Daily Times

Kashmir a is living proof that it is not going to compromise, far less abandon, its demand for freedom, which is its birthright and for which it has paid the price in blood and suffering that has not been exacted from any other people of the South Asian subcontinent. Compared to the sacrifice Kashmir has had to endure, India and Pakistan themselves gained their freedom through a highly civilised process.

That is a most poignant truth. But even more bitterly ironical is the contrast between the complicated and decades-long agony the Kashmir issue has caused to the Kashmiris, to Pakistan and to India itself and the rational measures that would be needed for its solution. No sleight of hand is required, no subtle concepts are to be deployed, and no ingenious deal needs to be struck between an Indian and a Pakistani leader with the endorsement of the more pliable Kashmiri figures. The time for deceptiveness is gone. All that is needed is going back — yes, going back — to the point of agreement which historically existed beyond doubt between India and Pakistan and jointly resolving to retrieve it with such modifications as are necessitated by the passage of time.

That point of agreement is the one India as well as Pakistan, each independently, brought to the United Nations Security Council when the Kashmir dispute was first internationalised. In fact, the Council itself took that point as the basis of the resolutions it later formulated.

The point was one of the inescapable principles — that the future status of the State of Jammu and Kashmir shall be decided by the will of the people of the state as impartially ascertained in conditions free from coercion. The two elements of a peaceful settlement thus were: first, the demilitarisation of the state (i.e. the withdrawal of the forces of both India and Pakistan) and a plebiscite supervised by the United Nations.

What is desperately needed is an affirmation by the Indian and Pakistani leadership at the highest level of the necessity of taking new measures to resolve the Kashmir dispute within a reasonable time frame

With propositions of such clarity and character accepted, what room was left for the dispute to arise? This question is bound to evoke divergent answers and entails the risk of reopening old recriminations. However, it would be disingenuous to avoid it altogether. It is apparent from the record of the Security Council that India articulated the principle, accepted the practical shape the Council gave to it and freely participated in negotiations regarding the modalities involved. However, when developments inside the State made it doubt its chances of winning the plebiscite, it changed its stand and pleaded that the agreement no longer bound it. Of course, India deployed ample arguments to justify the somersault. Even though the arguments were of a legal or quasi-legal nature, India rejected a reference to the World Court to pronounce on their merits. This is how the dispute became frozen with calamitous consequences for Kashmir most of all, with a heavy cost for Pakistan and with none too happy results for India itself.

However, despite the passage of decades, nothing has been irretrievably lost. The principle that the disposition of the territory in dispute must be in accordance with the will of its people can still be implemented as truly as it would have been in the 1950’s. It can be done better now because we are not as oblivious now as all sides seemed to be earlier of the unique heterogeneity of the State of Jammu and Kashmir — one of the most bizarre products of 19th century British colonialism.

Recognising the existence of several different ethnicities, each with its own history and affiliations, and the right of each to determine its future without constraint from not only India or Pakistan but also from one dominant region within the state on another, we are not likely to commit the fallacy of one-size-suits-all. The plan of action that would ensure for all components of the state as it existed on 15 August 1947 equal representation and equal freedom to decide whether to continue the status quo or to opt for a new dispensation is not difficult to work out. It can be done by a joint committee composed of the rightly qualified people from India and Pakistan, who would consult the leadership of Kashmiri political resistance and also, as necessary, experts from the United Nations.

What is visualised here is not a charade to be enacted by the respective foreign offices and the pretence of a so-called peace process, which merely means the bureaucratisation of the dispute. What is desperately needed is an affirmation by the Indian and Pakistani leadership at the highest level of the necessity of taking new measures to affect the settlement of the dispute within a reasonable time frame. To that end, India and Pakistan must together prepare a plan for the demilitarisation of the State with safeguards for security worked out together.

The confidence that a real peace process is being launched would be inspired by the ending of repressive measures within the Indian-controlled area by both the federal and the state authorities. If sincerity is brought to the process in place of cheap trickery, the dawn of peace will glow as never before osver the subcontinent.

Dr Fai is the Secretary-General, World Kashmir Awareness Forum. He can be reachedat gnfai2003@yahoo.com

Published in Daily Times, February 23^rd 2018.