Kashmir Dispute – The Myth

History vindicated Maharaja Hari Singh’s Stand

By Dr. M.K. Teng

Neither the composition of the population of the  Princely States nor the self-determination of their peoples was recognised by the British, the Muslim League and the Indian National Congress, as the determining factor of the future disposition for the states in respect of their accession.

After the 3 June Declaration, envisaging the partition of the British India, Nehru demanded the right of the people of the Princely States to determine their disposition in respect of their accession Mohammad Ali Jinnah rejected Nehru’s demand as an attempt to thwart the process of the partition. Shortly, before the transfer of power, the Governor General of India, Lord Mountbatten advised the Princess to keep in consideration the geography and the composition of the population of the States in reaching a decision on their accession. Mountbatten proposed to the Muslim League as well as the Congress to accept the principles of the partition–geographical contiguity and the composition of the population as the criteria of their accession. While the Congress leaders indicated their inclination to accept the proposals, the Muslim League leadership reacted sharply against the proposals and characterised them as an attempt to interfere with the rights of the Princes to determine the future of the States. At that time the Muslim League was deeply involved in shadowy maneuvers to support the Muslim rulers of several major States to remain out of India and align with Pakistan. It has been pointed out in an earlier part of this paper that Pakistan invoked the partition to legitimize its claim to Jammu and Kashmir on the basis of the Muslim majority character of its population after the last two Muslim ruled States of Junagarh and Hyderabad were integrated with India.

There is enough historical evidence available, which reveals that in persuading the Congress leaders to accept the partition the British assured the Congress leaders that after the Muslim majority provinces and regions were separated to form the Muslim homeland of Pakistan, the unity of the rest of India, including the states would be preserved and not impaired any further.

The Indian leaders rejected the claim Pakistan made to the Muslim majority States as well as the  Muslim ruled States, but they dithered when the time to act and unite the States with India arrived. Instead of taking active measures to bring about the unification of the States with India, they resorted to subterfuge..

The Indian leaders turned to Mountbatten and not the people of the States to bring about their  integration with India. Mountbatten steered the States Department to accept a balance between the Muslim ruled States and the Muslim majority States. The largest of the Muslim ruled States were deep inside the Indian mainland. Neither Gandhi nor Nehru objected to the course, the Indian States Department followed.

The Viceroy did not forgive Hari Snigh for having disregarded his advice to come to terms with Pakistan. He refused stubbornly to deal with Jammu and Kashmir independent of the Muslim States and in the long run did more harm to Jammu and Kashmir than anybody else in India did. He was the main proponent of the policy of isolation, the Indian leaders followed towards Jammu and Kashmir. The way Mountbatten acted as the Governor General of India till 15 August 1947, and the way he acted as the Governor General of the Indian Dominion after 15 August 1947, left wide space open for Pakistan to claim a separate freedom for the Muslim of Jammu and Kashmir on the basis of the Muslim majority character of its population. Not many months after the Security Council adopted its first resolution on Jammu and Kashmir in August 1948, the Muslims laid claim to a separate freedom for them on the basis of the Muslim majority character of the population.

The Government of India and the Indian political leadership failed to rebut the claim made by Pakistan and the Muslims in Jammu and Kashmir that the state was on the agenda of the partition of India. Not only that, the Government of India and the Indian political leadership failed to refute the claim made by the Muslims of the state to a separate freedom, different from the freedom that the Indian people were ensured by the Constitution of India – a separate freedom which was determined by the theological imperatives of Islam. The Indian leaders overlooked the fact that the conflict which led to the partition of India was rooted in the claim the Indian Muslims made to a separate freedom which drew its sanction from the precept and precedent of religion.

The Muslim League followed a meticulously designed plan to use the Muslim rulers of several major Princely States, situated deep inside the Indian mainland to bring about the fragmentation of India. The Indian  leaders walked into the trap when they tried to balance the accession the Muslim majority state of Jammu and Kashmir with the accession of the Hindu majority States ruled by the Muslim Nawabs like Bhopal, Hyderabad and Junagarh. The strategy to refer the issue of the accession to the people of these States tantamounted to the acceptance of the Muslim claim to a separate freedom, the Two-Nation theory envisaged. The Indian proposals to Pakistan to refer the accession of Junagarh with that Dominion, accomplished by the ruler of the State on the eve of the transfer of power, was a tame recognition of the Muslim claim to a separate freedom. When Pakistan made a counter-proposal to hold a plebiscite in all the three States, the Government of India was suddenly faced with a catastrophic choice. It promptly rejected the proposals made by Pakistan.

The Indian Government, for unknown reasons, separated its offer to refer the accession of the State to its people i.e. the Muslims for their endorsement. Why did not the Indian Government propose to refer the accession of Bhopal and Trancore to the Dominion of India, to the people of the two States? The rulers of both the States were opposed to join India and their people took to the streets and forced them to accede to India. Hardly ten months after the accession of the Jammu and Kashmir while the Indian armies were still fighting to drive out the invading forces, United Nations foisted a resolution on India which envisaged a plebiscite to determine its final disposition in respect of its accession. The resolution of the Security Council, virtually underlined the repudiation of the accession of the State to India and opened the option for the Muslims of the State to exercise their choice to join Pakistan. The Security Council Resolution was the first step in the process of the internationalization of the claim of the Muslims of the State to a separate freedom.  The Government of India cried hoarse that it had rejected the Two-Nation Theory inspite of having accepted the partition of India. But its commitment to refer the accession of the State, accomplished by Hari Singh to its people was a tacit recognition of the right to a separate freedom, which underlined the demand for Pakistan.

Another ten months after the August resolution of the Security Council was adopted the Indian Government took a fateful step and formally recognised the right the Muslims for Jammu and Kashmir to a separate freedom, when in May 1949, it agreed to exclude Jammu and Kashmir from the constitutional organisation of India. In November 1949, the Constituent Assembly of India incorporated provisions in the Constitution of India which left out the State from the constitutional structure which it had evolved for the Dominion as well as the Princely States which had acceded to India  and after years of labour. The special provisions for the State, embodied in the Constitution of India, stipulated the application of only Article if the Constitution of India to the State. A blanket limitation was imposed upon the application of the rest of the provisions of the Constitution of India to the State. The Union Government was empowered to exercise powers listed in the Central list of the Seventh Schedule of the India Constitution only in respect of defence, foreign affairs and communications which corresponded with the powers delegated by the State to the Dominion Government by virtue of the Instrument of Accession.

The Interim Government of the State, constituted by the National Conference insisted upon the right to frame a separate constitution for the State, which fulfilled the aspirations of the Muslims who constituted a majority of its population. The Interim Government arrogated to itself unrestricted powers and ruled the State by decree and ordinance. Within six years of its tenure, it completed the task of the Muslimisation of the State by enforcing the precedence of Islam and the Muslim majority in its social, economic and political organisation. In 1953, the Interim Government claimed a separate freedom for the Muslim ‘nation’ of Kashmir. The Indian leaders had conceded to the Muslims the right to constitute a Muslim State of Jammu and Kashmir on the territories of India. Confronted by the demand for a Muslim State outside the territories of India, the Indian leaders were flustered. They refused to countenance the Muslim demand for a separate Muslim State of Jammu and Kashmir, which did not form a part of India. The Interim Government was dismissed and the National Conference broke up.

Pakistan, the Muslim separatist and pro-Pakistan Muslim flanks joined by a large section of the leaders and cadres of the National Conference, called for a plebiscite in the State, which enabled the Muslims to exercise their right of self-determination. They claimed that they had acquired in consequence of the partition of India and which India, Pakistan as well as the United Nations had explicitly recognised.

The Muslim separatist movement led by the Plebiscite Front, committed itself to an ideological framework which was based upon the distortions of the history of the partition of India. The ideological commitments of the Plebiscite Front underlined : (a) that the right of the Muslims to a separate freedom enmated from the partition of India and the creation of the Muslim homeland of Pakistan; (b) that the right of the Muslims to a separate freedom transcended the accession of the State to India, brought about by the ruler of the State; and (c) that as a consequence of the partition of India, the Muslims, constituting the majority of the population of the State, had acquired an irreversible right to exercise their option to join the Muslim State of Pakistan.

In 1990, the Muslim Jehad initiated by Pakistan and the Muslim separatist forces in the State, claimed their aims to be the unification of Jammu and Kashmir with Pakistan on the basis of the Muslim majority character of its population to complete the agenda of the partition of India. The Jehad claimed that Muslims of the State, as the Muslims elsewhere in India, had acquired a right to a separate freedom which the  Muslim struggle for Pakistan had secured the Muslim nation of India.

The Indian Government and the Indian political class must realise that the Muslims of the State did not acquire any right to separate freedom from the partition of India, which brought Pakistan into being and any attempts to arrive at a compromise with the Muslim separatists forces will lead straight to a second partition of India. The Muslim claim to a separate freedom on the basis of religious is a negation of the unity of India.

Of the many distortions of the history of the transfer of power in India, which form a part of the Kashmir dispute, the most conspicuous is the distortion of the historical facts of the boundary demarcation between the Dominion of India and Pakistan in the province of the Punjab. After the announcement of the partition plan on 3 June, 1947, a Boundary Commission was constituted by the British to demarcate the boundary between the Muslim majority zones and the Hindu-Sikh majority zones in the two provinces of Bengal and the Punjab. The Boundary Commission for the demarcation of the Muslim majority zone in the Punjab was constituted of four Boundary Commissioners, two of them representing the Muslims and two representing Hindus and the Sikhs. Justice Din Mohammad and Justice Mohammad Munir represented the Muslims and Justice Mehar Chand Mahajan and Justice Teja Singh represented the Hindus and the Sikhs respectively. A British lawyer of great repute, Sir Cyril Radcliff was appointed the Chairman of the Commission. Sir Radcliff presided over the Boundary Commission appointed for the demarcation of the boundary in the province of Bengal as well.

The Boundary Commission was charged with the responsibility of demarcating the Muslim majority region of the Punjab from the Hindu-Sikh majority region of the province on the basis of the population and other factors, which were considered to be relevant to the division of the province. Justice Mohammad Munir and Justice Din Mohammad refused to agree upon the criteria to specifically identify the factors other than population ratios. The Muslim Commissioners insisted upon strict adherence to the population proportions as the basis of the division of the province.

Mehar Chand Mahajan and Teja Singh pleaded for a balanced interpretation of the terms of reference of the Boundary Commission and emphasised the need to bring about harmonization between population proportions and the “other factors”, specified in the terms of reference. They felt that the division of the province of the Punjab was bound to affect the lives of millions of people, belonging to various communities living in the province as well as the future of the two Dominions, India and Pakistan. The Commissioners pointed out to the Commission that the population of the Hindus and Sikhs was unevenly distributed over the province of the Punjab. They pointed out that larger sections of the Hindu and Sikh population were concentrated in relatively smaller region of the East Punjab  and the imbalance would be reflected in demarcation of Hindu and Sikh majority regions from the Muslim majority regions of the West Punjab. They expressed the fears that the territorial division of the Punjab on the basis of population would earmark a smaller part of the East Punjab, to the Hindu and Sikh Community which would not commenserate with their population in the province. The Hindus and the Sikhs, Mahajan and Teja Singh pointed out to the Commission formed 45 percent of the population of the province and the territorial division of the province on the basis of the population ratios would leave them with less than 30 percent of the territory of the Punjab.

Mahajan and Teja Singh pointed out to the commission that fair distribution of river waters, irrigation headworks and canal system and cultural and religious centres could not be left out of its consideration in the delimitation of the Muslim majority and the Hindu and Sikh majority regions of the province. They emphasized the necessity of keeping in view the geographical contiguity of the demarcated regions, the communications and the viability of the borders  of the two Dominions of India and Pakistan. They told the Commission that in the demarcation of the borders between the West Punjab and the East Punjab balance would have to be achieved to ensure a fair and equitable division of the territories of the province between the Muslim community and the Hindu and the Sikh communities.

The most controversial and bitterly contested part of the demarcation for the borders was the division of the Doab, comprising the districts of the Lahore Division. Of the four districts of Lahore Division, the District of Amritsar was a Hindu-Sikh majority district and the district of Gurdaspur was a Muslim majority district with the Muslims having a nominal majority of 0.8 percent. Both Din Mohammad and Mohammad Munir insisted upon the inclusion of the entire Lahore Division in the West Punjab. The Muslim Commissioners were men of great ability and legal acumen and had the advantage of representing the majority community of the Punjab. They knew that the inclusion of the Lahore Division in the West Punjab would be of crucial importance to the future of Pakistan. The inclusion of the Lahore Division in the West Pakistan would ensure the Muslim homeland a larger share of water resources, irrigation headworks and the canal system of the Punjab. It would also close the only communication line; the Jammu-Madhopur fair weather road, which ran between the Jammu and Kashmir State and the Dominion of India. The Muslim League leaders were keen to isolate Jammu and Kashmir and build pressure on the ruler of the State to compel him to come to terms with Pakistan. Jammu and Kashmir was not wholly isolated from India and had a contiguous frontier with Kangra and the Punjab Hill States, which had acceded to India. The State Government could construct an alternative communication route to connect the State with India. The construction of an alternative road between the State and the Dominion of India would, however, be an arduous task and take a long time, thus exposing the State to more hardship. Logistically also the construction of an alternative road would pose many problems. The borders between the State and the Indian Union running east of the Pathankot tehsil in Gurdaspur district, through which the Jammu-Madhopur road run, were mountainous and rugged and largely snowbound. The closure of the Jammu-Sialkot road and railway line and the Jhelum Valley road, which linked Srinagar with Rawalpindi had been closed by Pakistan and there was little prospect of their being thrown open for transport after the State joined India. By the time, the Boundary Commission begun its work, Pakistan was left with little doubt about the disinclination for the ruler of the State Maharaja Hari Singh to accede to that country.

Mahajan and Teja Singh pleaded for the inclusion of the Division of Lahore in the East Punjab. The two Commissioners raised fundamental issues with unparalleled eloquence in respect of their claim, which Sir Cyril Radcliffe could not overlook altogether. The issues they raised, included:

i) the distribution of water resources between the East and West Punjab, the location of the irrigation headworks and the canal system;

ii) the continuation of the communication lines in the East Punjab of which the Lahore Division formed Centre;

iii) the demarcation of a viable and defensible border of the India in the Punjab;

iv) the interests of the Sikh Community which had its largest assets in the West Punjab and its main religious and cultural centres in the Division of Lahore;

v) the Indian interest in the road-link between Jammu and Madhopur, arising out of its proximity to Jammu and Kashmir State for the security of that state as well as its future relations with the Indian Dominion.

Both Mahajan and Teja Singh avoided the heavily value-laden discourse of the Congress leaders, in their presentation to the Commission. They marshalled up concrete facts relevant to the demarcation of boundary in the Punjab and elucidated in detail the consequences – geographic, economic, political and strategic, the division of the province was bound to lead to and their impact on the future of the Hindus and Sikhs in the Punjab. Sir Radcliffe was a man of independent outlook, sent down from his country to draw the boundaries of the new Muslim State of Pakistan, which the British had actively connvived in creating. Sir Radcliffe knew little of the cultural configuration of the Punjab, its economic organisation and its history. Not only the Punjab, Sir Radcliffe knew much less of the history and culture and economic and political organisation of Bengal, the other Indian province he was commissioned to divide between the two communities, Hindus and Muslims, on the basis of population proportions.

Mahajan and Teja Singh were genuinely fearful of the future of their communities in the Punjab. The history of the Punjab had been shaped by Hindus and the Sikhs. The Sikhs established a powerful Kingdom in the Punjab, the borders of which extended from Afghanistan to the eastern fringes of Tibet. The Sikh state integrated the Himalayas into the northern frontier of India. The Himalayas, Sanskritised by the Hindus of Kashmir, formed the civilisational frontier of India. The establishment of the Sikh power put an end to the long history of the invasion of India from the north. The division of Punjab was bound to have serious effect on the future of the Sikh community. The Punjab was considered by the Sikhs to be their homeland. The Sikh places of pilgrimage were located in the eastern part of the Punjab, mainly the Division of Lahore. The responsibility of apprising the Boundary Commission of the sociology of the Sikh religion and its moorings in the Hindu civilisation of India, fell upon the Hindu and Sikh Commissioners. Teja Singh, ravaged by the anti-Hindu riots in the Punjab, exhibited great courage and forbearance, in defending the cause of his community.

The Muslim League carried on a strident campaign to build pressure on the Commission to demarcate the boundary between the east and the West Punjab on the basis of the population proportions. The British Governors of the Punjab and the North-East Frontier province along with the British officials posted in the two provinces acted in tandem to influence the Commission.

The Boundary Commission was entrusted with the historic task, of the demarcation of the Indian frontier in the north. Jammu and Kashmir formed the central spur of the warm Himalayan uplands and the new configuration of power created by the emergence of the Muslim state of Pakistan, was bound to effect the security of the Himalayas. There is no evidence to show that the Indian leaders realised the importance of the crucial changes, the emergence of Pakistan, would bring about in the structure of power-relations along northern frontier of India.

