Benefits of Kashmir talks outweigh everything else
Kashmir’s worsening situation has recently attracted growing attention from a worried world, alarmed at the increasing frequency and casualties of cross-border clashes along the heavily militarised LoC, barbaric killing and torture of unarmed (or stone- pelting )protestors, including children, as also the matter of militancy in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK). The UN Secretary-General’s spokesman stated in June that the ‘situation (in Kashmir) continues to be of concern to us’, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei referred to Kashmir in the same breath as Yemen, as an ‘oppressed nation’ requiring the ‘support of all Muslim nations’. At the 44th session of the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers on Tuesday, the 56- member usually rift-ridden Council, in a unanimous resolution, roundly condemned Indian state terrorism in IOK, urging it to implement relevant UN resolutions. The latest entrant in the list of outside do-gooders is China which offered to play a ‘constructive role’ for peace and stability in the region, cautioning that Kashmir situation had attracted ‘international’ attention, though their timing, with the spat in the Doklam area with Bhutan, hardly seemed opportune. But India rejected it out rightly, as it has all third party involvement.
Herein lies the unfortunate Indian mental block that has kept Kashmir in flames for the past six decades, its unbending obstinacy on Kashmir being an integral part of India (even the communiqué following the recent Trump-Modi meeting refers to Jammu and Kashmir as IOK), its inflexible insistence on bilateral dialogue, and linking this with alleged cross-border infiltration and terrorism, always blamed on Pakistan, without providing actionable evidence. From a combination of these Indian complaints, Pakistan’s oft-repeated offers for talks on Kashmir, as well as the well-meaning overtures of other concerned countries, have been met with a stony rebuff.
New Delhi will need to shed its rigid pre-conditions mind-set and enter in immediate talks with Pakistan, put an end to the present brutal and inhuman treatment meted out to Kashmiri civilians, and also make a fresh factual, realistic and sagacious appraisal of the real reasons behind its unending Kashmir imbroglio.
