Author and social media activist Ajaypal Singh Brar traces the origin of the Kashmir political conflict and provides a global perspective, cautioning India for its miscalculated, malicious and mayhem-ridden misadventure in Indian-administered Kashmir. The author compliments Sikh response to the evolving crisis and admonishes those who use intemperate and uncivil language against the Kashmiris, especially Kashmiri women.

FIFTY-THREE YEARS AGO, while rejecting the Punjabi Suba Bill, then Member of the Indian Parliament -Sikh scholar-leader Sirdar Kapur Singh stated, “I oppose this Bill, on behalf of my constituents and reject it on behalf of my parent party -Shiromani Akali Dal. I do so for three reasons. Firstly, it is conceived in sin, secondly, it has been delivered by an incompetent and untrained midwife and thirdly, it is opposed to the best interests of the nation, as it will almost certainly lead to a weakening of national integration and loss of faith in the integrity of those who exercise political power in the country.” He was intervened by Shri Tyagi who retorted, “It is not an illicit child.”

This August, the same Indian Parliament, once again delivered a Bill, not only conceived in sin but illicit too. Indian Home Minister Amit Shah delivered a fatal blow to the Indian constitution on the floor of the Parliament with his government unilaterally revoking the special status of Jammu and Kashmir and splitting the state into two centrally-administered union territories.  In a matter of minutes, Kashmir was downgraded from a semi-autonomous state to a colony of India, with a sizeable chunk sliced away from its core body.

Since the time of Partition, 72 years ago, India and Pakistan have been respectively calling each other -occupier and oppressor of the Kashmiris, while the Kashmiris have always maintained that more than any special status or merging with India or Pakistan, they would like to be left alone.  Azaadi -full independence, is what they yearn for.

Azaadi -full independence, is what the Kashmiris yearn for.

Occasionally, there have been half-hearted pledges that Kashmiri people should probably get to do what they want with their paradise. In 1948, the United Nations Security Council called for a plebiscite so that Kashmiris could decide their own fate. This has not happened as India has reneged on its promise to the Kashmiris, to the international forum and has immorally side-stepped the issue as an international one.

Whatever the Kashmiris may want, one thing is certain. They did not want what they got this August.  Kashmir’s special status and relative autonomy revoked under India’s Constitution, some seven hundred thousand military and para-military personnel in the world’s most militarized region, schools shut, offices shut, the internet snatched away, landlines dead, Kashmiri political leaders — even those who have advocated a pro-India policy, behind bars. This is Kashmir today and much more still unknown and locked to the world.

Not surprisingly, before being detained, a former Chief Minister of the state of Jammu and Kashmir regretted the decision to align with India at the time of partition of the sub-continent in 1947.

Though the revocation of Article 370 was first articulated by a Bengali politician -Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, the founder of a right-wing Hindu political outfit -Jan Sangh, but its seeds lay in Indian nationalism that arose in Bengal in the late 19th  century, which was Brahmanical in texture and  character, with an objective  to confront and decimate the Islamic minority.

The ideological successor of the Jan Sangh, -the Bhartiya Janata Party -BJP, adopted a similar stance on Kashmir and included revocation of Article 370 in its Election Manifesto of the just-concluded 2019 general elections in the country.

Unquestionably, the decision when it was taken on 5 August, it was welcomed by a large swath of Indians in general but it was especially celebrated by the Hindu nationalist right-wing party and its followers as the party had always felt that the Kashmiri people have enjoyed too many privileges and has been consistently questioning their attachment with India and Indians.  Hindu nationalists danced in the streets and set-off firecrackers, waving the Indian flag, hugging and kissing each other as a victor and a conqueror.

Shamelessly, Hindu nationalists danced in the streets and set-off firecrackers, waving the Indian flag, hugging and kissing each other as a victor and a conqueror.

Ramesh Shinde, a spokesperson for the Hindu Jana Jagruti Samiti -a Hindu nationalist organization, called the elimination of Kashmir’s autonomy a “historic step toward establishing the Hindu Rashtra.”

Before Article 370 was scrapped, successive regimes of the Congress party had turned the special status into a toothless piece of paper. It was nothing more than a hollow edifice from the past. Kashmiris had the notional privilege of making their own laws and flying their own flag. Even this notional privilege came with huge human and financial costs. They were punished for it for decades. Thousands of Kashmiris have been made to involuntary disappear or be illegally detained. Kashmir has seen the largest mass-blinding with pellet guns in human history. Lockdowns are almost daily rituals.

And what an opportune timing it was!  As the “You extricate me in Afghanistan and, I mediate in Kashmir” narrative, swung the dynamics of the US-Pakistan relationship in the region, India pre-empted it and struck the first blow, taking its arch-rival Pakistan by surprise.