The Hindu and Sikh leaders of the Punjab evinced serious interest in the boundary demarcation. Both Mahajan and Teja Singh kept themselves in close touch with the Hindu and Sikh leaders of the Punjab. Among them were Sir Shadi Lal and Bakshi Tek Chand. Both Sir Shadi Lal and Tek Chand were in the confidence of Maharaja Hari Singh. The Indian leaders had warbled notions about the northern frontier of India. They were carried away by the fraternal regard, the Asian conference held in Delhi in 1946, symbolised. The Indian leaders viewed the solidarity of the Asian people and the emergence of the Asian nation from colonial dominance as basis for coexistence and cooperation among the Asian people. Gandhi disclaimed national frontiers. He claimed commitment to vaguely conceived concept of anarchism which formed a part of the intellectual tradition of the early twentieth century.

They had accepted partition of India, but they refused to recognise its political implications. They were unable to comprehend the significance of the demarcation of the boundary between India and Pakistan in the Punjab. Their inability to link the boundary demarcation in the Punjab with the security of the Northern Frontier of India exposed Jammu and Kashmir and the entire Indian frontier, stretching to its east, to foreign aggression.

Another man, whose future  was linked with the de marcation of the boundary in the Punjab, was Maharaja Hari Singh, the ruler of Jammu and Kashmir. The Jammu-Madhopur fair weather cart-road was the only communication link between the State and India. The two major all weather motorable roads, the Jehlum-Valley Road linking Srinagar with Rawalpindi and the Jammu-Sialkot road ran into the West Punjab. The railway line connecting Jammu with Sialkot also ran into the West Punjab. The border between the State and Kangra and the Punjab Hill States, which had decided to accede to India, was broken by rugged mountainous terrain. An alternate road could be built via Mukerian to connect Jammu with Kangra and via Doda with the Punjab Hill States. Indeed, when Mahajan and Teja Singh pointed out to the Commission the necessity of securing access to Jammu and Kashmir through East Punjab, Mohammad Munir and Din Mohammad suggested the construction of an alternate land route via Mukerian connecting Jammu with Kangra. The Hindu and the Sikh Commissioners  realised, as did Hari Singh, the importance of the tehsil of Pathankot to the viability and the defensibility of the borders of India as well the Jammu and Kashmir State.

Sir Shadi Lal and Bakshi Tek Chand kept Hari Singh informed of the boundary demarcation in the Punjab. They were close to Mehar Chand Mahajan and had apprised him of the interest Hari Singh had in the demarcation of the boundary in the Punjab.

Hari Singh was suspicious of Mountbatten, whose mind he knew. He did not trust the Congress leaders. He had received a communication from States Minister, in which the latter had advised him to release the National Conference leaders and come to terms with them. Unsure of the course Sir Radcliffe would follow in respect of his State, he reportedly, conveyed to the British officials, through some of his trusted British friends, his interests in a balance border with the two Dominions of India and Pakistan and the importance of the Jammu-Pathankot road for the security of his State. Reportedly, he conveyed to the British authorities that in case he was not secured the land route between Jammu and Pathankot he would have no other alternative except to depend upon the Dominion of India for the construction of a new transit route, across the eastern borders of the State with Kangra or with any of the Punjab Hill States, which had already acceded to India.

The British were not averse to a balanced border of the State with India and Pakistan, for they were keen to avoid any diplomatic or political lapse which would push the Maharaja into the lap of India. Some of the British officials sincerely believed that Hari Singh would opt for an arrangement in which he was not required to accede to any of the Dominions, if he was guaranteed peace on his frontiers. Ram Chander Kak, out of stratagem or straight devotion to his master, had spared no efforts to assure the British, that Hari Singh pursued a policy, which enabled him to retain his independence, rather than join India which was beset with serious difficulties.

In view of the extremely divergent views and deep disagreement among the Hindu and Sikh Commissioners and the Muslim Commissioners, the Boundary Commission was unable to reach a mutually acceptable agreement on the demarcation of the boundary across the Lahore Division. In accordance with the procedure laid down for the Boundary Commission, in case of disagreement among the Hindu, Sikh and the Muslim representation in the Commission, it was decided by mutual agreement to entrust the task of the demaracation to Sir Radcliffe, the Chairman of the Boundary Commission. The Commissioners, representing the Hindus and the Sikh as well as the Muslims agreed that the arbitral award made by Sir Radcliffe would be binding on them.

History had cast a unique responsibility on Sir Radcliffe, to lay down the future boundaries of the nation of India, which was on the threshold of freedom from centuries of slavery as well as describe the future boundaries of an independent Muslim state in India. The Congress leaders, were perhaps, oblivious of the elemental  change the creation of Pakistan would bring into the civilisational boundaries of India and the far-reaching effect the establishment of a Muslim power in India, would have on its northern frontiers. Jammu and Kashmir formed the central spur of the great Himalayan uplands poised as the State was, it stood as a sentinel for any eastward expansion of any power from the west as well as the north.

Pakistan was, however, keenly conscious of the strategic importance of Jammu and Kashmir. But the Government of Pakistan was unable to judge the ability of Maharaja Hari Singh to defeat their designs. Hari Singh played a historic role in persuading Sir Radcliffe to accept  that his State could not be completely isolated from the Indian Dominion.

The Muslim League leaders did not trust Hari Singh. They spared no efforts to convince the British officials in the Government of India about the necessity to ensure that the Boundary Commission did not deviate from the principle of the population proportions. The Muslim League leaders were keen to acquire the Ravi Headworks at Madhopur isolate the district of Amritsar and seal the existing road-link connecting Jammu and Kashmir with India. The League leaders sent Chowdhary Mohammad Ali to convey to the British officials in the Indian Government their concern about the future of the Lahore Division. Mohammad Ali met, Lord Ismay, the Political Advisor to the Viceroy to convey to Mountbatten the anxiety of the Muslim League leaders about any deviation from the principle of population-proportions the Boundary Commission may resort to in the demarcation of the boundary in the Punjab. Ismay told Mohammad Ali that the Boundary Commission was an independent body of which the functions were determined by its terms of reference, and the Government of India had no role in its function. Many years later, research in Pakistan revealed that during his meeting with Lord Ismay, Mohammad Ali showed the Political Advisor a sketch map of the demarcation of the boundary between east and west Punjab which was not strictly based upon the principle of population-proportions. Ismay, reportedly expressed dissatisfaction with it.

The award of the Boundary Commission was announced on 18 of August 1947, three days after the transfer of power in India. Sir Radcliffe left India the same day. The districts of Amritsar and Gurdaspur were included in the East Punjab, whereas the districts of Lahore and Sheikhopora were included in the West Punjab. The entire Muslim League leadership flared upon in anger against the inclusion of Gurdaspur in the East Punjab and blamed Sir Radcliffe of connivance in a craftily devised plan to give India access to Jammu and Kashmir and provide the Indian state the strategic ground to grab the State. Communal riots flared up in Lahore and spread to the whole of the Punjab.

Sir Radcliffe followed uniform standards in the delimitation of the boundary between India and Pakistan in Bengal as well as the Punjab. Evidently, he did not overlook the consideration of other factors, specifically mentioned in the terms of reference of the Boundary Commission in the delimitation of the boundary between the East and the West Punjab. He did take into consideration the nominal majority, the Muslims enjoyed over the Hindus and the Sikhs in Gurdaspur. The Tehsil of Pathankote in the Gurdaspur district had a distinct Hindu majority and it could not have been included in the West Punjab by any stretch of imagination. Sir Radcliffe had not followed the district boundaries as the basis of delimitation of the boundaries elsewhere in the Punjab. Besides, the Ravi irrigation headworks were located in Pathankot and they could not have been excluded from the East Punjab, to ensure a just and equitable distribution of water resources in the Punjab between India and Pakistan. undoubtedly, Sir Radcliffe did not overlook the necessity of providing a balanced border to the Jammu and Kashmir State, for which Mahajan and Teja Singh had spiritedly  pleaded. The security of the Jammu and Kashmir State, which constituted the central spur of the northern frontier of India and which was crucial to the security of the Himalays, could not be left out the consideration of the Boundary Commission. The division of the Punjab was a part of the partition  of India and the demarcation of the boundary between India and Pakistan could not be undertaken in isolation from its effects on the Indian States. The delimitation of the boundary in the Punjab around the Bahawalpur State, was undertaken with due consideration of its future affiliations. Bahawalpur joined Pakistan,.

Sir Radcliffe recognised the inclusion of the district of Gurdaspur in the East Punjab as a strategic requirement of the security of the northern frontier of India, including the frontier of India in the Punjab. He accepted in his report that the inclusion of Gurdaspur in the East Punjab was necessary for the security of the district of Amritsar, which would otherwise he surrounded by Pakistan. Perhaps, Radcliffe was aware of the security of the northern Frontier of India, in which the British were more interested than the Congress leaders, who had warbled notions about the security of the Himalayas. Unlike the other officials of the Government of India, Radcliffe was free of the trappings, the British officials of the Indian Civil Service were strapped to. He did not visualise the partition of India as the British officials of the Indian Government did, and he was guided by his own judgement. He refused to recognise the claim to the geographical expression of the Muslim nation of Pakistan, the way the British officials of the Indian Government did. He had little regard for their colonial concerns or Jinnah’s notions of the ascendance of the Muslims power in India.

An important consideration which Sir Radcliffe had in mind in dividing the Lahore Division was the future of the Sikh Community, which was bound to be adversely affected by the partition of the Punjab. The land and the assets owned by the Sikhs were largely situated in the west Punjab but a larger section of their population lived in the East Punjab. Besides, their main religious centres and most sacred shrines, including the Durbar Saheb, were located in the Lahore Division. The division of the Punjab was bound to uproot them from the West Pakistan and deprive them of their land and assets. The claim laid by the Muslims to the whole of Lahore Division, would divest them of their sacred places and shrines. Lahore was the seat of the Sikh empire of the Punjab, which had changed the course of the history of India. The demarcation of the boundary of the East Punjab was therefore, crucial to the survival and future of the Sikh community. Both Mahajan and Teja Singh emphasised upon the need to consider the interests of the Sikh community in the demarcation of the boundary in the Punjab.

The inclusion of Gurdaspur in the East Punjab mitigated, though only partially, the rigours of the division of the Punjab. The delimitation of the boundary in the Punjab, Sir Radcliffe undertook, gave the Muslims, who constituted 55 percent of the population of the Province, 65 percent of its territory. The Hindus and the Sikhs who constituted 45 percent of the population got only 35 percent of the territory of the Punjab. The Muslim League leaders had no reason to grumble. Their reconstruction were politically motivated and aimed to prepare ground to launch a new form of Direct Action to reduce the Jammu and Kashmri State.

Pakistan resorted to the distortion of the history of the transfer of power in India, to justify its claim on Jammu and Kashmir. Inside Jammu and Kashmir the National Conference leaders who ruled the State for decades after its accession to India, resorted to the distortion of the history of the accession of the State to India, to legitimize their claim to a Muslim State of Jammu and Kashmir inside India but independent of the Indian Union and its political organisation. Not only that. The Muslim separatists forces, which dominated the political scene in the State after the disintegration of the National Conference in 1953, also resorted to the fossilization of the facts of the accession of the State to India. Interestingly, the entire process of the distortion of the history of the accession of the State, spread over decades of Indian freedom assumed varied expressives from time to time.

Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah who headed the Interim Government instituted in March 1948, disclaimed the Instrument of Accession executed by Hari Singh, as merely the Kagzi Ilhaq’ or “paper Accession” and claimed that the “real accession of the state to India” would be accomplished by the people of the State, more precisely the Muslim majority of the people of the State. While the Constitution of India was on the anvil and the issue of the constitutional provisions for the States came up for the consideration for the Constituent Assembly of India, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah claimed that the National Conference had endorsed the accession of the State to India on the condition that the claim the people of the state had to a separate freedom was recognised by India and the leadership of the National Conference had been assured by the Indian leaders that the people of Jammu and Kashmir would be reserved the right to constitute Jammu and Kashmir into an autonomous political organisation, independent of the Indian constitutional organisation.

Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and other National Conference leaders, claimed that they had been assured that Jammu and Kashmir would not be integrated in the constitutional organisaion of India and the assurances were incorporated in the Instrument of Accession. They stressed that they had agreed to the accede to India on the specific condition that the Muslim identity of the State would form the basis of its political organisation.

In his inaugural address to the Constituent Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir convened in 1951, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah who was the Prime Minister of the Interim Government of the State, claimed that the Constituent Assembly was vested with the plenary powers, drawn from the people of the State and independent of the Constitution of India. He claimed that the Constituent Assembly was vested with the powers to opt out of India and assume independence or join the Muslim state of Pakistan.

Fifty years later the claims Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah made in the Constituent Assembly were echoed in the first Round Table Conference, convened by the Government of India in 2006, to reach a consensus on a future settlement of the Kashmir dispute.

Mr Muzaffar Hussain Beg, represented the People Democratic Party in the Round Table Conference which was a constituent of the coalition government in the State, headed by the Congress Party. Beg claimed, that the Instrument of Accession was a treaty between two independent states, the Dominion of India and the Jammu and Kashmir State and the Constituent Assembly was a sovereign authority, independent powers inherent in its sovereignty.

The Government of India made no efforts to put the record straight. Frightened at the prospect of losing the support of the National Conference the Indian leaders did not question the veracity of the claims the Conference leaders made. Indeed, they depended upon the support of the National Conference to win the plebiscite which the United Nations Organisation was hectically preparing to hold in the State. The Indian leaders, overwhelmed by their own sense of self-righteousness, helped overtly and covertly in the falsification of the history of the integration of the Princely States with India and the accession of Jammu and Kashmir with the Indian Dominion in 1947. Many of them went as far as to link the unity of India with the reassertion of the subnational identity of Jammu and Kashmir, which the Muslim demand for separate freedom for the Muslim symbolised.

The Indian Independence Act of 1947, laid down separate procedures for the transfers of power in the British India and the Indian Princely States. The Princely States were left out of the partition plan, which divided the British Indian provinces and envisaged the creation of the Muslim state of Pakistan. In respect of the Princely States, the Indian Independence Act, envisaged the lapse of the paramountcy – the power which the British Crown exercised over the Indian States. The British Government clarified its stand on the future disposition of the States in the British Parliament during the debate on the Indian Independence Bill. It categorically stated that the lapse of the Paramountcy would not enable the Princes to acquire Dominion status or assume independence.

The British Government made it clear that the reversion of the Paramountcy to the rulers of the States would inevitably lead to mutually accepted agreements between the Dominions and the Princely States which would involve their accession. The Indian Independence Act did not envisage in the procedure the accession of States. The Nawab of Bhopal approached the Diplomatic Mission of the United States of America in India to seek the recognition of the Independence of his state. The American Government snubbed the Nawab and refused to countenance any proposals for the independence of the Princely States in India. It was left to be formulated by the two Dominions of India and Pakistan.

The Political Department of the British Government of India was divided into two separate Political Departments – the Political Department of Pakistan to deal with the Indian Princely States. The Political Department of India was put in charge of Sardar Vallabhai Patel and the Political Department of Pakistan was put in charge of Sardar Abdur Rab Nishtar. The procedure for the accession of the States to the two Dominions was evolved separately by their respective Political Departments.

The Muslim League however, insisted upon the independence of the Princely States in order to enable the Muslim ruled states to remain out of India. The Muslim League aimed to Balkanise the Princely States and place the state of Pakistan in a position which provided it a way to forge an alliance with them. The Indian States spread over more than one-third of the territory of India constituted more than one fourth of the Indian population. Some of the Muslim ruled Princely States were largest among the Princely States of India and several of them were fabulously rich.

The claim Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah made in his inaugural speech to the Constituent Assembly of the State that the States had the option to assume independence was a reiteration of the stand the Muslim League had taken on the future disposition of the states following the lapse of the Paramountcy. The lapse of the Paramountcy did not underline the independence of the States. It did not envisage the reversion of any plenary powers to the Princes or the people of the states as a consequence of the dissolution of the Paramountcy. The states were not independent when they were integrated in the British Empire in India. They did not acquire independence when they were liberated from the British Empire 1947. They were not vested with any inherent powers to claim independence to which Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah referred to in his inaugural address to the Constituent Assembly.

The convocation of the Constituent Assemblies in the States was provided for in the stipulations of the Instrument of Accession that the Princely States acceding to India, executed. The Instrument of Accession devised by the States Department of Pakistan for the accession of the States to that country did not envisage provisions pertaining to the convocation of the Constituent Assembly. The power to convene separate Constituent Assemblies was reserved for all the major states the Union of the States, which acceded to India.

The Jammu and Kashmir State was no exception. In fact, Constituent Assemblies were convened, in the states of Cochin and Mysore and the State Union of Saurashtra, shortly after their accession to the Indian Dominion.

