What Goes Around, Comes Around
Being from Coastal Andhra Pradesh, I had unique emotion when Modi government announced bifurcation of the state of Jammu & Kashmir along with abrogation of Article 370. More than the elation of the BJP ranks, the disapproval by Congress’ Rajya Sabha members, namely P. Chidambaram and Gulam Nabi Azad, intrigued me since it came across as a paradox. While today they seem to be on the receiving end, five years ago they were on the other side. It is hard for people of A.P. to forget February 2014 when Congress joined hands with BJP to bifurcate their state.
The then Home Minister, Mr Chidambaram played an important and aggressive role in the process, starting with 9th December announcement. His anguish today that the government has divided and disfigured Jammu & Kashmir, and his sudden realization and trauma that any state, including his own Tamil Nadu, can be divided by a future government, is amusing. That exact unsettling truth had to be swallowed by the people of A.P. in 2014, thanks to Mr Chidambaram and his party. While Mr Azad laments that his state’s head is chopped off and identity has been taken away by the BJP government, his party closed ranks with this very BJP and handed the same humiliation to the people of A.P. in 2014.
In 2014, there was deafening silence from the same people who now complain of democracy and constitution being stifled, and exhort others to be vocal. Let us remember that Andhra MPs were beaten, expelled from the Parliament to exclude them from voting, the army was called, doors of the Parliament were shut, TV cameras were turned off and the A.P. Reorganization Act was passed in the din at night while violating all the norms of the Parliament. Interestingly, in February 2014 in the last minute, Farooq Abdullah started backpedalling to the embarrassment of his fellow UPA members. Abdullah probably saw the fate of his state at that moment.
Why Not Trifurcation?
Ladakh’s exit from Jammu & Kashmir should probably be called “Lexit”! It is surprising that while Ladakh was separated from Kashmir, Jammu was not. Maybe that is the plan. The divide between Jammu & Kashmir has always been deep. Maharajah Gulab Singh and his Dogra clan were rulers of Jammu who bought Kashmir from the British in 1846. While the Kashmiris viewed Dogras as foreign rulers, the people of Jammu resent the Kashmiris who inherited power after the democratization in 1947, by virtue of their numbers. Jammu will eventually need to separate from Kashmir for the same reasons Telangana was separated from A.P. in 2014.
Is The Kashmir Problem Solved?
When Home Minister Amit Shah says Article 370 was a temporary provision and that it is not the link that connects Kashmir with India, he is right. It is the Instrument of Accession that ties Kashmir with India, and it was the same formatted document that all other 560 monarchs had signed. However, when Shah says that Article 370 caused separatism and terrorism, he is wrong.
Contrary to his rhetoric, his own party’s positions that Kashmir is in the hands of the United Nations and that India is on the hook for Plebiscite, stoke separatism and violence. While presenting the bill in Rajya Sabha, Amit Shah had claimed that the Kashmir problem started with the introduction of Article 370, which is ironic since the bill was championed by Sardar Patel whom Shah, his boss Narendra Modi and his party BJP idolize. It is also illogical since there was no terrorism before 1989, which was 40 years after Article 370 was enacted.
While the likes of Anupam Kher declare that Kashmir “Solution” has begun, I wish they clearly state the Kashmir “Problem” first! Is it Article 370? If so, yes, we found the Kashmir solution. But what if the problem is the fact that Pakistan holds part of the territory? Neither the abrogation of Article 370 nor the bifurcation—of what we already hold—addresses the problem.
Do we think war would solve the Kashmir issue instead of parliamentary politicking? Well in that case, the last thing you want to do is abrogate Article 370, arrest their leaders and antagonize Kashmiris.
And then there is the United Nations and the Plebiscite! If Kashmir is in the hands of the United Nations, then India may have to leave Kashmir at any point. This abrogation of articles and bifurcation are trivial pursuits! It would be even more hopeless if we must hold Plebiscite. In summary, it would be good if the government tells us what the problem really is, before implementing the solutions!
What Happens Now?
It is obvious that the government has decided to ride the tiger. This is uncharacteristic of non-Congress governments, and hence BJP’s decision to take the bull by its horns is a welcome move. So far, BJP has been blaming Jawaharlal Nehru for over 70 years for every problem while they contributed nothing to the solution so far. As many people are now cautioning, there will be consequences! How adverse are these consequences, how long they last and what will be the result is anybody’s guess at this point! But BJP owns the problem now. Indians should hold BJP accountable now and should not allow that party to abandon halfway and blame Nehru.
Kashmiris will now claim that they are not related to India anymore since the bond of Article 370 is broken. While this is a false claim, the blame should not be on Kashmir political parties alone. BJP, too, should be held accountable, for perpetuating that theory to further their agenda of showing Nehru in a bad light. Pakistan will fish in the troubled waters as they always have and will try to invoke the United Nations or the United States. Once again, it would be wrong to blame Pakistan alone. BJP should be equally held responsible for perpetuating the agenda of Pakistan.