TV "analysts" even mentioned the J&K Constitution
and its Section 3.
Since none of these self-styled
"experts" --- and probably none in our Parliament --- would seem to have
knowledge of how the J&K Constituent Assembly was elected through universal
adult suffrage in 1951 and how it deliberated for five full years before
adopting the J&K Constitution on November 17, 1956 and bringing it
into effect fully from January 26, 1957, it will be a great public service
that BJP Today can perform if it publicises the fact of the J&K Constitution
and its salient features. Particularly conspicuous in this regard is that
our present Chief Justice, A. S. Anand, obtained his Ph.D. from London
University on the very subject of the J&K Constitution and converted
his dissertation into a scholarly book which is now its third edition published
by Universal Law Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd. of New Delhi. On page 199 of
that book Dr Anand says "The source of the Constitution of Kashmir is the
will of the people who have achieved the right to frame their own constitution
after a great sacrifice." It is that sentence which should have been hammered
into General Musharraf s ears at the Agra summit of July 2001 and should
be repeatedly dinned into all Pakistanis as well as those ignorant "analysts"
or traitors in India who advocate the Pak cause. Indeed, instead of presenting
Musharraf with a painting by Hussein, Vajpayee should have presented 101
copies of Dr Anand's book to the visitor.
Arvind Lavakare, Mumbai
(Thanks. However, the Ministry
of External Affairs had distributed copies of the instrument to every news
organisation.)