The Constituent Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir was a creature of the Instrument of Accession. It exercised powers which were drawn from the state of India and its sovereign authority. It did not assess any powers to revoke the accession of the State to India to bring about the accession of the State to Pakistan or opt for its independence, as Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah in his inaugural address to the Constituent Assembly claimed or as Mr Muzaffar Hussain Beg claimed in the Round Table Conference.

The truth of what happened during those fateful days of October 1947, when the accession of Jammu and Kashmir to India was accomplished was concealed by a irredentist campaign of disinformation which was launched to cover the acts of cowardice and betrayal, subterfuge and surrender which went into the making of the Kashmir dispute.

The National Conference leaders, were at no stage, brought in to endorse the accession of the State to India. No one among them was required to sign or countersign the accession and none of them signed or countesigned the Instrument of Accession, executed by Maharaja Hari Singh. The Indian Independence Act, an Act of the British Parliament, which laid down the procedure for the transfer of power in India, did not recognize the right of self-determination of either the people of the British India or the people of the States.

The transfer of power was based on an agreement among the Congress, the Muslim League and the British. The British and the Muslim League stubbornly refused to recognise the right of the people of the British India and right of the people of the Princely State to determine the future of the British India or the Indian states. The Muslim League and the British insisted upon the lapse of the Paramountcy and its reversion to the rulers of the States. Accession of the States was not subject to any conditions and the Instrument of Accession underlined an irreversible process the British provided for the dissolution of the empire in India.

No assurance was given to the National Conference leaders that the Constituent Assembly of the State would be vested with plenary powers or powers to ratify the accession of the State to India, revoke it opt for its independence or its accession to Pakistan. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and the other National Conference leaders did not seek the exclusion of the State from the Indian political organization as a condition for the accession of the state to India. Nor did the Indian leaders give any assurance to them that the Jammu and Kashmir would be reconstituted into an independent political organisation, which would represent its Muslim identity.

At the time of the transfer of power in India, the National Conference leaders and cadres were in jail. They were released from their incarceration after the proclamation of General Amnesty was made on 6 September 1947. Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad, the Acting President of the National Conference who had evaded arrest and taken refugee in the British India in May 1946, arrived in Srinagar with several other senior leaders of the National Conference on 12 September 1947. Meanwhile, Mohi-ud-Din Qara the Director General of the War Council, which had been constituted by the National Conference to direct the Quit Kashmir Movement, surfaced from his underground quarters alongwith some of his close aides. Onkar Nath Trisal, who played a historic role in the defence of Srinagar, when the invading armies of Pakistan surrounded the city, was with him. Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah was released from jail on 29 September 1947.

Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad used the good offices of Pandit Sham Sundar Lal Dhar, a personal aide of the Maharaja to arrange a reconciliatory meeting between Hari Singh and Sheikh Mohammd Abdullah. The meeting did not go beyond usual formalities as the two men who shaped the future of the State looked at each other with cold distrust. Shiban Madan, a close kin of Sham Sundar Lal Dhar, then a man of younger years acted as a help. Shiban Madan told the author in a interview held in Srinagar in 1978, that Hari Singh sat through the meeting glumly. His Highness looked straight when the usual presentation ceremony of the Nazarana was completed. He sat glum and expressionless, his haughty demeanour more than awkwardly visible. The rest of the meeting was strictly formal.”

Hari Singh was unable to judge the far-reaching consequences of the end of the British empire in India. Not only him, the other Princes too refused to realise that their power, which had its sanction in the British Paramountcy had virtually suffered dissolution with its withdrawal. The Princely rulers genuinely believed that the States were their fiefs and the British had usurped their right to rule them. They visualised the end of the British Empire as an act of deliverance for them, which they believed would enable them to regain the unquestioned authority they had as the sovereigns of the states.

They considered accession of their States to India as a new arrangement with the Dominion of India, by virtue of which they would part with the specific powers of the defence, foreign affairs and communications of the states and retain the rest of the powers of the governance without the encumbrances the Paramountcy entailed.

Hari Singh had been shaken by Mountabatten’s advice to come to terms with Pakistan when the Viceroy visited Srinagar. Accession to Pakistan was the last act, Hari Singh was prepared to perform. However, when he turned to India and conveyed to the Indian leaders his desire to accede to India the Indian leaders advised him not to take any perceptible action in respect of the accession, till the transfer of power had been accomplished. The Indian leaders advised Hari Singh to end the distrust with the National Conference,  release the leaders and cadres of the Conference and take them into confidence and commence preparations to associate them with the government of the State.

After the transfer of power in August 1947 Hari Singh promptly ordered fresh recruitment to his armed forces and reportedly sought to secure field guns from Patiala and Hyderabad. Reports appeared in the newspapers in Pakistan that he tried to seek military assistance from India and wanted the Indian Government to take up the conversion of the fair weather road from Jammu to Madhopur, into a national roadway.

He was alarmed by the establishment of the Provisional Government of Pak-occupied-Kashmir at Tran Khel in the district of Mirpur by Sardar Ibrahim Khan on 30 August 1947. Hari Singh knew that the proclamation of the Provisional Government of Azad Kashmir had been made in connivance with the intelligence agencies of the Government of Pakistan and the leaders of the Muslim League to build pressure on him to accede to Pakistan.

Meanwhile Sham Sunder Lal Dhar helped to bridge the differences between Hari Singh and the National Conference leaders. Hari Singh agreed to revive the Dyarchy he had introduced in the State Government in 1944, and provide a wider share of power for the National Conference and accept to entrust a fairly large measure of responsibility in the State Government to National Conference leaders as members of his Council of Ministers. The National Conference leaders had shown their readiness to join the State Government.

For Hari Singh however, the difficulties he faced in regard to the accession were not eased. Several developments in the process of the integration of the States complicated his situation further. Junagarh, situated in the midst of the Kathiawad States, which had acceded to India, acceded to Pakistan on the eve of the transfer of power. The Nawab of Hyderabad refused to join India and secretly plotted with the leadership of the Muslim League to align himself with Pakistan.

Not only that. Mountbatten was at the helm of affairs in India, where he had been placed by the Congress leaders probably, to earn them a favourable disposition of the British. Hari Singh knew that Mountbatten had not forgiven him for his audacity to send him back to the Indian capital, without having agreed to abide by his advice to come to terms with Pakistan. It is hardly possible that the Congress leaders must not report have received the intelligence of what transpired between the Viceroy and the Maharaja in Srinagar. But how did they install him the first Governor-General of the Dominion of India is an enigma, which continues to remain unexplained.

Hari Singh was unsure of the Congress leaders as well, who had, in unabashed self-conceit, indicated their willingness to accept a settlement on the Princely States on the basis of their population and geographical location. Perhaps, they sought to use the influence of the Viceroy to ensure the accession of the Muslim ruled States, inhabited by Hindu majorities and situated within the territorial limits earmarked for the Indian Dominion to India. It is hardly possible that they did not know the mind of the Viceroy and perhaps the strategic implications of the future disposition of Jammu and Kashmir to the British interests in Asia. A section of the Congress leadership was not averse to the division of the States on the basis of their population even after the transfer of power. Some of them believed that Mountbatten would be able extricate Junagarh from Pakistan and bring about the integration of Hyderabad with India. Their prestige in the whole of the Kathiawad peninsula had plummeted down as they had reacted to the accession of Junagarh to Pakistan  pussiliminously. The rulers of the Kathiawad States had to send Jam Sahib of Nawanagar to convince the Congress leaders that Junagarh posed a serious threat to them and to demand immediate and effective action to liberate Junagarh, which was fast slipping into a civil wear.

The Congress leaders looked up to Mountbatten, who advised them restraint. Later admissions made by him in his interviews and memoirs, prove that he was keen to secure the interests of Pakistan and his country, Britain, in Jammu and Kashmir, but he had no mandate from the British Government to secure the Indian interests in the Muslim ruled States of Junagarh and Hyderabad. He disapproved of any perceptible action for the reclamation Junagarh and Hyderabad.

Hari Singh did not lose sight of the problems, arising out of his enemity with Mountabatten and the duplicity of the Congress leaders. Jinnah scuttled the proposals to divide the States on the basis of their population and scoffed at the suggestions made by Mountbatten. Hari Singh knew that if he took a false step, Mountbatten as well as the Congress leaders would nor hesitate to abandon him in a bargain with Pakistan.

This was the greatest act of betrayal committed by the men in power in India. The Indian Government crumbled in its resolve to set right the wrong in Junagarh and rein in the Nawab of Hyderabad. The Indian leaders  looked upto Mountbatten to deliver them from their predicament though experience had shown to them that the major role in the integration of the States had been played by the States people who had struggled for the unity of the States with India and the Hindu rulers of the States who had acceded to India.

The Government of India should have made a bold move to take Hari Singh into confidence, thrash out the issues pertaining to the transfer of power to the peoples representatives with him and helped in removing the prevailing distrust between him and the National Conference leaders. Instead the Indian leaders sulked away. Gandhi had advised Hari Singh to handover the State Government to the National Conference leaders and entrust them the responsibility to conduct elections to the Praja Sabha, the State Legislative Assembly and empower the elected representatives of the people to take a decision on the accession of the State. Hari Singh had refused to abide by Gandhi’s advice and told him that such a course would enable Pakistan to grab the State with the support of the Muslim Conference and the other pro-Pakistan flanks in the state. Later events proved that Hari Singh had chosen the right course. Jammu and Kashmir would have gone the way, North West Frontier Province did if he had opted for elections to the Praja Sabha.

The Indian Princely States were a part of the Indian nation. Partition did not divide the States, nor did the partition empower Pakistan to grab Junagarh or claim Hyderabad on the basis of being Muslim ruled States and annex Jammu and Kashmir on the basis of its population. The Muslim League as well as the British treated the States as their personal preserve and sought to use them to Balkanise India. The Princes as well as the people of the States defeated their designs.

The role played by Mountbatten and VP Menon, in the integration of the Indian States was only marginal. The States’ Ministry did not draw up any plans for the consolidation of the northern frontier of India of which Jammu and Kashmir was the central spur. Nor did the States Ministry formulate any plans for the security of the Himalayas against the threat of their de-Sanskritsation which the creation of Pakistan posed.

Few in-depth investigations and inquiries have been undertaken so far to unravel the forces and factors, which shaped the events in Jammu and Kashmir, during the fateful days following the transfer of power in India. No investigations were ever carried out in the actions of men, who were at the helm of affairs in India, Pakistan and Jammu and Kashmir, their motivations and their personal prejudices. Much of what happened those days, has been covered under false propaganda by the Government of India as well as the  Government of Pakistan and the  Interim Government which was instituted in Jammu and Kashmir after the accession of the State to India. A widespread disinformation campaign was launched by the Interim Government in collusion with the Government to find scapegoats for their failures and to apportion blame, where it did not belong. The sordid story of what happened in the state, those days, is yet to be told.

Pakistan sought to bend the procedure laid down by the Indian Independence Act for the transfer of power in India, to grab the Muslim majority states as well as the states ruled by Muslim Princes.

The Indian Government failed signally to counteract the stratagem, subversion and military intervention, Pakistan employed to achieve its objectives. Perhaps the British, who had quit India, still cast a shadow on the Indian outlook. The Congress leadership with its liberalist tradition which denied the civilisational boundaries of the Indian nation, continued to play the Muslim card, to prove that Jammu and Kashmir would be more Islamic than the Muslim State of Pakistan after its inclusion in the Indian Dominion.

The Congress leaders wanted Maharaja Hari Singh to follow what they did in collusion with Mountabatten to retrieve Junagarh and bring round the Nawab of Hyderabad to come to terms, with India. Gandhi advised Hari Singh, during his visit to Kashmir, towards the close of July 1947, to (a) transfer the powers of the State Government to the representatives of his Muslim subjects, who formed a majority of the population of the state; (b) hold fresh elections to the Praja Sabha, the State Legislative Assembly, on the basis of universal adult franchise and (c) entrust the Praja Sabha with the task of taking a decision on the accession of the state. The meeting between Hari Singh and Mahatma Gandhi was held on the lawns of the Gupkar Palace, situated on the eastern bank of the Dal Lake in Srinagar. Maharani Tara Devi and the Heir-Apparent Karan Singh were present in the meeting. The only other man present in the meeting was a senior officer of the state army, who acted as an aide to the Maharaja and prepared the situation report of the meeting for the military archives of the state.

Gandhi had lost touch with the developments in the princely states. He was not aware of the dangerous  situation in Jammu and Kashmir. He did not know that an armed rebellion was brewing in the Muslim majority districts of the Jammu province, where arms and ammunition were being dumped by the elements of the Muslim League from a  cross the border of the state with the Punjab. He was hardly aware of the sharp divide between the Kashmiri speaking Muslims and non-Kashmiri speaking Muslims. He did not know that the non-Kashmiri speaking Muslims, who constituted nearly half the Muslim population of state along with a small section of the Kashmiri-speaking Muslims owing loyality to the Mirwaiz, the chief Muslim divine of Kashmir, supported the Muslim Conference, which spearheaded the struggle for Pakistan. He was completely unaware of the fact that the Kashmiri-speaking Muslims constituted about half the population of the Muslims of the State and together with the Hindus, the Sikhs and the Buddhists they formed more than sixty percent of the population of the State. The Hindus, the Sikhs and the Buddhists, a million people, constituted more than a quarter of the population of the State. Gandhi was completely unaware of the impact of the partition on the leaders and cadres of the National Conference, which had its main support bases in the community of the Kashmiri-speaking Muslims, largely concentrated in the Kashmir province. He did not know that an influential section of the leaders and cadres of the National Conference favoured a reconsideration of the commitment of the National Conference to the unity of India.

Gandhi believed that by seeking to divest Hari Singh of his powers to determine the future affiliation of the State in respect of its accession and empowering his Muslim subjects to take a decision on the accession of the state, he would be able to create a precedent for the rulers of the Muslim ruled states, to entrust their powers to determine the future affiliations of their states their Hindu subjects, who formed a majority of their population. Nearly all the Muslim ruled states, barring a few of them situated within the territories delimited for the Muslim State of Pakistan, nearly all the Muslim ruled States in India, including the major states of Hyderabad, Junagarh, Bhopal, were populated by preponderant Hindu majorities.

Perhaps, Gandhi believed that the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir committed to support the accession of the state to India, would opt to join India after power was transferred to them and they were empowered to  determine the future affiliations of the state. He was convinced that the transfer of power in Jammu and Kashmir would provide him a moral ground to bring round Pakistan as well as Mountbatten to persuade the Muslim rulers to abnegate from their power to determine the future affiliations of their states and entrust their subjects and of whom the Hindus formed a majority, to opt for India.

Gandhi and the other Indian leaders did not even get the wind of the secret preparations in Pakistan for military intervention in the Jammu and Kashmir State in the name of the Jehad for the liberation of the Muslims from their subjection to the Dogra Rule, while Gandhi went on a indefinite fast to prevent communal violence in India which threatened the Muslims, Pakistan prepared feverishly for the invasion of the state. Pakistan planned to reduce the state by military force and then deal with India from a position of strength in respect of Junagarh and Hyderabad. Junagarh had acceded to Pakistan and Hyderabad was plotting the align itself with Pakistan to remain out of India.

Had Hari Singh accepted Gandhi’s advice he would have provided open ground for Pakistan and the Muslim League to grab the state by stratagem and force. Gandhi’s suggestion to hold the elections to the Praja Sabha would have enabled the Muslim Conference and the flanks of pro-Pakistan Muslim activists, operating underground, to sabotage the National Conference and use religious appeal for Jehad to pack the Praja Sabha with the Muslim Conference. Any stringent measures adopted by him to prohibit religious propaganda in the elections would have brought him the blame of having settled the expression for the will of the Muslims. In case he did not take effective measures to prohibit the use of religious propaganda in the elections he would virtually leave the field open for the Muslim Jehad to take over.

Hari Singh had borne the ravages of Muslim communalism. He had also faced the scourage of the Paramountcy. The Congress leaders had installed Mountbatten as the first Governor General of the Dominion of India. Hari Singh had rebuffed Mountbatten and refused to abide by his advice to join Pakistan. Mountbatten, later events proved, had not forgotten the slight Hari Singh had caused to him. The Maharaja did not allow himself to be arranged before the man, who had spared no efforts to push his state into Pakistan for his management. He refused to accept Gandhi’s advice.

Hari Singh contested Gandhi’s views on the accession of the state and refused to abnegate from his rightful obligation to determine the future of his state. He told Gandhi, in measured words in the presence of Maharani Tara Devi, who regarded the Mahatma in awe, that the safety and the security of the Hindus and the other minorities in the state was uppermost in his mind, and he would not abandon them at any cost. He insisted upon the recognition of his rights as the ruler of the state to determine the basis of his future relations with India. He reminded Gandhi that nor only had the lapse of the Paramountcy vested in him the right to determine the future of the State, the Indian States Ministry had recognised the rights of the rulers of the States as the basis of their accession to India and he could not be treated in a manner different from the way, the rulers of all other acceding states had been treated.

