A searching analysis of Kashmir dispute

Comprising a collection of articles on the Kashmir dispute, the book seeks to study the problem of Kashmir from a politico-legal angle

Abdul Gafoor Abdul Majeed Noorani, popularly known as A G Noorani (b.1930), is a Mumbai–based senior Indian lawyer, and an eminent constitutional expert and political commentator. Known for his secular-leftist leanings, he writes regular columns for newspapers on history, political and constitutional issues. His widely known publications include Islam, South Asia and the Cold War, Article 370: A Constitutional History of Jammu and Kashmir, Jinnah and Tilak: Comrades in the Freedom Struggle, History and Diplomacy, Indian Political Trials 1775-1947, Constitutional Questions and Citizens’ Rights, Islam and Jihad: Prejudice versus Reality, and The Babri Masjid Question 1528-2003: ‘A Matter of National Honour’ (in two volumes).

The book, comprising a collection of articles on the Kashmir dispute, seeks to study the problem of Kashmir from a politico-legal angle. It incorporates the history of the issue and the resultant discontent and dissent shrouding it, in the context of the forcible accession of the state of Jammu and Kashmir to the Indian Union.

In an unusually lengthy introduction spread over some 148 pages, the author has ventured to set forth the multitudinous issues and resolutions concerning Kashmir in a comprehensive manner. The dominant themes of these articles are ‘The Indo-Pak dispute’, ‘The US and Kashmir’, and ‘The Endgame’. The book also carries some archival and contemporary documents highlighting the important episodes in the history of the formation of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Thus the book is meant to provide ‘a background to the current political reality’ on the subject.

The author has made a searching analysis of the issue of plebiscite on Kashmir, in the ‘introduction’ of the book. He observes that ‘If he (Pundit Nehru) arrived at an agreement with Pakistan on plebiscite in January 1949 and a cease-fire, it was only to buy time.’ The following excerpt, though slightly extensive, would further elucidate the situation:

‘Nehru had other plans. In private he had adamantly set his face against a plebiscite in 1947. In public, till 1954 he continued to make the most explicit – almost extravagant – and solemn pledge to hold a plebiscite. It was nearly fifty years later, in 1996, that the clue to Nehru’s entire Kashmir policy emerged, with the publication of Volume 22 of the Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru (SWJN)… Nehru wrote a secret note to Sheikh Abdullah, dated 25 August 1952, while camping at Sonamarg in Kashmir (SWJN Vol 22:32-30). It was one of the rare writings he authored – cogent, comprehensive, unemotional, yet destructive in the ruthless course it foreshadowed. Its thesis was: (1) the people did not matter; (2) the UN was powerless; (3) so was Pakistan, as ‘we are superior to Pakistan in military and industrial power’, which would acquiesce while India professed friendship all along; (4) the accession must be rendered non-provisional, it must be made final; (5) Kashmir’s leaders must banish doubt for ‘doubts in the minds of leaders percolate to their followers and to the people generally.’ There must be no debate or argument in future; accession is an accomplished and final fact, and nothing is going to unsettle it (vide Document 5).’

In the opening chapter, the author traces the history of the Indo-Pak dispute on Kashmir. The case of the ‘accession’ of Junagadh state to India has been highlighted to expose the vacuity of the Indian claim over the occupation of Kashmir. The paradox is that India annexed Junagadh because its people had shown their ‘preference’ for India in a so-called referendum but at the same time she grabbed Kashmir blatantly trampling the wishes of the great majority of its people to accede to Pakistan. Likewise the annexation of the princely state of Hyderabad Deccan against the wishes of its ruler, the Nizam, is a sordid tale of India’s hegemonic designs in the region following the Partition of India.

The writer avers that any lasting solution of the Kashmir issue would require acceptance from all the three sides viz, India, Pakistan and the people of Jammu & Kashmir along with four concomitant conditions to be respected by them: ‘India cannot concede secession. Pakistan cannot accept the Line of Control (LoC) as a solution unless something substantial is also conceded. The people cannot accept the State’s division or acquiesce in the denial of self-rule and the fundamental rights to its people.’

India’s retreat from plebiscite, after Nehru had ruled it out in 1948, was affected in four stages. First, ‘nit-picking on UN’s proposals discarded privately in 1948’; second, ‘plebiscite was rejected publicly in 1955-56’; third, ‘mediation was rejected’ (1962); and fifth, ‘even meaningful bilateral talks were ruled out’.

The book delves deep into the intricacies of the Kashmir question. The author has deliberated on the following topics in his discussion of the problem: the genesis of the issue; bilateral negotiations on Kashmir (1947-2006); azaadi or independent Kashmir?; the Nehru-Liaquat Summits in 1947; the Dixon Plan; the Nehru-Mohammed Ali Bogra Summit 1955; Nehru-Ayub Murree Summit 1960; the Simla Pact, 1972; contours of the militancy 1947-2000; the accord on ‘Composite Dialogue’; the Lahore Summit 1999; the Agra Summit 2001; the Indus Water Treaty; the UN Resolution today; the No-War pact parleys 1949-1988; the US and Kashmir; interview with President Musharraf (August 2006); moves towards a consensus; the penultimate phase: talks on Kashmir 2006-09 and developments inside the State; and the agenda for Kashmir today.

The book narrates the ‘mindless intransigence’ of the Indian government on the Kashmir issue. The writer is of the view that despite Kashmir’s accession to India, the idea of independence of Kashmir was freely aired by Mountbatten, Pundit Nehru, Gopalaswami Ayyangar, and others. On one occasion (1949), Sh Abdullah himself declared: ‘Accession to either side cannot bring peace’.

According to the writer, the Dixon Plan (1950) is even today nostalgically cherished by the people of Kashmir as a viable solution of the Kashmir issue. Sir Owen Dixon, an Australian judge, in his capacity as representative for India and Pakistan, proposed this plan pursuant to the Security Council’s Resolution of March 14, 1950. According to his plan, Ladakh would be assigned to India, the Northern Areas and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir to Pakistan, Jammu would be split between the two, and a plebiscite would be held in the Kashmir Valley. The writer goes on to claim that ‘Liaquat accepted the plan, provided Nehru would agree to a neutral administration for the Valley. But Nehru rejected the idea… to Dixon’s annoyance.’ Furthermore, in the writer’s view, ‘Pakistan’s acceptance of military aid from the US in 1954 provided Nehru a pretext for discarding the idea of plebiscite publicly.’

The book seeks to discuss and analyse threadbare the standpoints of the successive governments in India, as also in Pakistan, on the Kashmir issue. The author has extensively relied on archives and statistical data to propound his thesis that ‘all the cures prescribed over the years (to resolve the conflict) have failed dismally. They ignored the ones who matter – the people – and do not care to ask what it is that they really yearned for.’

In the concluding part of the book, the writer avers that any lasting solution of the Kashmir issue would require acceptance from all the three sides viz, India, Pakistan and the people of Jammu & Kashmir along with four concomitant conditions to be respected by them: ‘India cannot concede secession. Pakistan cannot accept the Line of Control (LoC) as a solution unless something substantial is also conceded. The people cannot accept the State’s division or acquiesce in the denial of self-rule and the fundamental rights to its people.’

The Kashmir Dispute 1947-2012

Author: A G Noorani

Publisher: Oxford University Press, Karachi

Pages: 550; Price: Rs1,595/-