Though such moves that whip up Hindu frenzy is expected when elections are around, this time the move probably stemmed from global geopolitics in the region, with China battling an economy-crippling trade war, is embroiled already on two fronts -the Uighur Muslims and the pro-democracy unrest in Hong Kong. Pakistan too is in an economic quagmire, sinking deeper and deeper. The Modi-Shah duo blitzkrieg has put Pakistani planners on the horns of a dilemma -whether to commit its meagre war-time and military resources on the Afghan front which is critical to its strategic depth or to get further embroiled in Kashmir.

“The elimination of Kashmir’s autonomy a “historic step toward establishing the Hindu Rashtra.”

Ramesh Shinde, spokesperson, Hindu Jana Jagruti Samiti

The Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan is under pressure to act and avenge what in the words of National Security Adviser and former Indian Intelligence Agency RAW chief A S Daulat has amounted to “nothing less than rubbing the Kashmiri nose on the ground.”

The Kashmir subcontinent has its own version of Palestine. Reports indicate that the Indian government may have informed the United States well in advance of its move for status change, and hoped that America will remain silent on the issue. The US has denied any such complicity and the international arena is gradually letting out muted voices. Israel’s success in normalizing its relationship with the Arab world even while continuing to annex the West Bank and China’s mass internment of Uighurs with the support of most Muslim governments almost certainly reinforce the views of Indian nationalists who believe that tight media controls, demographic engineering and harsh punishment will fix the Kashmiri problem.

This is the gross mistake India is committing. India is not Israel, nor is it China. It cannot embrace the illegal methods used in the West Bank, Tibet and Xinjiang without damaging itself in unpredictable ways.

With close to a million jackboots on Kashmiri soil, Indian imperialism in its malicious glory has sent shivers down the spine of minorities and subalterns.  Like in June 1984, the sheer scale and intensity of the force used to thrust this retrogressive decision down the throats of ‘recalcitrant Kashmiris’ and the nasty and hateful narrative doing rounds in the country must ring alarm bells in the minds of minorities, regional identities and deprived communities. All such denominations who are resisting the efforts of the Hindutva forces to reset the relationship with them and efforts to place them into the Hindu Varna-ashram hierarchy, clearly face an uphill task.

It is the gross mistake India is committing. India is not Israel, nor is it China. It cannot embrace the illegal methods used in the West Bank, Tibet and Xinjiang without damaging itself in unpredictable ways.

While Indian imperialism is trying to lure the gullible section of Kashmiris by  dangling a carrot  of increased  infrastructure investment and employment opportunities,  the saffron-clad brigade is working overtime to sanctify the neo-colonial loot, as the Hindi cow-belt crowds applaud and cheer the idea of plunder and rapine, eyeing the Kashmiri land and  women, with greed and lust.

Resisting tyranny and oppression is the core Sikh tradition following the teachings of the Gurus. Standing sentinel to this, Sikhs have not only raised their voice against the oppression in Kashmir on various platforms globally but have also come to rescue the oppressed.  Sikhs have come forward to the rescue of Kashmiri students pan-India. Instances of Sikh bodies helping Kashmiri girl students reach home safely from the lecherous eyes of the likes of Haryana CM ML Khattar reinforces the humanitarian strain of Sikhism.

In an inebriated state of absolute power, those in authority seem to have forgotten that empires and nations have lasted not because they had vast resources and large armies, nor because they could inflict fatal damage on their subjects, but because they could give them justice, peace and prosperity.

This week, whilst Muslims worldwide were celebrating Eid, Kashmiri brethren stood caged in their houses, while some mothers lined up for hours at makeshift telephone booths set-up by the administration for them to gain access to their beloveds far and wide. These mothers were either telling them to stay away from Kashmir or were rushing their pelleted kin to hospitals, amidst a totally denial-mode administration and a complicit and silent Indian media.

In an inebriated state of absolute power, those in authority seem to have forgotten that empires and nations have lasted not because they had vast resources and large armies, nor because they could inflict fatal damage on their subjects, but because they could give them justice, peace and prosperity.

The powers-that-be, the followers of mass jingoism and hate in India will do well to recall the Shanti Parva of the epic Mahabharata, wherein, lying on a bed of arrows, Bhishma had advised Yudhistra:

दण्डनीत्यां यदा राजा सम्यक् कात्स्न्येन वर्तते।
तदा कृतयुगं नाम कालसृष्टं प्रवर्तते।। शान्ति ६९.८० ।।

When the king uses with honour, truth, and care -the instrument of governance,
he creates the times called Krita-Yuga.

दण्डनीतिं परित्यज्य यदा कात्स्येन भमिपः।
प्रजा: क्लिश्नात्ययोगेन प्रवर्तेत तदा कलि: ।। शान्ति ६९.९१ ।।

When the king abandons honour, truth, and care in the acts of governance
and, by indefensible means oppresses the people, then arise the times called Kali.