Gandhi gave expression to his feelings in a statement he gave to the press in Punjab, on his way back to Delhi. He said that Jammu and Kashmir was a Muslim state and therefore, its future must be determined by Muslims who formed a majority of its population. He denounced the treaties between the Princes and the British as “parchments of paper” and decried the claims made by the Princes to any rights arising out of such treaties.

Hari Singh did not accept the surrender to a Muslim majority identity as the basis of a settlement of the accession of the state. He refused to become part of the process to consolidate the borders of the Muslim state of Pakistan, which Mountbatten and the Congress leaders visualised as the guarantee of the unity of India.

Later events proved Hari Singh right. Pakistan strove hard to hold Junagarh and openly supported Hyderabad in its endeavour to remain out of India. Pakistan invaded the State, irrespective of the procedure laid down by the Indian Independence Act, for the lapse of the Paramountcy, showing little regard for the ruler of Jammu and Kashmir and the people of Junagarh and Hyderabad.

Gandhi’s press statement administered a jolt to Maharaja Hari Singh. Maharani Tara Devi favoured reconciliation with the Congress leadership. She cautioned Hari Singh against the isolation into which the State was sinking fast. It is a lesser known fact that the Maharani tried to bridge the gulf between Hari Singh and the Indian leaders.

Shortly after Gandhi left Kashmir Hari Singh removed Ram Chandra Kak from his office and appointed General Janak Singh, one of his close kin the Prime Minister of the state. Ram Chandra Kak headed the State Government during the last years of the British Raj in India. Kak served the Maharaja with unflinching loyalty and devotion. Kak belonged to the Kashmiri Pandit community in Kashmir, which played a pioneering role in the growth of national consciousness in the State. While in office, Kak acted as an interface for the Maharaja with the British as well the Muslim League, at a time, when the Princes were struggling to place the State in between the British Crown and an independent Indian nation. The political Department of the British Govt. of India, with conrad corfield, a diehard British Civil Service officer, as its head, spared no efforts to assure the Princes that the British would not abandon the Princely India and would ensure the continuity of the treaties between the States and the Crown. Like the other Princes, Hari Singh was suddenly brought on the crossroads, when India was divided and the British Paramountcy was withdrawn.

The British refused to continue the protection, the Paramountcy had provided the States and the Muslim League claimed Jammu and Kashmir for the Muslim State of Pakistan on the basis of the Muslim majority of its population.

During the days, the future of the constitutional organization of India was taking shape, Ram Chandra Kak was at the Centrestage of the negotiations between the Princes, the British and the Indian leaders. The Princes were not left with the choice to seek a place outside the constitutional organization of the two successor Dominions of India and Pakistan. The undersecretary of the State for India in the British Government, clarified in the British Parliament, during the debate on the Indian Independence Bill, that the British Government would not recognize the States as the Dominions of the Commonwealth nor would extend it recognition to their independence. Kak was no longer relevant in the political context in which Jammu and Kashmir was left with no choice except to join India, the option to accede to Pakistan was not acceptable to Hari Singh or Kak.

Hari Singh turned away from the British, when he refused to abide by the advice of the Viceroy of India tendered to him to come to terms with Pakistan.

He earned the displeasure of the leaders of the Muslim League, when he refused to grant permission to Mohammad Ali Jinnah to visit Jammu and Kashmir, during the days, the transfer of power in India was in process of completion. Jinnah sent several of his emissaries to persuade Hari Singh to accede to Pakistan on conditions which he specified. A second world war veteran Major General Shaukat Hayat Khan, arrived in Kashmir with a peculiar proposal from him.

Khan met Hari Singh in his palace. He told the Maharaja that he had been commissioned by Jinnah to convey to the Maharaja that he could lay down any conditions that he chose, to accede to Pakistan and that Pakistan would deposit a huge amount of money in British currency worth hundreds of millions of Sterling Pounds, in the Bank of England, as guarantee against any breach of the conditions laid down by him.

Hari Singh was slighted, but he did not lose his poise. He told Shaukat Hayat that he would take a decision on the accession of the State only in consideration of the interests of his subjects.

Naseeb Singh, an Army officer, of the Signal Corps, who was in attendance on the Maharaja those days, told the author in an interview: “I heard him (Shaukat Hayat) tell his aides, how strange of the Maharaja it was to have turned down the offer. As he saw me standing bye, he recoiled and fell silent”. Thakur Kartar Singh, a close kin of the Maharaja and a former Revenue Minister of the State, told the author in an interview in Jammu. “His Highness was severely intolerant of any suggestion about his relations with Pakistan.

He felt hurt by what happened around him. He had given a long rope to Ramchandra Kak. He waited patiently, though that was not in his habit, for an opportunity to save the State from going to Pakistan. Pakistan pressurized him to agree to accede to that country, offering to accept any number of conditions that he would lay to safeguard his interests. But he “withstood all pressures”.

Hari Singh offered a Standstill Agreement to India as well as Pakistan for which the Indian States Department and the State Department of Pakistan had provided the option. The Indian Government did not take any action on the Standstill Agreement, though it extended the period of accession by two months for both the States – Jammu and Kashmir as well as Hyderabad. Hyderabad was the other Princely State, which did not accede to the Indian Dominion by 15 August 1947.

That Pakistan had adopted a policy of confrontation with the State Government was signaled by the formation of the Provisional Government of ‘Azad’ Kashmir, by pro-Pakistan Muslim flanks and the cadres of the Muslim Conference, at Trad Khel on 30 August 1947. Sardar Ibrahim Khan founder of the Provisional Government of ‘Azad’ Kashmir, took the salute of a contingent of armed volunteers of the Provisional Government which march passed before him in a military formation. The volunteers were armed with the rifles supplied to them from Pakistan.

Hari Singh proclaimed a general amnesty for all political prisoners who were involved in the Quit Kashmir Movement and against whom proceedings were in process in the courts of the state. Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad, the Acting President of the National Conference, who had taken refuge in the British India, during the Quit Kashmir Movement, alongwith other leaders of the National Conference, arrived in Srinagar on 12 September 1947. He received a tumultuous welcome, from the people in Srinagar.

The leaders and cadres of the Conference who had gone underground, had already begun to emerge from their underground quarters. Mohi-ud-Din Qara the Head of the War Council, which had been constituted to direct the Quit Kashmir Movement, came out of his underground quarters, alongwith a number of his senior cadres. Among them was Onkar Nath Trisal, a senior communist party activist, who later played a memorable role in the defence of Srinagar, when the invading armies of Pakistan were pouring into its outskirts. Mohi-ud-Din Qara addressed a number of public meetings, where he impressed upon the people of the necessity to maintain intercommunity peace and combat communalism and subversion.

While the National Conference leaders and cadres set out to reconstruct the organizational units of the National Conference, which had been battered by the Quit Kashmir Movement, Pakistan launched a surreptitious campaign in the State to unite the Muslims in support of its accession to that country. The leaders and cadres of the Muslim Conference and the sections of the Muslim community which were ideologically committed to the Muslim struggle for Pakistan, though they did not support the Muslim Conference, carried on the campaign with the support of the widespread network of Pakistani agents, spies and intelligence sleuths of the Government of Pakistan which operated underground and in vast numbers, Muslim League cadres and other political activists who had slipped into the state unnoticed.

The creation of Pakistan symbolized the realization of the desperation of the Muslim Ummah in India and (a) religious obligation devolved on the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir to support its accession to Pakistan to consolidate the Muslim power (b) the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir were part of the Muslim Umah and therefore were bound to Pakistan by the bond of Islam; (c) any deviation from a commitment to the unity of the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir would be an un-Islamic act. The National Conference had spearheaded the Muslim struggle for liberation from the Dogra Rule and now the only option for the leaders and National Conference was to join the struggle for the unification of the State with Pakistan (d) India and the Hindus who formed the main resistance to the struggle for Pakistan, were trying their utmost to scuttle the freedom of the Muslims in the Princely States, where the Muslims were subject to severe repression and the ruler of the State was waiting for an opportunity to join India, scuttle the freedom of the Muslims and perpetuate his power (e) the Muslim struggle for Pakistan was not against the Maharaja and the Muslims of the State had assured him that they would recognize him as the constitutional head of the State if he opted for Pakistan; (f) the National Conference and its cadres and supporters would be accommodated in the Muslim commonwealth of Pakistan on the basis of equality and brotherhood enjoined by Islam upon all the Muslims irrespective of their language and the region which they inhabited (g) any differences between the National Conference leadership and the Muslim leadership of the people of Pakistan could be settled mutually and (h) the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir had to stand united in the struggle for Pakistan in view of the efforts the enemies of Islam were making in India to impair the unity of the Muslims.

The police intelligence of the State reported that it had received information about an underground cell, involved in the raising of a militia, the Muslim Guard, to defend the struggle for Pakistan against any police or military action the State Government resorted to. A woman volunteer of Pakistan was charged with the tasks of recruitment of local Muslim volunteers to the ranks of the Muslims guard. The intelligence report about the Muslim Guard reached the State Government and a summary of the report was sent to Hari Singh as well. As usual, Hari Singh sent it to the State archives. But no action was taken against the sabotage planned by the enemy agents to foment a rebellion in the State, probably to coincide with the invasion of State Pakistan was secretly planning.

The Indian leaders took little notice of the developments in the State. The States’ Minister wrote a cryptic letter to Hari Singh, imploring the Maharaja to bring all punitive measures against the National Conference to an end, release the Conference leaders and cadres from imprisonment and seek their cooperation to meet the challenge the State was faced with.

On September 3, 1947, an intelligence signal was received in the Army headquarters at Delhi, that armed infiltrators of Pakistan had raided a border outpost, three miles inside the state territory. The signal with the staggering import evoked response from the Indian Government. The Indian leaders received information about the border raids and the heavy damage to life and property the Hindus and the Sikhs suffered in the border districts of the State. No voice was raised in India against the depredation, the armed infiltrators spread in the border districts of the State.

Note: The Article, in this series are based upon documentary sources in the Indian Archives, Archives of the Jammu and Kashmir State, Sardar Patel Papers; documents and Papers in Sapru House Library, Indian Council of World Affairs, New Delhi, Contemporary Newspaper Files and Interview.

Source: Kashmir Sentinel

Gilgit-Baltistan package termed an eyewash

The Dawn

 GILGIT/SKARDU: Public representatives, nationalist and progressive political groups and activists on Saturday rejected the Gilgit-Baltistan Empowerment and Self-governance Order, saying it is gimmick of words to perpetuate the bureaucratic rule over the region. Labour Party Pakistan Gilgit chapter chief Advocate Ehsan Ali rejected the package and said that it would increase the sense of deprivation among the people. ‘The real powers rest with the governor, who is President’s appointee and not answerable to Gilgit-Baltistan Legislative Assembly,’ said Mr Ehsan. There is no constitutional protection to the provincial setup. Talking to Dawn Hafizur Rehman, member Northern Area Legislative Assembly and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz president declared the package mere a gimmickry of words and said once again the centre was throwing dust in the eyes of people. He said a powerful governor, who would be appointed by the President, would enjoy absolute authority. He criticised that other political parties were not taken on board nor any consultation was done in formulation of this package, which was not desired by the people of the region.Chairman of his own faction Nazir Khan Naji bashed the centre and said Gilgit-Baltistan were again deceived in the name of package. He said the so-called packages could not heal the decades-old wounds of the people of this region and they need only their identification. Advocate Fidaullah, member Nala, said Islamabad and PPP-led government won hearts of the people of Gilgit-Baltistan by giving them autonomy and this would ensure that people were governed through their elected representatives. He said independent judiciary was longstanding demand of the people. The PPP member said that the new setup would strengthen democracy. Advocate Aftab Haider, PPP member of Nala, stressed the need for observing a thanksgiving day for this historic package and said the federal government had once again fulfilled the demands of the people of Gilgit-Baltistan like Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto who had introduced remarkable reforms. Mr Aftab said that the package would usher in the area into a new era of prosperity. He was of the view that now Gilgit-Baltistan would be hub of economical and political activities as the package was guaranteeing social, political and economical uplift. Member Northern Area Legislative Assembly Ghulam Mohammad, also secretary general of PPP, said that the package was complete reflection of the aspiration of the people and the government had taken all members of the society on board before finalising it. Safdar Ali, spokesman for Balawaristan National Front, said his party totally rejected the package, which was mere eyewash. ‘It’s meant to detract the international community from the violation of human rights in this region,’ he added. Local journalist and political analyst, Imtiaz Ali Taj, said the package contained nothing for the people and it would only benefit the representative of the federal government who would enjoy the authority and powers. Shujaat Ali, a nationalist leader, said the centre should allow the people of Gilgit-Baltistan to govern their region. ‘The so-called provincial setup aims at concealing the human rights violations and continue the colonial control over the region,’ said Manzoor Hussain Parwana, chairman Gilgit-Baltistan United Movement Said that the so-called empowerment order was illegal and held no ground at all because Gilgit Baltistan didn’t fall under the constitutional ambit of Pakistan. He demanded an independent judiciary and constitutional assembly until the resolution of Kashmir dispute. He said the government did not take the public representatives and political leadership on board to formulate the packages while the people were expecting and demanding Azad Kashmir like setup. Zulfiqar Ali Khan adds from Hunza The nationalist parties in Hunza-Nagar termed the package ‘old wine in a new bottle’. They said through such cosmetic measures the government was playing with the legal and constitutional rights of the people. They however welcomed renaming of the region as Gilgit-Baltistan. Talking to this correspondent, Baba Jan, chief organiser of Progressive Youth Front, demanded an independent and constitutionally protected governance system for the region. He said the federal government through such packages wanted to justify and prolong its illegal occupancy of the region. The Hunza chapter of Pakistan People’s Party has appreciated the new package however shown their concern for not giving additional seats for Hunza in the Assembly. Karimullah Baig, general secretary of the local chapter of PPP, said the party would issue detailed statement after convening a special meeting regarding the package. Public opinion leaders and representatives rejected the empowerment and self-governance package and said that nothing new had been announced rather old win had been poured into a new bottle. The package was criticised and it was declared as designed to strengthen the bureaucracy and unelected forces which ruled the people of Gilgit-Baltistan.

The Kashmir -History

Kashmiri Pandits who have left the Saffron Valley, feel the pain and agony of migration.

