Daily Times

The Indian government is planning on introducing a controversial legislative bill in the Indian parliament known as the ‘Geospatial Information Regulation Bill 2016’. This bill shall make it illegal for local and international geospatial mapping organisations along with individuals to depict India’s map ‘incorrectly’. According to the officials involved in drafting this bill, the states of ‘Arunachal Pradesh’ and ‘Jammu and Kashmir’, including Pakistan’s Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan regions, are to be depicted as union territories of India across all mapping groups in the world. This includes navigation devices, paper maps and online depictions of South Asia. Furthermore, any organisation or person failing to abide by the proposed bill shall be liable to hefty penalty that even includes Google and subsidiary Google Earth.

This bill is not only controversial but by established norms of international law it is also legally dubious. Pakistan took the right step in approaching the United Nations Secretary-General (UNSG) regarding the legislation of the bill. The letter sent to UNSG by Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs aptly states, “Through the passage of this Bill, the Indian government would penalise the individuals and organisations who depict Jammu and Kashmir as a disputed territory as per the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions.” Past UN resolutions including Resolution 47 of the UN Security Council have already declared the state of Jammu and Kashmir as a disputed region with UN Military Observer Group acting a peacemaker in the region. It is widely known that Resolution 47 was non-binding under Chapter 6 of the UN Charter but the issue is of international level and cannot be subdued on the wishes of India.

By introducing the geospatial mapping bill, India is not only breaking international law but also forcefully trying to depict a neighbouring country’s region as its own. Should the bill get approved, Pakistan should pursue aggressive lobbying in the international community to force India to withdraw the controversial legislative draft bill.

The reality is that the regions of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan are an integral part of Pakistan with their people standing firm with the state. The real cause of concern for India and the international community should be what the Indian Army is doing in Indian-Occupied Kashmir with the local people. It is widely believed that gross violations of human rights along with the suppression of the struggle for freedom are being perpetrated in Indian occupied Kashmir.

Nevertheless, Pakistani mapmakers have also depicted Indian-Occupied Kashmir as an integral part of Pakistan. Instead of going by wishful thoughts, the actual map to be drawn by both India and Pakistan should depict the Line of Control (LoC) as the temporary border. The future of this border largely depends on how the issues of Kashmir including Siachen are resolved and one can only hope for peace to prevail. The arms race in South Asia created by India is already deteriorating the regional balance of power and this new issue of mapping may further complicate the matter. *