This book by an advocate by profession, politician by mission and a journalist by passion, is one of the many that he has written on various aspects of Kashmir. This latest one is about the state of things in his home state during times of war and peace. He begins when the dawn of freedom is in the offing after the mid forties and the people are drifting and getting tossed afar due to a painful schism created among them.
He goes back to the year 1945 when Maharaja Hari Singh returns to Kashmir after participating in World War II. According to the author, it was the Indian politicians who wanted Kashmir to remain independent at that time and not Maharaja Hari Singh, who was determined to accede to India. He criticises Sheikh Abdullah whose ?cards were not clear, nor his stand unambiguous and firm. His fundamentals of politics had been flexible and himself wavering.? Following his release from prison on September 29, 1947, Sheikh Abdullah raised the slogan, ?Ilhak sey pehlay azadi? (freedom before accession) to open new vistas to start bargaining. It was the Congress leaders? misplaced trust and blind faith in Sheikh Abdullah that power was transferred to him and his party, says the author.
He continues that, ?after Independence, Pakistan government strove hard to expand and extend its tentacles to make interference easy in the internal affairs of the state. Anti-Hindu and anti-Maharaja feelings were whipped up by a large number of armed intruders from Pakistan to generate and escalate communal disorder and disturbances.? It was done to let the Muslims rule over the Hindus in the state. He holds not only the Indian leaders responsible for this state of conditions but also the British Government, who withdrew from India ?without any guidelines to the Indian princely states. They were left in the lurch, albeit three options were given to the ruler of a state: 1) accede to Dominion of India, 2) accede to Dominion of Pakistan and 3) declare independence. The ruler of Jammu & Kashmir executed legally valid accession under the India Independence Act 1947, in favour of India, making his state a full-fledged component and unit of the Indian Union.? But Pakistan did not accept this and went to the Security Council, which, in 1949, passed a resolution to divide and decide on holding of plebiscite in Jammu & Kashmir, subject to fulfilment of certain conditions. Rest is history.
Pyarelal Kaul says that Pakistan continues with its low-profile proxy war against India, keeping alive border terrorism and ?it is understandable that there was American influence, if not pressure, working behind holding the bilateral negotiations (after the Kargil War), but it is not understandable as to why India should succumb despite being on a righteous path.?
The suffering Kashmiri author, like many other fellow Kashmiris, says that just as Nehru had contested Pakistan'slocus standi in Kashmir by quipping, ?You have no right to be in Kashmir. Kashmir belongs to us?, why can'tIndia tell this fact in plain language to the new rulers of Pakistan?
(Suman Publications, Top Floor, Samachar Post Chambers, 50- C Main Road, Preet Vihar, New Delhi-110 092.)
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