Myth and reality move together in the Saffron Valley of mystic splendor. The reclamation of land from Satisar created certain complications. The Saraswati River that flowed into the eastern Punjab, Rajasthan, Sind and other parts of Indian subcontinent suddenly got dried up. Geologists are of the opinion that all those streams, which fed Satisar and form the source of water for the Saraswati river, mostly ran underground. Once the cleft materialized at Baramulla, the water of the Satisar flowed out in an opposite direction, leaving the Saraswati basin dry. The Aryan Saraswat Brahmans, who used to live on the banks of Saraswati river, migrated to the Kashmir Valley to continue their austerities. With the passage of time these people came to be known as ‘Bhattas’ in Kashmir. The word is derivative of Brahman. Now they are called the Kashmiri Pandits or the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir, who believe in the mystic combination of Shaivism, Kali Bhakti, Shakta worship and Tantra.
History of the Kashmiri Pandits is the history of Kashmir since unknown millennia. They are associated with its society, culture, civilization, customs, traditions, myths and realities. The rise of Buddhism and reactions by Brahmans gave rise to a long struggle between the two rival ideologies. The Naga (Snake) worship was also the dominant religion in the 4th and 3rd centuries B.C. However, Buddhism flourished in the Valley during the reign of Durnadeo, Simhadeo, Sundersen, Ashoka and Kanishka. The great Buddhist council was held at Kanishpur in Kashmir during the rule of Kanishka and it was presided over by two eminent scholars — Asvaghosha and Vasumitra. About 500 monks from different parts of the subcontinent attended the same. Nagarjuna , a Bodhisattva and the greatest philosopher of Buddhism, lived in Kashmir. During the reign of Abhimanu, a number of people were converted to Buddhism. It was first struggle of the Kashmiri Brahmans for their survival. A number of Kashmiri scholars – Kumarajiva (AD 384-417), Shakyashri Badhra (AD 405), Ratnavera, Shama Bhatta (5th Cen AD) and others went to China and Tibet to preach Buddhism. However, the Brahmans regained their supremacy during the reign of Nara I . The struggle between Buddhism and Brahmanism came to an end with the emergence of modern Hinduism. A period of comparative historical validity began with the establishment of the Karkuta rule in AD 627. Avantivarman (AD 855-833) is believed to be the first Vaishnavite ruler of Kashmir. During his rule there was a tremendous cultural development in the Valley. The great Shaiva philosophers of this period were Kayyatacharya, Somananda, Muktakantha Swamin, Shiva Swamin, Ananda Vardhana and Kallata.
The struggle between the Brahmans and other castes, such as Kayasthas, began during the reign of Shankara Varman. The authority of the Brahmans was broken and the sacred character of their citadels was violated. However, the Shaivite thought and philosophy flourished. Pradyumana Bhatta, Utpalacharya, Rama Kantha, Prajnarjuna, Lachaman Gupta and Mahadeva Bhatta have made a tremendous contribution to this philosophy. During the regime of Lohara dynasty, Kashmir came into contact with the Muslim invaders who attacked India. When Mahmud Ghazni annexed the Punjab, most of the tribes on the borders of Kashmir embraced Islam. At that time, the Valley was ruled by Sangram Raja (AD 1003-1028). Even after their conversion to Islam, these people continued to visit Kashmir – as traders, wanderers and even missionaries. There are historical evidences that some of these tribals settled in the Valley and made some venture into propagating their new religion.
Harsha (AD 1089-1101), was a man of extravagant habits and a jumble of contraries. He robbed the temple treasures and melt idols of gold and silver to tide over his financial crisis. Before him two other kings, Jalauka and Kalasa, employed the same approach of plundering the temples and melting the images of gold and silver to augment their depleted treasuries. Harsha also employed Muslim generals, who are called Turushkas by Kalhana, for the first time in the history of Kashmir. Now Muslims as a class appeared in the political field and began to consolidate its roots. Bhikshachara, a descendant of Harsha, organized a cavalry force mainly consisting of the Muslims. During the reign of Gopadeva (AD 1171-1180), the Brahmans consolidated their position. But the Lavanya tribe shattered their roots once again. The Damaras, Lavanyas and other tribes never allowed the Brahmans to monopolize. In the reign of Jassaka (AD 1180-1198), two Brahmans – Kshuksa and Bhima, endeavored to capture the throne. But it was the fear of Damaras or feudal lords that prevented them. Ramadeva (AD 1252-1273) humiliated those Brahmans who had helped him in his coronation. They conspired against him but could not succeed. A reign of terror, loot and plunder was let loose against them. Many Brahmans were killed and others crushed barbarously. This was the first direct assault against them in the history of Kashmir. To save themselves they cried “ Na Batoham” (I am not a Bhatta). The Kashmiri Pandits are even now taunted as Bhattas and Dalli Bhattas.
To counter the supremacy of the Brahmans, the rulers of Kashmir encouraged the influx of Muslims into the Valley. During the reign of Suhadeva (AD 1301-1320) many Muslim adventurers came to Kashmir. The chief among them was a Muslim missionary- Bulbul Shah. Two others were Shahmir from Swat and Rinchana from Tibet. Shahmir came in AD 1313 along with his numerous relations. Suhadeva granted him a jagir in a village near Baramulla. Ramachandra, the Prime Minister and Commander-in-Chief of Kashmir, employed Rinchana and granted him jagir in a village in the Lar Valley. These two adventurers were instrumental in the establishment of the Muslim rule in Kashmir. Another adventurer who received Suhadeva’s patronage was Lankar Chak.
Dulucha, a Tartar chief from Central Asia, invaded Kashmir with 60,000 strong horsemen. Suhadeva tried to induce him to retreat by paying him off a large sum of money. For this purpose he imposed heavy taxes even upon the Brahmans who had never before been taxed. But Dulucha refused to retreat and struck terror. He ravaged the Valley with fire and sword. Monstrous miseries were inflicted upon the people including the Brahmans. According to Baharistan – i -Shahi, “Dulucha and his soldiers killed everyone they could find . People who had fled to the hills and forests were pursued and captured. Men were killed, women and children were reduced to slavery and sold to the merchants of Khita (Turkistan), whom the invaders had brought with them. All the houses in the cities and the villages were burnt. The invaders ate as much of the corn and rice as they could . Whatever was left, they burnt and destroyed. In this way the whole of the Kashmir Valley was trampled under foot”. Suhadeva fled to Kishtwar, leaving the Kingdom to the cruel aggressors. Dulucha stayed here for eight months and took about 50,000 Brahmans with him as slaves. But all the troops and slaves perished while crossing the Devsar pass. It was a terrible experience for the legendary Kashmiri Pandits.
Dulucha went away from the Valley but left it haunted. The cursed people had lost all faith in their ruler- Suhadeva. Taking the advantage of the chaos and confusion, Rinchana- the refugee from Tibet, occupied the throne with the help of some chiefs . He killed his benefactor, Ramachandra, in the fort of Lar by treacherous means and married his daughter, Kota Rani.
Rinchana, a pseudo- Buddhist, wanted to get initiated into the Brahmanical fold to strengthen his political position. At that time, Shaivism was the most extensively practised religion in the Valley. So he called Sri Devaswami, the religious head of the Shaivas, to indoctrinate himself into the Hindu religion. Devaswami called a secret meeting of the prominent Pandits, who refused to accept Rinchana into Hinduism because of his low birth. Jonaraja says,” The King asked Devaswami to initiate him in the mantras of Shiva, but as he was Bhautta (Tibetian), Devaswami feared that the King was unworthy of such initiation and did not favour him”. This was a monstrous blunder on the part of Pandits, which turned the course of history. In fact, the Brahmans were not ready to share their privileges with an outsider. Thus deflected, Rinchana wanted to establish a uniform faith of warring sects and creeds in Kashmir with himself as its head. But Shahmir and Bulbul Shah manipulated his conversion to Islam. Ramachandra’s son, Ravanachandra, and many others also embraced Islam. A Muslim ruling class came into existence. In this way the Kashmiri Pandits were responsible for the destruction of their own ascendency and the ruin of their very existence. They are tremendously paying for it till today.
People of inferior origin and subordinate castes were attracted to Islam by gradual methods. This newly established Muslim class slowly consolidated its position and employed various methods to propagate the new faith. However, the Brahmans put a brave front and resisted the tide. After the death of Rinchana (AD 1326), Udyanadeva, the brother of Suhadeva, was installed on the throne of Kashmir and Shahmir was appointed as Commander-in-Chief.
Achala, a Turkish chief, invaded Kashmir during the reign of Udyanadeva, laying waste the territories he passed through. The king fled to Tibet. Kota Rani – the queen, faced the invader, procured his death and saved the kingdom. In this operation , Shahmir played the dominant role. Jonaraja says, “Strange that this believer in Allah became the saviour of the people. As a dried up river allows men to cross it and gives them shelter on its banks, even so this believer in Allah, calm and active, protected the terrified subjects.” Shahmir’s influence increased tremendously and he further strengthened his position by entering into matrimonial relations with the powerful nobles in Kashmir. A subversive struggle was born between the tolerant Hinduism and the militant Islam.
In AD 1339, after defeating Kota Rain by a foul strategem and procuring her death, Shahmir ascended the throne of Kashmir under the name of Sultan Shamas-ud-Din (The Light of the Religion – Islam). He got khutaba read and the coins struck to his name. Islam became the court religion. Shahmir became the legitimate author and architect of Muslim rule in Kashmir. With the establishment of the new regime Muslim missionaries, preachers, sayyids and saints penetrated into the Valley. Sayyid Jalal-ud-Din, Sayyid Taj-ud-Din, Sayyid Hussain Simnani, Sayyid Masud and Sayyid Yusuf came to Kashmir to avoid the intended massacre by Timur. Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani (Shah Hamadan) entered Kashmir with 700 sayyids; and, his son, Mir Muhammad Hamadani, with 300 more. They endured in the Valley under royal protection and disseminated the message of Islam. Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani (AD 1314-AD 1385) wrote in “ Zakhirat’ul Maluk ” :
1. Muslim ruler shall not allow fresh constructions of Hindu temples and shrines for image worship.
2. No repair shall be executed to the existing Hindu temples and shrines.
3. They shall not proffer Muslim names.
4. They shall not ride a harnessed horse.
5. They shall not move about with arms.
6. They shall not wear rings with diamonds.
7. They shall not deal in or eat bacon.
8. They shall not exhibit idolatrous images.
9. They shall not built houses in the neighbourhood of Muslims.
10. They shall not dispose of their dead in the neighbourhood of Muslim graveyards, nor weep or wail over their dead.
11. They shall not deal in or buy Muslim slaves.
12. No Muslim traveller shall be refused lodging in the Hindu temples and shrines where he shall be treated as a guest for three days by non-Muslims.
13. No non-Muslim shall act as a spy in the Muslim state.
14. No problem shall be created for those non-Muslims who, of their own will, show their readiness for Islam.
15. Non-Muslims shall honour Muslims and shall leave their assembly whenever the Muslims enter the premises.
16. The dress of non-Muslims shall be different from that of Muslims to distinguish themselves.
This naturally caused animosity among the Brahmans and resulted in frail rebellion during the reign of Shihab-ud-Din (AD 1354-1373). In order to break the upheaval among the Hindus and to make them prostrate, the Sultan turned his attention towards their temples. All the temples in Srinagar, including the one at Bijbehara, were wrecked to terrorize the poor Kashmiri Pandits. It seems that by this time, the sultans of Kashmir were perfectly islamized as a result of their contacts, interactions and intercourses with the sayyids. These sayyids came here as absconders in search of safe harbours, but manoeuvered the events for their own cause and fanatic iconoclastic zeal. The Hindus began to feel deserted and alienated in their own land. To consolidate their rule, sultans institutionalized the “policy of extermination” to eradicate all traces of Hinduism in any form. However, the Kashmiri Pandits stuck to their own religion and traditions, ignoring the atrocities, barbarism and cruelties of the privileged ruling class. But there were many from other castes who, either by conviction or in order to gain royal favour, embraced Islam. These new converts were looked down upon by the Kashmiri Pandits as traitorous and treacherous, with no loyalty for time-honored values. This gave rise to a new class rivalry. Suha Bhatt, who after embracing Islam took the name of Saif-ud-Din, became the leader of the fresh converts during the reign of Sikandar (AD 1389-1413).
Sikandar- the Butshikan, was bigoted with fanatic religious zeal to spread Islam in the entire Valley. This fanaticism was stimulated by Mir Muhammad Hamadani. Suha Bhatt – the convert, was appointed Prime Minister by Sikandar and both hatched a deadly conspiracy to persecute the Hindus and enforce upon the Nizam-i-Mustaffa. Jonaraja says, “ The Sultan forgot his kingly duties and took delight day and night in breaking images … He broke images of Martanda, Vishaya, Ishana, Chakrabrit and Tripureshvara …… There was no city, no town, no village, no wood where Turushka left the temples of the gods unbroken.” According to Hassan (History of Kashmir), “ This country possessed from the times of Hindu rajas many temples which were like the wonders of the world. Their workmanship was so fine and delicate that one found himself bewildered at their sight. Sikandar, goaded by feelings of bigotry, destroyed them and levelled them with the earth and with the material built many mosques and khanqahs. In the first instance he turned his attention towards the great Martand temple built by Ramdev (the temple was rebuilt by King Lalitaditya, AD 724-760) on Mattan Kareva. For one year he tried to demolish it, but failed. At last in sheer dismay, he dug out stones from its base and having stored enough wood in their place, set fire to it. The gold gilt paintings on its walls were totally destroyed and the walls surrounding its premises were demolished. Its ruins even now strike wonder in men’s minds. At Bijbehara, three hundred temples including the famous Vijiveshwara temple, which was partly damaged by Shihab-ud-Din, were destroyed. With the material of Vijiveshwara temple, a mosque was built and on its site a khanqah, which is even now known as Vijiveshwara Khanqah.” The stones and bricks which once configurated a marvelous and splendid temple or monastery, now hold up mosques. Hassan further adds, “ Sikandar meted out greatest oppression to the Hindus. It was notified in the Valley that if a Hindu does not become a Muslim, he must leave the country or be killed. As a result some of the Hindus fled away, some accepted Islam and many Brahmans consented to be killed and gave their lives. It is said that Sikandar collected, by these methods, six maunds of sacred thread form Hindu converts and burnt them. Mir Muhammad Hamadani, who was a witness of all this vicious brutality, barbarism and vandalism, at last advised him to desist from the slaughter of Brahmans and told him to impose jazia (religious tax) instead of death upon them. All the Hindu books of learning were collected and thrown into Dal Lake and were buried beneath stones and earth.” Sikandar issued orders that no man should wear the tilak mark on his forehead and no woman be allowed to perform sati. He also insisted on breaking and melting of all the gold and silver idols of gods and coin the metal into money. An attempt was made to destroy the caste of the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans by force and those who resisted were subject to heavy fines. Farishta says, “ Many of the Brahmans, rather than abandon their religion or their county, poisoned themselves; some emigrated from their native homes, while a few escaped the evil of banishment by becoming Muhammedans”. To strictly enforce the Nizam-i-Mustaffa, Sikandar established the office of Shaikh-ul-Islam.
According to W.R. Lawrence, the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir were given three choices-death, conversion or exile. “Many fled, many were converted and many were killed, and it is said that this thorough monarch (Sikandar) burnt seven maunds of sacred threads of the murdered Brahmans”. As for the statements of Hassan and Lawrence, six maunds of sacred threads of converts and seven maunds of murdered Pandits were burnt. The number of people, to whom these thirteen maunds of sacred threads belonged, might have been tremendously colossal. A mammoth number of the Saraswat Pandits also went into exile, causing the first disastrous mass exodus of the community. When Suha Bhatt- the convert, came to know that many Brahmans were leaving Kashmir, he tried to check their exodus and ordered the frontier guards not to allow any one to cross the borders. The unfortunate Pandits caught while crossing the border were awarded severe punishments. Even the converts were required to pay jazia as they were suspected of secretly clinging to their old religion.
Not only Sikandar- the Butshikan, but Suha Bhatta – the convert, also was responsible for this barbarous, murderous and cruel approach towards the mythical Kashmiri Pandits. Jonaraja says, “ Suha Bhatta- the convert, after demolishing the temples felt the satisfaction, and with the help of sayyids, ulema and newly converts tried to destroy the caste of the people… the illustrious Brahmans declared that they would die rather than lose their caste and religion, and Suha Bhatta – the convert, subjected them to a heavy fine, jazia, because they held to their caste and religion.” There is no parallel of this religious persecution in the history of the subcontinent.
Ali Shah – the tyrant (AD 1413-1430), son of Sikandar- the Butshikan, during his short rule of six years, carried on his father’s 24-year tyrant reign with homicides, conversions, tyranny and enforced jazia. Suha Bhatta – the convert, who retained the prime ministership continued his earlier crimes and atrocities against the Kashmiri Pandits. Jonaraja gives a graphic account of the plight of the illustrious Kashmiri Pandits in the draconian reign of Ali Shah. He says,” Suha Bhatta- the convert, passed the limit by levying fine, jazia, on the twice – born. This evil-minded man forbade ceremonies and processions on the new moon. He became envious that the Brahmans who had become fearless would keep up their caste by going over to foreign countries, he therefore ordered posting of squads on the roads, not to allow passage to any one without a passport. Then as the fisherman torments fish, so this low born man tormented the twice-born in this country. The legendary Brahmans burnt themselves in the flaming fire through fear of conversion. Some Brahmans killed themselves by taking poison, some by the rope and others by drowning themselves. Others again by falling from a precipice. The country was contaminated by hatred and the king’s favourites could not prevent one in a thousand from committing suicide …. A multitude of celebrated Brahmans, who prided in their caste, fled from the country through bye-roads as the main roads were closed. Even as men depart from this world, so did the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir flee to foreign countries. The difficult countries through which they passed, the scanty food, painful illness and the torments of hell during life time removed from the minds of the Kashmiri Pandits the fears of hell. Oppressed by various calamities such as encounter with the enemy, fear of snakes, fierce heat and scanty food; many Brahmans perished on the way and thus obtained salvation.” This was the second miserable mass exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits. Jonaraja calls it “ Chandh-Dandh” – violent, cruel, brutal and horrible punishment, for the abandoned and vulnerable Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir. History repeated itself again in AD 1989-1990.
The brutal religious persecution of the Kashmiri Pandits has been borne testimony to by almost all the Muslim historians. Hassan, Fauq and Nizam – ud – Din have condemned these excesses in unscathing terms. It was the reign of terror and homicide. The majority of the Hindus were converted forcibly and a large number had left the Valley. Yet many more were passing their days in the most deplorable conditions only on payment of jazia. The allowances of the Brahman academicians were stopped to destroy the ancient learning, literature, education, art and culture. These enlightened intellectuals had to move from door to door for food, like dogs. One can’t imagine a higher level of mental torture!
The Brahmans, even after paying jazia, could not openly declare themselves as Hindus nor could they apply tilak on their foreheads. Neither could they pray in their temples or perform any religious ceremony. Even then they did not forget their past and rich tradition. As the custodians of their extraordinary cultural heritage, they wrote the illuminating treatises on the stupendous Kashmir Shaivism, colossal literature, splendid art, marvelous music, grammar and medicine.
Sultan Zainul Abidin-the Budshah (Great Monarch), ruled Kashmir from AD 1420 to 1460. The son of Sultan Sikandar – the Butshikan, and the brother of Sultan Ali Shah- the tyrant, Zainul Abidin followed the policy of tolerance, endurance, patience, sympathy and broad mindedness. He recalled the Kashmiri Pandits who had left the Valley during the rule of Sikandar and Ali Shah. Jazia was abolished and the Brahmans were given their earlier positions in administration. Demolished temples were rebuilt and new ones constructed. Two temples were built by Zainul Abidin at Ishbar, Srinagar. The Sultan also participated in the Hindu festivals. A large number of houses were built for the widows of the Brahmans who had suffered during the reign of terror. Zainul Abidin stopped the killing of cows, restricted the eating of beef and catching of fish in the sacred springs of the Hindus. Even the personal law as laid down in the Shastras was adopted for the Hindus. The legenday Kashmiri Pandits were resurrected and resuscitated. Ferguson observes that indeed history has very few examples where the policy of a father was so completely reversed by the son. Even the Mughal monarch, Akbar – the great , capitalized on the religious policy of Zainul Abidin. But the conservative and dogmatic Muslims reacted very sharply to this policy of toleration and mutual coexistence . According to Mulla Bahauddin, “ The Sultan reimported practices of infidels which had once become extinct”.
But the honey-moon of the Kashmiri Pandits proved very brief. During the reign of Haider Shah (AD 1470-1472) – the prodigal son of the great Zainul Abidin, Kashmiri Pandits once again suffered tremendously. Under the evil influence of Purni- the Hindu barber, Haider Shah adopted various corrupt and cruel practices against the Saraswat Brahmans. The repression was so terrible that the tolerant Pandits lost their cool. Hassan says, “ the patience of the Pandits having reached the breaking point, they rose in a body and set fire to some mosques which were built with the material of the Hindu temples once demolished by Sikandar. The rising was quelled by the sword; many more Pandits were drowned in rivers; and, loot and plunder was practiced with unbridled licence.” Srivara also illustrates the cruel and inhuman treatment given to the mythical Kashmiri Saraswat Brahmans, “ many Pandits struggled and threw themselves in river Vitasta to be drowned there. The arms and noses of many people were cut off, even of those Brahmans who were king’s servants.” Ravage and arson of the sacred places continued during the indifferent rule of Hassan Khan (AD 1476-1487), when the real authority was with the gang of three persons- Shams Chak, Shringhar Raina and Musa Raina. The pressure exerted on the illustrious Kashmiri Pandits was so barbarous that, in order to save themselves from merciless brutality, some of them gave up their caste and screamed – “ I am not a Bhatta, I am not a Bhatta” ( I am not a Hindu). They went in strict seclusion to avoid any argument or controversy.
Mir Shams-ud-Din Iraqi, who visited the Saffron Valley twice in AD 1477 and 1496, was the founder of Nurbakhshiya order (Shia sect) in Kashmir. His mission was the vigorous propagation of his faith. So, not contented with peaceful preachings, violent methods were employed. In this adventure , Iraqi was helped by the homicidal creature and most dreaded tyrant- Malik Musa Raina, a convertee, whose original name was Soma Chandra. Not only the poor vulnerable Brahmans, but the Sunni Muslims were also violently converted to Shia sect by murderous techniques. This dogmatic fanaticism even crippled the Sunni ruler of Kashmir, Fateh Shah (AD 1510-1517). A khanqah was built at Zadibal (Srinagar) by Iraqi, which became the nucleus of Shia concentration.
Kashmiri Pandits suffered ferociously under the instructions of Shams-ud-Din Iraqi and Musa Raina. About 24,000 of them were forcibly converted to Shia sect of Islam. Iraqi had even issued orders that everyday about 1500 to 2000 Brahmans be brought to his doorsteps, remove their sacred threads, administer Kalima to them, circumcise them and make them eat beef. These decrees were ferociously and brutally carried out. The Hindu religious scriptures from 7th century AD onwards and about 18 magnificent temples were destroyed, property confiscated and ladies abused. Thousands of Brahmans killed themselves to evade this horrific barbarism and thousands migrated to other places, resulting in their third tragic mass exodus from the Saffron Valley of Kashmir. Those who stayed behind were not only forced to pay jazia, but their noses and ears were chopped off. To escape the tremendous pain and agony, they cried. “I am not a Hindu.” After Kashmir , the next destination of Iraqi for war against so-called infidelity was Kargil. It is now a Shia –dominated area and there are frequent sectarian clashes between them and the Buddhists.
In AD 1519, about ten thousand Kashmiri Pandits died during pilgrimage to Harmukh Ganga, where they had gone to immerse the ashes of those eight hundred Hindus who had been massacred during Ashura a year before. Poet-historian Suka says about this cataclysm, “ Ganga was oppressed with hunger, as it was after a long time that she had devoured bones; she surely devoured the men also who carried the bones.” It was after a gap of many years that the people were allowed to go on a pilgrimage to Harmukh lake, which ended in the most devastating tragedy.
Qazi Chak, the founder of Chak rule in Kashmir (AD 1553-1586), carried on ferocious religious policy and made conversion of many Hindus to Shia sect of Islam. According to Suka, one thousand cows were used to be killed everyday without any opposition under the orders of the Chak rulers, who were Shias, just to injure the religious sentiments of the Kashmiri Pandits. These celebrated and highly educated Aryan Saraswat Brahmans were made the objects of laughter and reproach. They were publically taunted, abused and humiliated. The last Chak ruler, Yaqub Chak, had a bigoted zeal for the propagation of Shia sect and planned mass conversion of the Hindus. However, he could not administer his criminal designs because of the Mughal annexation.
Akbar was tremendously influenced by the amazing moral supremacy of the Kashmiri Pandits. Abul Fazl records in Ain-i-Akbari, “ the most respectable class in this country (Kashmir) is that of the Pandits, who, notwithstanding their need for freedom from the bonds of tradition and custom, are the true worshippers of God. They do not loosen their tongue of calumny against those not of their faith, nor beg, nor importune. They employ themselves in planting fruit trees and are generally a source of inspiration for others”. The great Mughal Emperor abolished jazia and other unjust taxes imposed upon the Hindus. He also evinced great interest in the rehabilitation of the Pandits. Suka says, “ The Emperor announced that he would without delay reward those who would respect the Brahmans in Kashmir and that he would instantly pull down the houses of those who would demand the annual tribute from them.” The greatness of Akbar lies in his magnificent and fascinating policy of religious tolerance. Jahangir and Shah Jahan were not so tolerant. But their religious enthusiasm cannot be termed as fanatic. During this period, the Brahmans could perform their religious ceremonies after paying some tribute. But the whole scenario changed with the accession of Aurangzeb to the throne. With his bigoted fanatic and dogmatic approach, the Kashmiri Pandits were once again made vulnerable. Iftkar Khan, the Mughal governor of Kashmir during the reign of Aurangzeb, brutally tyrannized over the Brahmans to such an extent that they approached Guru Teg Bhahadur, the ninth Sikh Guru, at Anandpur in Punjab and solicited his personal intervention with the Emperor. This ultimately led to the Guru’s martyrdom and made Guru Gobid Singh to create the Khalsa to fight the oppressors . Muzaffer Khan, Nassar Khan and Ibrahim Khan were other governors of Aurangzeb who ferociously terrorized the Kashmiri Pandits. These celebrated scapegoats were once again forced to migrate from the land of their origin. It was the fourth disastrous mass exodus of the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans from Kashmir.
During the rule of later Mughals, Kashmir witnessed the outbreak of the worst kind of religious intolerance. In AD 1720, Mullah Abdul Nabi, also called Muhat Khan, a non-resident Kashmiri Muslim, was appointed as Shaikhul Islam . In order to assert his religious authority, he asked the Deputy Governor, Mir Ahmed Khan , to start a campaign of persecution of the Kafirs (infidels) – as the Kashmiri Pandits were called. In order to satisfy his satanic ego, the Mulla issued six commandments:

1. No Hindu should ride a horse, nor should a Hindu wear a shoe;
2. That they should not wear Jama (Mughal costume);
3. That they should move bare arms;
4. That they should not visit any garden;
5. That they should not have tilak mark on their foreheads;
6. That their children should not receive any education.

But Ahmed Khan refused to execute the mischievous decree. The Mullah then excited his followers against the Kashmiri Pandits. He established his seat in a mosque, assumed the duties of the administrator under the title of Dindar Khan and let loose the reign of terror. The Hindus were wickedly tormented, their houses burnt and property looted. Hundreds of Brahmans were killed, prostrated, maimed and humiliated. They began to run away in large numbers and hide themselves in mountainous terrain. This was the fifth dreadful mass exodus of the legendary Kashmiri Pandits from their mystic motherland. Those who remained behind lived in the most horrific and terrible conditions generated by the Mullah and his gang. But soon he was assassinated by his rivals and his son, Sharif-ud-Din, become the new Shaikhul-Islam. The son improved upon the brutal methods of his father and inflicted most barbaric, cruel and inhuman tortures upon the vulnerable Brahmans. The plight of the Kashmiri Pandits during this period became tremendously miserable and tragic.
The Afghan rule in Kashmir (AD 1753-1819) was a period of cruelty, homicide and anarchy. W.R. Lawrence calls it the “reign of brutal tyranny.” The barbarous Afghans employed every wild, inhuman, primitive, ferocious, cruel and brutal method to suppress the Kashmiri Brahmans. A pitcher filled with ordure was placed on the head of a Pandit and stones were pelt on it, till it broke and the unfortunate Brahman become wet with filth. Their brutality and atrocity crossed the extreme limits when Hindus were tied up in grass sacks, two and two, and drowned in the Dal Lake. The victimized Hindu were forced to flee the country or were killed or converted to Islam. There was horrible mass exodus of the Kashmiri Pandits, sixth one, to far away places like Delhi, Allahabad, etc. Many covered the long distances on foot.
Hindu parents destroyed the beauty of their daughters by shaving their heads or cutting their noses and ears to save them from degradation. Any Muslim could jump on the back of a Pandit and take a ride. Mir Hazar – an Afghan governor, used leather bags instead of grass sacks for the drowning of Brahmans. Turbans and shoes were forbidden for them. The Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir were also forced to grow beards and tilak was interdicted. The Afghans are now only remembered for their barbarity, brutality, ferocity, tyranny and cruelty. They thought no more of cutting of heads than of plucking a flower.
The Shahmirs, Chaks, Mughals and homicidal Afghans tore the fabric of society in Kashmir and left deep scars on it. When the Afghan oppression became intolerable, the Pandits turned with hope to the rising power of Maharaja Ranjit Singh. But they were suspected. The Afghan governor, Azim Khan, confiscated their jagirs and imposed jazia on them. Eminent Pandits were brutally killed, humiliated and their authority was snatched. Nur Shah Diwani – a cruel Muslim official who was in charge of revenue collection, hatched a conspiracy in league with Azim Khan to eliminate the distinguished Kashmiri Brahmans. But this evil manoeuvre was exposed and a galaxy of Pandits saved. Pandit Sahajram, the Diwan, played a prominent role in the rescue operation.
Azim Khan had appointed Sukhram Safaya, Mirza Pandit and Birbal Dhar as revenue collectors. Birbal Dhar could not collect the required amount due to failure of crops. The atrocious Afghan governor browbeated Pandit Birbal to make the payment of one lac rupees. Rowdy and boisterous soldiers were send to threaten him and other Pandits. Sensing the Afghan tsunami, distinguished Kashmiri Pandits called a backstairs meeting in which it was resolved to invite Ranjit Singh for the conquest of Kashmir and salvation of the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans. Accordingly Birbal Dhar and his minor son, Raja Kak Dhar, secretly left for Lahore with a petition signed by the prominent Kashmiri Pandits through which as invitation was extended to Ranjit Singh to take over the Valley. When Azim Khan came to know about these developments, he sent his soldiers to nab Birbal Dhar and teach him a lesson. But when these bandits met with no success, the cruel governor turned his guns towards the wife and daughter-in-law of Birbal Dhar . Both the ladies had taken shelter in the house of a trustworthy Muslim, Qadus Gojwari. Azim Khan asked Pandit Basa Kak to hunt down the innocent ladies. Basa Kak knew about the retreat of ladies but did not disclose it even after monstrous tortures and oppressive penalties. At last his abdomen was ripped open in the most barbarous manner and the dead body discredited – the most unfortunate and brutal crime against humanity in the civilized world. The poor ladies were also captured . Birbal Dhar’s wife committed suicide by swallowing a piece of diamond. The younger lady was violently converted to Islam and handed over to an Afghan noble, who carried her to Kabul.
Nervous to the marrow of his bones and crazy with rage, Azim Khan tormented all those Kashmiri Brahmans whom he suspected to be in league with Birbal Dhar. Prominent Pandits were detained in a concentration camp at Nishat Garden and ferociously tortured. But on learning about the Sikh advances towards Kashmir, he lost all nerve and solicited instruction from Pandit Sahajram Dhar. The illustrious Pandit advised him to sent off his ladies folk to Kabul. It was the only way to save them from the ignominious treatment. Sahajram himself escorted the ladies to Kabul and saved them from disastrous shame. Azim Khan himself ran away from the Valley, leaving the administration into the hands of his brother, Jabbar Khan. However, atrocious Afghans were crushed and the Sikhs annexed Kashmir. Some extremist Sikhs, including Phul Singh, endeavoured to knock down the mosque of Shah Hamadan. But celebrated Birbal Dhar, at a considerable risk to his own life, made them desist from this action. According to GMD Sufi, “ It is to the lasting credit of Birbal Dhar that when a deputation of Muslims headed by Sayyid Hasan Shah Qadiri Khanyari approached him to dissuade the Sikhs from the destruction of the Khanqah, he moved in the matter, used his influence and saved this historical structure from vandalism.” It reveals the true personality and character of a distinguished Kashmiri Pandit.
During the Sikh rule in Kashmir, AD 1819-1846, the celebrated Pandits reclaimed their past glory and magnificence. They claimed back the prominent places of trust and honour. Cow slaughter was banned, temples renovated and the earlier wrongs rectified. The legendary Kashmiri Pandits received a healing touch after centuries of barbarity, ferocity and tyranny. But by the time, the Sikhs conquered Kashmir in AD 1819, about nine-tenths of the population had become the followers of Islam. Out of the 10% Hindu population, a large number had migrated to the Punjab and other provinces. The Pandits in general belonged to the middle class while the upper and lower classes were dominated by the Muslims.
With the formation of Jammu and Kashmir State; and, establishment of the Dogra rule in 1846, Kashmiri Pandits were imperceptibly elbowed to the background. Administrators and officials were deputed from Jammu region. Though they enjoyed comprehensive religious freedom and social emancipation, political rights of the Kashmiri Brahmans were confined. On certain occasions, they even became victims of intrigue and suspicions. The vicious communal forces also turned their wrath against them. During the communal disturbances of July 1931, shops and houses belonging to the Kashmiri Brahmans were not only looted but also burnt. Three innocent Hindus lost their lives. This communalism in the state politics aggravated and magnified with the passage of time . It was fed for years with vicious communal propaganda and brainwashing.
After independence and accession of Jammu & Kashmir state to India, Kashmiri Pandits were pushed back to the barbarous Afghan era. They were given the sugarcoated dozes of poisonous toxics. Article 370 of Indian constitution just reduced them to cipher and liquidated their population. Under the pretext of economic reforms, their jagirs were confiscated and distributed among the Muslim peasants. The administration of Shaikh Abdullah adopted malicious and pernicious approach towards the Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir. They were taunted on one excuse or the other. Hindu temples were desecrated, looted and plundered. Minor girls of the community were forced to embrace Islam and marry the Muslim youth.
Shaikh Abdullah tried to create “ Shaikhdom” for his dynastic rule in Kashmir. But his dreams were shattered when he was arrested in 1953 for anti-national activities. In 1958, he was released but detained again after three months under the Kashmir conspiracy case. However, the case was withdrawn in 1964 because of political reasons. But he was arrested again in May 1965 for his subversive activities and released in January 1968. Again, in January 1971, a ban was imposed forbidding him to enter the Jammu Kashmir state. This restriction was lifted in 1972.
During 1953-1974 Shaikh Abdullah characterized India as an imperialist power endeavouring to subjugate the people of Kashmir. He asserted that the accession of Kashmir with India was his greatest blunder for which history will never forgive him. He also demanded the right of self determination for the people of Muslim – dominated Kashmir, but ignored the Hindu- dominated Jammu and Buddhist- dominated Ladakh regions. The sophist Shaikh advocated plebiscite and unconditional withdrawal of Indian army from the Saffron Valley. He also campaigned against the import of food grains from India and asked people to eat potatoes grown in Kashmir. For such arguments, Shaikh Abdullah was nick named as “Aaloo Bab” — Feeder of Potatoes. He made emotional solicitations that after death his body should not be buried in the subjugated Valley, but immersed into the sacred waters of Arabian sea. However, today his magnificent tomb stands on the banks of beautiful Dal Lake in Srinagar and is guarded by the Indian security personnel. By such gratuitous and conflicting statement, his secular credentials evaporated into thin air. The prospect of disloyalty and sedition began to haunt the Saffron Valley. Kashmiriyat switched over to political vandalism and bigoted fundamentalism. Shaikh Abdullah desperately held Indian Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, a Kashmiri Pandit, responsible for the shattering of his malevolent dreams in 1953. The mortified Shaikh ambiguously decided to retaliate against the whole Pandit community in Kashmir. In vindictiveness, he instigated his associated that while making a choice between a Kashmiri Pandit and dreaded cobra, kill the Pandit first. A vicious campaign of terror was launched against the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir. They were refused entry to government jobs and institutions of higher learning. Besides hurling strong statement against the Government of India and Kashmiri Pandits, the Shaikh derided that the whole lot of Indian army cannot save the Hindus in Kashmir against the malevolence of Muslims. Farooq Abdullah also employed the same approach towards the crumbled Pandits when his brother-in-law, Gulshah, seized the chief ministership in 1984.The reactionary leaders- Afzal Beg, Maulvi Farooq, Mohi-ud-Din Kara and Maulana Masoodi; ignored the very existence of Kashmiri Pandits during their political adventurism. The Kashmiri Pandits were made to pay for every move on the political chessboard in Kashmir because they represented the pseudo-secularism, incognito- socialism and flowering- democracy of India. They were scolded and emotionally hurt in the Afghan fashion.
But then the whole political scenario in Kashmir took a dramatic turn in 1974, when Indira-Shaikh accord was signed by virtue of which the Shaikh became the Chief Minister of the State after the lapse of 22 years. Ignoring the great expectations he had created among the people in Kashmir and his vigorous campaign for plebiscite, the sophist Shaikh began to speak the language of Indian nationalism, democracy, socialism and secularism. The slogans of plebiscite, self-determination and independent Kashmir melted away. But the Hate- India virus, infused by him into the blood of the Muslim youth in Kashmir, was exploited by other corrupt self-styled politicians for their own interests from time to time. A vacuum was created because the people were betrayed disillusioned, politically raped and left in wilderness by their own leaders.
Omkarnath Ganjoo, who established the Index Branch of the Jammu & Kashmir Criminal Investigation Department under the directions of Union Home Ministry in early 1960 and managed the same upto 1986, established a powerful network in the State. He collected detailed information about the seditious, subversive and treasonous persons and sent the detailed dispatches to the government from time to time . He also excavated the nefarious designs of ISI- the Pak Intelligence Agency, and informed the concerned authorities. But the state as well as the central administration lacked the determination and resolution to act.
The programmes and policies of Bakshi, Sadiq, Qasim, Farooq and Gulshah were also damaging for the Kashmiri Pandits. They were continuously haunted by antagonistic, hostile and rebellious elements. Mufti Syed is even believed to be responsible for the anti-Hindu communal riots of 1986, when cows were slaughtered and temples destroyed in Anantnag district. From 1947-1986 about four lac Kashmiri Pandits silently migrated from Kashmir. Hypocritical atrocities and criminal ignorances of political leaders were responsible for these development. Pakistan, to avenge the defeat of Bangladesh, blatantly sponsored the violence and terrorism in the Valley, resulting in the turmoil of 1989-90. The then celebrated governor of Jammu and Kashmir, Jagmohan, wrote a detailed letter to the former Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi , on April 21,1990, endorsing the alarming signals earliest transmitted by discerning Omkarnath Ganjoo. But cowardly Indian leadership was still unconcerned.

