Author: Hari Om
Publication: Organiser
Date: December 14, 2003
Chairman of the 'secular' Jammu
and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) Yasin Malik has now clearly crossed
the Lakshmana rekha. He has declared that if the over three lakh internally
displaced Kashmir Pandits (IDKP) sincerely wish to return to their
original habitat or the (Jhelum), they will have to accept his condition.
His condition: The IDKP will have to make common cause with the Valley-based
seditious organisations and work whole, heartedly and with single-minded
devotion for the "liberation" of Jammu and Kashmir from the "aggressor"
India. The stand of the Chairman of the "liberal" and "moderate" Jammu
and Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party (JKDFP) Shabir Shah and other Valley-based
Hurriyat leaders such as Abbas Ansari, Prof. Abdul Gani Bhat and Syed Ali
Shah Geelani has been no different. They too, like Yasin Malik, sing the
same liberate the Muslim Kashmir from the Hindu India song and make it
abundantly clear that the IDKP can come back to the Valley on the condition
that they shall "actively support their (Muslim) 'brethren' in their struggle
for political emancipation from the Indian Government".
It needs to be noted that these
pro-independence and pro-Pakistan Kashmiri separatists have expressed
these seditious and patently communal views during their interaction with
none other than the former J&K Chief Secretary Musa Raza and his team
members, who on behalf of the National Minorities Commission, conducted
a tour of the State a few days ago to discuss the issue of the Pandit refuges
with their representatives and Hurriyat leaders. Musa Raza and his team
members, according to reports in a section of the print media, did try
their best to persuade the Kashmiri separatists not to insist on the "condition"
that binds the Pandit refugees to join a struggle, which they consistently
and vehemently oppose, but with no result.
But whatever Yasin Malik and others
of his ilk told Musa Raza and his associates the other day was, however,
not at all unexpected. For, they have been consistently following almost
similar line and outraging the sensitivities of the miniscule minority
of Kashmiri Hindus one way or the other even since December 1989, when
the secessionist and sectarian violence engulfed the whole Valley.
It is important to note that what
had provoked the Kashmiri separatists in 1989 to unleash a reign of terror
and senseless brutalities against the unarmed, hapless and peace-loving
Kashmiri Hindus was their outright refusal to support the former in their
anti-India crusade or join anti-India demonstrations and pro-independence
processions. Who does not know that the Kashmiri Hindus (whom the separatists
called "fifth columnists" or the "Indian agents in Kashmir") had vacated
the Valley in January 1990 and migrated to Jammu and other parts of India
to escape their physical liquidation at the hands of the dreaded ISI as
well as to save their culture, honour and .dignity leaving behind their
beautiful houses, properties worth billions of rupees, including big orchards,
vast and fertile agricultural tracts, large business establishments and
what not. And, they had taken this extreme step in view of the utter failure
of the power-that-be in the State and South and North Blocks, including
the then Union Home Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, to provide adequate
security to them and take any action against the secessionist forces or
book those involved in the anti-national and anti-minority activities.
In fact, the authorities left the Pandit minority to God or to the anarchy.
The only action the State Government took at the behest of the Union Home
Minister was the release of 11 top-ranking JKLF terrorists and this action
had been taken to secure the release of his kidnapped daughter Dr Rubiya
Sayeed. The fact is that those charged with the responsibility of maintaining
law and order and protecting the life and property of the common people
utterly failed to discharge their duties and left the field free for the
anti-India and anti-minority forces. And, the immediate fall-out was the
exodus of the Pandit minority from Kashmir.
It is indeed a matter of satisfaction
and pride that the attitude of the IDKP to India and the religio-political
agenda of the Pakistan-backed separatists have not changed a bit notwithstanding
the kind of treatment they have received during all these years in exile.
They continue to hold all those things very dear for which they quit their
ancient homes and hearths and have suffered, and continue to suffer, very
heavy political and economic losses. Rather, their fourteen years in exile
in their own country have further added to their resolve not to support
the separatists and fundamentalists and expose the true nature of the ongoing
separatist movement at all available fora in and outside India. The role
played by their organisations, including the Panun Kashmir [Apna Kashmir],
clearly demonstrates that they under no situation would support whose demands
range from the State's merger with Pakistan to "azadi" to pre-1953 constitutional
status to semi-independence.
It would be too much to expect from
these IDKP to preach any other view than that they have religiously preached
all these years and suffered in the process. And, why should they? These
IDKP and nearly six thousand of their co-religionists, situation of J&K
as other Kashmiris and non-Kashmiris are. No one, no even Yasin Malik,
Shabir Shah or any other Hurriyat Conference leader has any right whatsoever
to impose any condition on the Pandit refugees if they so decide to return
to their land of birth. If they do so, they would be surely regarded as
sinners against the Indian Constitution and would be treated as such. The
Kashmiri Hindus are the original inhabitants of Kashmir and Kashmir legitimately
belongs to them the way it belongs to others.
It would not be out of place to
mention here that it is the Kashmiri Pandits who actually represent the
over 5000-year-old Indian civilization, Indian culture, Indian liberal
tradition and Indian ethos. And, their burning desire was, and continues
to be, to remain part of the Indian tradition and shape and mould their
own political destiny within the country's highly pluralistic, liberal
and all-embracing polity. Not to honour their aspirations, needs and compulsions
would be to negate the very concept of secularism and pluralism and accord
a dangerous respectability to the gun culture and politics of separation
based on religious fanaticism. Besides, it would automatically mean the
recognition of the nearly 40year-old dubious doctrine of late French
President General De Gualle that those, who fire on soldiers and have blood
on their hands, are relevant and those with no blood on their hands are
irrelevant. We have no avert any such eventuality as it has all the potential
of unsetting everything in India. We have to work for an environment in
which the IDKP could live, move and work as free citizens anytime and anywhere
in Kashmir and participate in the State's democratic and economic processes
unhindered.
But more than that, we have to tell
the Kashmiri separatists that they are living in a world of the past and
watertight compartment. They have to be clearly told that they represent
only those who believe in an extreme form of sectarianism and exclusiveness
and annihilation of those who do not share their ideas and perceptions
and that such narrow approach has no place in the country's secular scheme
of things or anywhere in the civilized world. They have also to be reminded
that it is the Kashmiris-barring the Kashmir Hindus and Sikhs and all others
in J&K like the Jammuites and Ladakhis-who have been controlling the
State polity and economy ever since October 1947, when the State acceded
to the Indian Dominion in ten-ns of the constitutional law On the subject
and the Indian Independence Act. The best course would be to follow the
Chinese and their concept of state and nation and treat militant as a militant,
terrorist as a terrorist and separatist as a separatist. In other words,
establishment the rule of law is the only option available to us. Not to
exercise this option would be suicidal.
The need of the hour is a stroke
of farsighted statesmanship and marginalisation of all those who show disrespect
to the constitution and use gun as a political weapon in their bid to force
down the Indian throat obnoxious ideas based on religious fanaticism.