“Aay Zalimu, Aay Kafiroo,
Kashmir Hamara Choudh Dou”

“Bharat Kay Aiwanu Ko
Aag Lagado, Aag Lagado”

The final assault on the Kashmiri Pandits started with these slogans. Barbarous terrorists from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey, Sudan and even Saudi Arabia penetrated into the Saffron Valley. Brutal, wild and barbarous techniques were employed to hound and kill the Aryan Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir. Even the helpless ladies were not spared. Sarla Bhat, a nurse in Soura Medical Institute, was abducted on 19th April, 1990, by JKLF militants who repeatedly gang-raped her and eventually killed her on 25th April. Girja Tikoo, a teacher from Bandipur, was kidnapped, raped and eventually shred to pieces by a saw mill on 4th June, 1990. Bimla Braroo from the Nai Sarak, Srinagar, who along with her daughter, Archana, was raped in the presence of her husband, Sohanlal, before all the three were killed on 31st March, 1992. There are dozens of such brutal instances. Even wicked Afghans will be feeling sorry in their graves for the sanatic holocaust of the legendary Kashmiri Pandits.
The barbarous murder of hundreds of innocent Brahmans of Kashmir caused their seventh and final agonizing mass exodus from the Valley. This was the final knock down of ethnic cleansing and genocide of the Kashmiri Pandits. The mass massacres at Sangrampora (1997), Udhampore (1997), Prankot (1998), Wandhama (1998) and Nadimarg (2003) were the follow up cleansing operations. Pandits in Kashmir dwindled from 10% in 1947 to fewer than 5% in 1989 and to less than 1% today. The pretended world bodies, contaminated human rights organizations, pseudo-secularists, self-styled leaders, so-called policy makers, tainted political parties and slack bureaucracy have failed to express serious concern at this great human tragedy. Danse macabre is going on. During 1990-2005, the security forces seized around 30,000 assault rifles, over 15,000 pistols, more than 20,000 kg explosives, about 2000 UMGs and RPGs , from terrorists. In the barbarous turmoil about 45,000 persons including the Kashmiri Pandits, nationalistic Muslims and Sikhs have been killed. However the government is keen to provide a healing touch to militants. But the legendary Kashmiri Pandits, who were virtually exterminated from the Valley, have not even received the displaced status..

By: Dr.Satish Ganjoo

China: Latest assessment of Kashmir issue Guest Column-by D. S. Rajan The assessment on Kashmir issue, given by Chen Yiwu, the Pakistan based correspondent of the People’s Daily (Online Chinese language edition, Dec 1 &2,2004) for the benefit of readers in China, is notable for its significance, as views expressed in the authoritative paper invariably reflect the Chinese official stand. Taking note of the resumption of India-Pakistan peace talks since November 29,2004 and giving a historic account of the circumstances surrounding the Kashmir issue, the article described the issue as a ‘time bomb’ in India-Pakistan relations. Hinting that Pakistan’s stiff anti-India position on Kashmir is linked to its inability to take over Hyderabad and Junagarh at the time of partition, the article highlighted the fact that both India and Pakistan accepted the January 20,1948 UN Security Council resolution for a ceasefire, demilitarization and a step by step solution on the accession issue by holding a ‘plebiscite’. It added that in the fifties, India considered Pakistan as an aggressor in Kashmir and demanded for full withdrawal of latter’s troops before a ‘plebiscite’ could be held. Pakistan, on its part, asked for withdrawal of troops of both the sides from Kashmir prior to such a plebiscite. Observing that Pakistan’s joining the SEATO in 1954 and later the Baghdad Pact were aimed at resisting India’s strength, the write-up indirectly criticized India for announcing the irrelevance of the plebiscite principle on the pretext of Pakistan’s joining such military blocs. It pointed out that in the 15 years since the beginning of armed attacks in the Indian controlled Kashmir in 1989, 45000 people were killed. Though the accession of Kashmir is basically a legacy of India-Pakistan partition, the subsequent changes in the international situation and the continued uncertainty in India-Pakistan relations, brought other factors like security and political strategy of each side into focus, making the issue further complicated, the People’s Daily item remarked. Analysing the perceptions of India and Pakistan regarding the issue, the item said that although the Indian Congress Party came under compulsion to accept partition in 1947, India till today does not accept the ‘ two nation theory’, which formed the basis for Mountbatten’s formula on partition of the South Asian sub-continent. India is of the view that the partition has caused damage to its historic unity which arose out of the country’s old culture. The partition also had a deep negative influence on India’s big power status as well as defence. Pakistan, on its part, relies on the ‘two nation theory’ to win a broad Muslim religious and national sympathy. Moreover, since its formation, it is intentionally making efforts to gain features, which are different from that of India, so that it can exist as a pure Muslim nation. The article further observed that when Pakistan came into being, India thought that the former would not survive for long and aspired to continuously weaken that country with an eye on its leading position in the sub-continent. Also, India hoped for reunification of the sub-continent some day, considering partition as a mistake. Facing serious imbalance in terms of national strength and keeping in view India’s long term plans, the Government and people of Pakistan were pushed to nurture a feeling of crisis and insecurity. Pakistan saw India’s taking over of Hyderabad and Junagarh by force. It also realized that at the same time, India was not willing to abandon its claim over the Muslim majority Kashmir but with a Hindu ruler. The People’s Daily item opined that these factors led to Pakistan’s resolve to support the cause of Kashmir’s accession to it through use of force. Tracing the strategic reasons behind deepening of India-Pakistan hostility and unyielding positions on Kashmir issue adopted by both the sides, the article said that. Pakistan views the Kashmir issue as being not purely a territorial one, but also religious in nature, in view of the region’s Muslim majority. For India, protecting Kashmir is important for establishing an effective control over other regions in the country, particularly over Punjab through curbing separatist tendencies there. India also feels that if Kashmir goes out of its control, it could face a chain reaction. Kashmir is the home for the family of former Prime Minister Nehru and is thus a pride for the nation and the people. The People’s Daily item added that in addition India feels that the rich Indus river and its tributaries flowing into Pakistan, originate in Kashmir and that a control over this would ensure its domination over the life-line of Pakistan’s water resources. Pointing out to the emergence of internal pressures in each side on the Kashmir issue over the years, the item assessed that as a result, a realistic concession or compromise on the issue appear difficult for both India and Pakistan. As the country’s constitution stipulates that Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India, New Delhi, irrespective of the party in power, cannot accept any formula for solving the Kashmir issue on the basis of a plebiscite. If it does so, the regime would come under the blame of selling the country’s territory. For Pakistan, helping the Kashmir Muslims on the accession issue is a policy evolved out of an internal consensus. The article remarked that any rethinking in this regard by Pakistan would make the country to face political dangers, particularly in respect of internal stability. Making a reference to measures taken by India and Pakistan like holding of elections to legitimize the regimes in their respective sides of Kashmir, the article said that in such a process, local forces and elements with vested interests have emerged in both sides of Kashmir, capable of putting pressure on India and Pakistan in the matter of making mutual concessions. Though the article is generally balanced, what is visible is a veiled criticism of India for its attempts to weaken Pakistan with an eye on gaining a leading position in the sub-continent as well as its stand on the plebiscite principle. The strategic perceptions of India and Pakistan on Kashmir and the assessment that both the sides may not be in a position to yield or compromise in the face of pressures likely from the vested interests in two Kashmirs, as brought out in the People’s Daily item, give an indication as to how the Chinese view the situation. Interestingly, the People’s Daily item made no mention of other factors relevant to India-Pakistan relations like the nuclear issue, the question of infiltration from across the border and Kargil conflict. This is also the case regarding Kashmir territory ceded by Pakistan to China

There was enough evidence about Tribal Raid
By A Special Correspondent

There is enough evidence to suggest that the J&K government and Government of India had sufficient information about raiders’ invasion before hand.

Dr. Atri’s revelation:

On October 8, 1947 Dr. SK Atri, a leading doctor of Srinagar had been informed by some of his patients who held pro-Pak views that an invasion was in the offing. He took Prof. Madhok and many others into confidence about it. This is corroborated by Prof. Niranjan Nath Raina, the founder of the communist movement in Kashmir. In his book ‘Kashmir Politics and Imperialist manoeuvres’ (1846-1980), he writes:

“Some influential refugees from the NWFP with close personal contacts among the Pathan elite, reached Srinagar in second week of October. They had personal knowledge that Khan Bahadur Kuli Khan had been recruiting tribes in the Swat Valley for invasion of Kashmir”.

Indian forces pushing back Pakistani Invaders in Nov. 1947 in Teetwal Sector.

The communist group in the National Conference acting on this information issued a handbill on the 14th or 15th of October warning that an invasion was being planned to take place before the onset of winter. It asked all the patriotic forces to rise to the occasion to defend the state against invasion. At the same time it asked for transfer of power to the people, claiming that only a government enjoying the confidence of the people would be able to organise effective defence.

Cunnigham Letter:

George Cunnigham, who was Governor of NWFP at the time of partition, wrote a letter to Lord Mountbatten divulging information that Pakistan was sending armed tribesmen to Kashmir. His letter was forwarded to Prime Minister Nehru by the Viceroy. Pandit Nehru later admitted in Parliament to having accidentally destroyed the crucial document.

Dewan Shiv Sharan Lal, who was Deputy Commissioner of Dera Ismail Khan had soon after his escape from Pakistan met Sardar Patel, the Home Minister and informed him about Pakistan’s preparations for invasion of Kashmir. Sardar Patel had, it is believed, despatched Dewan Shiv Sharan Lal to Srinagar to be in touch with DIG Kashmir, Sh. Gian Chand Bali.

Kalkat Episode:

By far the direct and comprehensive evidence about the Pakistani attack came from Major Onkar Singh Kalkot on 19th October i.e. more than two days prior to invasion.

Major OS Kalkat, who later rose to be the Major General in Indian Army was serving as the Brigade Major at HQ Bannu Frontier Brigade Group at the time when preparations were underway for tribal invasion. His Brigade head was Murray, a British national Kalkat had been with Murray for over a year and was in his confidence. He was a postgraduate in Economics from Delhi University and had joined the Army rather late at the age of 24 in 1942.

Soon after partition there was communal trouble in Mirpur, killings had gone unabated.. Kalkat had offered to go there but was restrained by Murray. The latter told him it was better that a white officer went there, otherwise the issue would get politicised. Kalkat’s family had already reached East Punjab.

Kalkat was under watch of Pakistani intelligence, a junior Lieutenant was watching his movements. Besides Kalkat there were other few non-Muslim military personnel stationed at Bannu brigade outpost.

Messenger packet used to come on every Monday. The duty officer brought the packet, Kalkat as Brigade Major signed for it. The packet marked ‘personal/top secret’ was meant for Brig. Murray. It was an official communication from Commander-in-Chief of the Pakistan Army. Major OS Kalkat was on the horns of a dilemma. As Brigade Major it was his duty to relay the message by radio to his Brigadier. At the same time becoming privy to what was supposed to be secret communication to his boss would put his life in danger. For a moment Kalkat hesitated. Then he opened the packet, which included a letter addressed to Brig. Murray. It was signed personally by General Sir Frank of Messervy, C in C. Kalkat on reading the contents of the letter got nervous and felt excited. He bolted the door of his room to study the details in secrecy.

The letter and the accompanying briefing note detailed the plan for an Army offensive named ‘Operation Gulmarg’. The invasion was planned by Pak Army Headquarters meticulously with considerable strategic and tactical insight. The ‘Operation Gulmarg’ was to be an invasion of the Kashmir valley by tribal warriors of the northern frontier areas, which were to be armed and led by Pak army officers wearing tribal dress. The headquarters of ‘Operation Gulmarg’ was to be in the building that housed General Messervy.

Kalkat was the only Indian to know of secret invasion planned by Pakistan. Destiny had chosen him for a very special task. There were still two months in which India could make effective preparations to foil Pakistan’s nefarious game-plan. Kalkat made notes hurriedly, making a point-by-point copy of the plan.

‘Operation Gulmarg’ had devised a three-pronged operation:

Hit and Run attacks along the border with J&K force dispersal of state forces of J&K into small groups.

Unleashing of systematic propaganda on the border areas inciting the Muslims to fight the forces of the Maharaja and resort to religious-cleansing of their non-Muslim neighbours.

Finally, thousands of tribal warriors were to cross the frontier into J&K and occupy every bridle road and mountain tracks.

According to this plan, as revealed by Major Kalkat, every Pathan tribe was required to enlist one Lashkar of 1,000 tribesmen. The tribal detachments were to be collected at Baftnu, Wana, Peshawar, Kohat, Thal and Nowshera by the first week of September, 1947. The Brigade Commanders at these places had to issue them arms/ammunition and essential clothing items. Each Lashkar was to be commanded by a Major. A Captain and 10 JCOs of the regular Pakistan army were also to be provided to each Lashkar. The invasion was to be commanded by Major General Akbar Khan, who was assigned the code name ‘Tariq’.

As per ‘Operation Gulmarg’ all Lashkars were to meet at Abbottabad by October 18th. Six Lashkars were to advance along the main road—Abbottabad-Muzaffarabad-Uri-Srinagar, with the specific task of capturing the Srinagar Airport and subsequently the Banihal pass. Two Lashkars were to march from Haji Pir Pass direct on to Gulmarg, ensuring the security of the right flank for the main force advancing from Muzaffarabad. Two other raiders’ detachments were to move from Tithwal through the Nastachchun Pass for capturing vital towns of erstwhile Baramulla district—Sopore, Handwara and Bandipore. 10 other Lashkars were assigned the task of capturing Poonch, Bhimbar and Rawalkot before advancing to Jammu. Detailed plans were made for procuring guides/informers to be provided to different Lashkars. These guides/were to come from pro-Pak elements in J&K State forces.

Arms/Ammunition and other required items were to be transhipped to Abbottabad by October 15th. These were to be subsequently moved to Muzaffarabad and Domel after the D-Day.

The D-Day was fixed as 22 October, on which date the Lashkars were to enter J&K territory. Pakistan’s 7 Infantry Division was to concentrate on the Murre-Abbottabad area by October 21st and was ordered to be ready to back up Lashkars entering J&K territory and help these consolidate their hold on the Kashmir valley. Another infantry brigade was to be kept ready at Sialkot to move on to Jammu. The main attack was to be launched along the motor road. The raiders force was supplied rifles, the LMGs, 300 civilian lorries were put at their disposal.

Kalkat after finishing the notes asked his two Sikh batmen to stay back for the nightwatch. This made his junior Lieutenant spying on him suspicious. Kalkat concealed the envelope he had received in utmost secrecy. Then he talked to Brigadier Murray on radiophone. Kalkat conveyed that a code-named ‘Operation Gulmarg’ had been drawn up by the Pak Army and described it as an astounding plan—an invasion by Tribals.

Brig. Murray asked Kalkat to keep the plan to himself and not to reveal more on the radio. He warned him that any leakage would put his (Kalkat’s) life in danger.

Kalkat believed Brigadier Murray to be a part of conspiracy and took his advice as a veiled threat to keep quiet. Murray reached Bannu the following morning. It is said that the Pakistani Lieutenant had overhead Kalkat’s radio-talk with Brigadier Murray.

The next morning Kalkat was on a stroll. The Lieutenant, accompanied by a British officer surrounded him, putting him under arrest. The British officer told him, ‘you just poked your nose into something too big’. Kalkat was taken in a jeep for Lahore. He believed that the Pakistani Lieutenant or Murray himself had summoned them from Pak Army Headquarters.

At the helipad Kalkat was put before Major General Akbar Khan. Murray was also brought there. As per one version Akbar Khan himself shot him dead. Kalkat was put under house arrest in Lahore. He made his escape from Lahore, hiding in a goods train and reached Delhi via Ambala.

On 19th October Major OS Kalkat met Brigadier Kulwant Singh and Defence Minister Baldev Singh and revealed what Pakistan was cooking up. He also met other senior army officers at the headquarters. The Defence Minister asked his Army Hqrs. to analyse Kalkat’s information.

A Brigadier dismissed Kalkat’s revelations (Operation Gulmarg) as a Cock and Bull story’ and said the latter had invented it as his family was caught up in the riots and that was weighing on his mind. The Brigadier further claimed that he had spoken to his friends at Pak Army Hqrs, who laughed away at any possibility of trouble between India and Pakistan. But a colonel who knew Kalkat for years disagreed with his Brigadier and said Kalkat was steady as a rock who would never say anything for which he did not have basis. Kalkat was then taken to Prime Minister Nehru and made to repeat what he had said earlier to Defence Minister and other officers at Army Hqrs. Angry Nehru stared at his Defence Minister. Before Kalkat could finish, Nehru let loose verbal barrage against his senior Army officers for disregarding Kalkat’s information. He rumbled through his papers, telegraph messages and army couriers and flung these at them and kept shouting unrestrained.

Nehru turned to Kalkat and acknowledged, “This man (Kalkat) here risked his life, forgot about his family, to come to us here, to the PMO office, to tell us about an attack, a perfidious attack on our country. He had details, total step-by-step plans of an enemy operation. And what do my Army officers do, what does the Defence Minister of India, Sardar Baldev Singh, no less, do. They laugh it off. Kalkat is a mad man or worse. A paranoid patriot. They do nothing”. Pointing at the fallen papers Nehru said”, There is the proof that every word that Kalkat spoke was true. We have the news now that ‘Operation Gulmarg’ has already started and raiders are entering Kashmir.

Major Kalkat was soon drafted into the Kashmir operations (1947-48) and saw operations in the difficult Tithwal sector. Kalkat had great political foresight too. He was mentioned for his leadership role in Kashmir operations in dispatches. His plan for settlement of refugees from Muzaffarabad in 1947 was widely appreciated but ignored by Pt. Nehru at the instance of Sheikh Abdullah.

Kalkat later commanded 14 Infantry in the Western Sector to recapture 32 posts from Pakistanis in Mamdot and Jalalabad sectors in the 1971 war. In the same war Kalkat and Major General BN ‘Jimmy’ Sarcar had initially commanded ‘Operation Jackot’ in the Eastern Sector. Kalkat also worked as Chief Military Intelligence Officer in the Cabinet Secretariat for two years. He wielded a facile pen. His brilliant account—’The far-flung frontiers’ (Allied, 1983) has attained the status of a classic.

Though Kalkat was approved for promotion as Lt. General, he sought voluntary retirement at the age of 54 in 1972. This great son of India passed away at Chandigarh on December 3, 2004 after a prolonged illness.

Source: Kashmir Sentinel

Tribal Raid 1947

China aims to block India’s place in the sun
Posted by: John Elliott

It’s probably the tip of the iceberg of China’s ambitions to thwart India’s emergence as a significant economic and maybe diplomatic and military power. I’m referring to what might appear to some to be a crazy article on a Chinese strategic issues website, which claims that China could “dismember the so-called ‘Indian Union’ with one little move”.

Pakistan, which China has armed and helped become a nuclear power, has been destabilising India first in Punjab (in the 1980s) and then in Kashmir. China has also for years been encouraging separatist forces in India’s north-eastern states, including Assam, and will no doubt use its growing clout in Myanmar – and Bangladesh – to increase those activities. In the future it could perhaps use its growing influence in Sri Lanka – where it is developing a naval base and advised the government in the recent defeat of the Tamil Tiger separatists – to cause unrest among linked Tamil communities in southern India.It has also strengthened its border claims – for example by opposing a $3bn Asian Development Bank aid project in Arunachal Pradesh, an Indian border state that China claims as “south Tibet”. And it tried to block international approval of the recent India-US nuclear deal with the US.

This is of course a dangerous game and sometimes India has to respond – recently for example by moving fighter jets to the China border and, of course, by meddling in other countries, as a comment by Abhyaan (below) explains.

I have heard a former senior Indian bureaucrat argue privately that China’s basic – and permanent – aim is to force India to focus on domestic issues and thus thwart it becoming a future international rival.

China, according to this view – which is surely correct – is determined to be the world’s sole superpower after America, and does not want that status to be upset by a strong and democratic India backed by the US and Europe. Its tactics have become more insistent in the past two years as it has become irritated by India’s growing links with the US, culminating in the nuclear deal.

Everything that China does in relation to India therefore has to be seen through that prism. India will not fragment into 20 or 30 pieces – it is far too unified for that – but there is no prospect of permanent peace and co-operation between the two countries because, as the internet writer has said, “there cannot be two suns in the sky”.

Text of Memorandum submitted by 14 Muslim leaders of India

to Dr. Frank P. Graham, United Nations Representative

14 August, 1951

Reproduced from:
Converted Kashmir – Memorial of Mistakes
A Bitter Saga of Religious Conversion
Author: Narender Sehgal
Utpal Publications, 1994

It is a remarkable fact that, while the Security Council and its various agencies have devoted so much time to the study of the Kashmir dispute and made various suggestions for its resolution, none of them has tried to ascertain the views of the Indian Muslims nor the possible effect of any hasty step in Kashmir, however well-intentioned, on the interests and well- being of the Indian Muslims. We are convinced that no lasting solution for the problem can be found unless the position of Muslims in Indian society is clearly understood.

Supporters of the idea of Pakistan, before this subcontinent was partitioned, discouraged any attempt to define Pakistan clearly and did little to anticipate the conflicting problems which were bound to arise as a result of the advocacy of the two-nation theory. The concept of Pakistan, therefore, became an emotional slogan with little rationale content. It never occurred to the Muslim League or its leaders that if a minority was not prepared to live with a majority on the sub- continent, how could the majority be expected to tolerate the minority.

It is, therefore, small wonder that the result of partition has been disastrous to Muslims. In undivided India, their strength lay about 100 million. Partition split up the Muslim people, confining them to the three isolated regions. Thus, Muslims number 25 million in Western Pakistan, 35 million to 40 million in India, and the rest in Eastern Pakistan. A single undivided community has been broken into three fragments, each faced with its own problems.

Pakistan was not created on a religious basis. If it had been, our fate as well as the fate of other minorities would have been settled at that time. Nor would the division of the sub- continent for reasons of religion have left large minorities in India or Pakistan.

This merely illustrates what we have said above, that the concept of Pakistan was vague, obscure, and never clearly defined, nor its likely consequences foreseen by the Muslim League, even when some of these should have been obvious.

When the partition took place, Muslims in India were left in the lurch by the Muslim League and its leaders. Most of them departed to Pakistan and a few who stayed behind stayed long enough to wind up their affairs and dispose of their property. Those who went over to Pakistan left a large number of relations and friends behind.

Having brought about a division of the country, Pakistan leaders proclaimed that they would convert Pakistan into a land where people would live a life according to the tenets of Islam. This created nervousness and alarm among the minorities living in Pakistan. Not satisfied with this, Pakistan went further and announced again and again their determination to protect and safeguard the interests of Muslims in India. This naturally aroused suspicion amongst the Hindus against us and our loyalty to India was questioned.

Pakistan had made our position weaker by driving out Hindus from Western Pakistan in utter disregard of the consequences of such a policy to us and our welfare. A similar process is in question in Eastern Pakistan from which Hindus are coming over to India in a large and large number.

If the Hindus are not welcome in Pakistan, how can we, in all fairness, expect Muslims to be welcomed in India ? Such a policy must inevitably, as the past has already shown, result in the uprooting of Muslims in this country and their migration to Pakistan where, as it became clear last year, they are no longer welcome, lest their influx should destroy Pakistan’s economy.

Neither some of the Muslims who did migrate to Pakistan after partition, and following the widespread bloodshed and conflict on both sides of the Indo-Pakistan border in the north- west, have been able to find a happy asylum in what they had been told would be their homeland. Consequently some of them have had to return to India, e.g Meos who are now being rehabilitated in their former areas.

If we are living honorably in India today, it is certainly not due to Pakistan which, if anything, has by her policy and action weakened our pooition.

The credit goes to the broadminded leadership of India, to Mahatma Gandhi and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, to the traditions of tolerance in this country and to the Constitution which ensures equal rights to all citizens of India, irrespective of their religion caste, creed, colour or sex.

We, therefore, feel that, tragically as Muslims were misled by the Muslim League and subsquently by Pakistan and the unnecessary suffering which we and our Hindu brethren have to go through in Pakistan and in India since partition, we must be given an opportunity to settle down to a life of tolerance and understanding to the mutual benefit of Hindus and Muslims in our country – if only Pakistan would let us do it. To us it is a matter of no smaller onsequence.

Despite continuous provocations, first from the Muslim League and since then from Pakistan, the Hindu majority in India has not thrown us or members of other minorities out of Civil Services, Armed Forces, the judiciary, trade, commerce, business and industry. There are Muslim Ministers in the Union and State cabinets, Muslim Governors, Muslim Ambassadors, representing India in foreign countries, fully enjoying the confidence of the Indian nation, Muslim members in Parliament and state legislatures, Muslim judges serving on the Supreme Court and High Courts, high-ranking officers in the Armed Foroes and the Civil services, including the police. Muslims have large landed estates, run big business and commercial houses in various parts of the country, notably in Bombay and Calcutta, have their shares in industrial production and enterprise in export and import trade. Our famous sacred shrines and places of cultural interest are mostly in India.

Not that our lot is certainly happy. We wish some of the state Governments showed a little greater sympathy to us in the field of education and employment. Nevertheless, we feel we have an honourable place in India. Under the law of the land, our religious and cultural life is protected and we shall share in the opportunities open to all citizens to ensure progress for the people of this country.

It is, therefore, clear that our interest and welfare do not coincide with Pakistan’s conception of the welfare and interests of Muslims in Pakistan.

This is clear from Pakistan’s attitude towards Kashmir. Pakistan claims Kashmir, first, on the ground of the majority of the State’s people being Muslims and, secondly, on the ground, of the state being essential to its economy and defence. To achieve its objective it has been threatening to launch “Jehad” against Kashmir in India.

It is a strange commentary on political beliefs that the same Muslims of Pakistan who like the Muslims of Kashmir to join them invaded the state, in October 1947, killing and plundering Muslims in the state and dishonouring Muslim women, all in the interest of what they described as the liberation of Muslims of the State. In its oft-proclaimed anxiety to rescue the 3 million Muslims from what it describes as the tyranny of a handful of Hindus in the State, Pakistan evidently is prepared to sacrifice the interests of 40 million Muslims in India – a strange exhibition of concern for the welfare of fellow- Muslims. Our misguided brothers in Pakistan do not realise that if Muslims in Pakistan can wage a war against Hindus in Kashmir why should not Hindus, sooner or later, retaliate against Muslims in India.

Does Pakistan seriously think that it could give us any help if such an emergency arose or that we would deserve any help thanks to its own follies ? It is incapable of providing room and livelihood to the 40 million Muslims of India, should they migrate to Pakistan. Yet its policy and action, if not changed soon, may well produce the result which it dreads.

We are convinced that India will never attack our interests. First of all, it would be contrary to the spirit animating the political movement in this country. Secondly, it would be opposed to the Constitution and to the sincere leadership of the Prime Minister. Thirdly, India by committing such a folly would be playing straight into the hands of Pakistan.

We wish we were equally convinced of the soundness of Pakistan’s policy. So completely oblivious is it of our present problems and of our future that it is willing to sell us into slavery – if only it can secure Kashmir.

It ignores the fact that Muslims in Kashmir may also have a point of view of their own, that there is a democratic movement with a democratic leadership in the State, both inspired by the progress of a broad minded, secular, democratic movement in India and both naturally being in sympathy with India. Otherwise, the Muslim raiders should have been welcomed with open arms by the Muslims of the State when the invasion took place in 1947.

Persistent propaganda about “Jehad” is intended, among other things, to inflame religious passions in this country. For it would, of course, be in Pakistan’s interests to promote communal rioting in India to show to Kashmiri Muslims how they can find security only in Pakistan. Such a policy, however, can only bring untold misery and suffering to India and Pakistan generally and to Indian Muslims particularly.

Pakistan never tires of asserting that it is determined to protect the interests of Muslims in Kashmir and India. Why does not Pakistan express the same concern for Pathans who are fighting for Pakhtoonistan, an independent homeland of their own ? The freedom-loving Pathans under the leadership of Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan and Dr. Khan Sahib, both nurtured in the traditions of democratic tolerance of the Indian National Congress, are being subjected to political repression of the worst possible kind by their Muslim brethren in power in Pakistan and in the NWFP. Contradictory as Pakistan’s policy generally is, it is no surprise to us that while it insists on a fair and impartial plebiscite in Kashmir, it denies a fair and impartial plebiscite to Pathans.

Pakistan’s policy in general and her attitude towards Kashmir is particular thus tend to create conditions in this cauntry which in the long run can only bring to us Muslims widespread suffering and destruction. Its policy prevents us from settling down, from being honourable citizens of a State, free from suspicion of our fellow-countrymen and adapting ourselves to changing conditions to promote the interests and welfare of India. Its sabre-rattling interferes with its own economy and ours. It expects us to be layal to it despite its importance to give us any protection, believing at the same time that we can still claim all the rights of citizenship in a secular democracy.

In the event of a war, it is extremely doubtful whether it will be able to protect the Muslims of East Bengal who are completely cut off from Western Pakistan. Are the Muslims of India and Eastern Pakistan who sacrifice themselves completely to enable the 25 million Muslims in Western Pakistan to embark upon mad, self-destructive and adventures?

We should, therefore, like to impress upon you with all the emphasis at our command that Pakistan’s policy towards Kashmir is fraught with the gravest peril to the 40 million Muslims of India. If the Security Council is really interested in peace human brotherhood, and international understanding, it should heed this warning while there is still time.

Dr. Zakir Hussain
(Vice Chancellor Aligarh University)

Sir Sultan Ahmed
(Former Member of Governor General’s Executive Council)

Sir Mohd. Ahmed Syed Khan
(Nawab of Chhatari, former acting
Governor of United Provinces and
Prime Minister of Hyderabad)

Sir Mohd. Usman
(Former member of Governor
General’s Executive council and
acting Governor of Madras)

Sir Iqbal Ahmed
(Former Chief Justice of Allahabad High Court)

Sir Fazal Rahimtoola
(Former Sheriff of Bombay)

Maulana Hafz-ur-Rehman M.P.
Col. B.H. Zaidi M.P.

Nawab Zain Yar Jung
(Minister Gcvernment of Hyderabad)

A.K. Kawaja
(Former President of Muslim Majlis)

T.M. Zarif
(General Secretary West Bengal Bohra Community)

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