.

PUNCHLINE
Converting Struggle into Resolution
By
Z. G. Muhammad
To invite attention, it costs us lives of our youth, hundreds with bullet wounds
disabled for life and now scores of children pelleted to blindness. Such huge is the
cost we pay to make the world acknowledge the right to self-determination of 16
million people of the State. Interestingly and intriguingly, it equally costs pools of
blood to cause a debate in the Indian Parliament over the Kashmir situation and
wake up the ruling elite in Islamabad to the hard realities of the Kashmir situation-
not one portrayed by neo-progressive journalists of the country immune to the

suffering of people.
That has been our story for past sixty-seven years. Nevertheless, after offering
immense sacrifices and bringing back the dispute on the international diplomatic
turf every time there is something amiss somewhere. That fails our sacrifices to see
the international commitments guaranteeing the right to self-determination to
people of the state translated into reality. Is it the failure of people across the
dividing line to institutionalize their struggle at the international level that could
have enabled them garner support for the cause? The fact of the matter is that we
could not establish even an Institution like the Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS),
one of the most reliable institution on Palestine in Washington. Established in
Beirut in 1963, it has currently maintained an office in Beirut, Paris, Washington,
and Ramallah. The question, why our sacrifices after making to the international
diplomatic turf fail to produce tangible results should engage the attention of the
Kashmir leadership, the Diaspora and intelligentsia. How our failure to be
ambassadors of our cause has helped New Delhi to procrastinate and perpetuate
the Dispute needs to be analysed dispassionately.

Let me not go into the history of debates in the Constituent Assembly of India or
Indian Parliament testifying that New Delhis commitment to holding a plebiscite
in the State to people of India and international community. But in this column,
my focus will be New Delhis half-hearted approach to addressing the problem
after mass uprisings in the State. In 2006, Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh
constituted five Working Groups for addressing the Kashmir Problem. I am not to
vouchsafe that the recommendation of the Working Groups would have any takers
in Kashmir, moreover, if implemented these would have resolved the Kashmir
Dispute. Nevertheless, some of the recommendation like repealing of the
draconian laws would have created an atmosphere for initiating a dialogue
between all the three contesting parties for creating a conducive atmosphere for
settling the Kashmir Dispute amicably according to the basic principle of
upholding the right of people to decide their future. The recommendation, after
making them public were sent to the trashcan, only to be talked about after the
2008 mass uprising- later left on the shelves to gather the dust. These were
brought into the public domain once again after the 2010 Intifada when Kashmir
Dispute was once again in the headlines and debated in 2000 opinion pieces in the
international media. Now when Kashmir is again in the headlines for blinding of
children with pellets and killing of teenagers it has again become cause of
concern for New Delhi. Ironically instead of looking at it as a political problem
anchored in the birth of India and Pakistan it has been looking at it as a law and
order problem. This mindset needs to be changed. Instead of a cosmetic approach
like appointing interlocutors with no clear mandate, New Delhi needs to look at the
Kashmir Dispute as candidly as was seen by some brilliant Indian minds like
Pankaj Mishra and Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar in their writings during 2010
and come out of the denial mode. That, in fact, would be looking forward.
It is a hard historical reality that New Delhis Kashmir Policy continues to be
Babu tailored as that in 1947 bordering on procrastination. It was this policy that
brought Kashmir to the Security Council. For inventing narratives and conjuring
alternative discourses on Kashmir, this policy once again going to bring Kashmir
back to the UN as a nuclear flashpoint- disadvantageous to India looking for a big
seat in the August body. It is in Indias own benefit to resolve the Kashmir Dispute

in accordance with the UN resolutions.

On Friday 22 July 2016, after a gap of 23 years, Pakistan decided to knock the
doors of the UNHRC for sending a fact-finding mission to the curfewed state of
Jammu and Kashmir. This time, Islamabad has decided to approach the
organization on its behalf and behalf of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
(OIC) Contact Group on Kashmir. Pakistan had taken a similar initiative in 1993
when an international conference was arranged by the popular Arab and Islamic
Congress (PAIC) in Khartoum, and it had devoted several sessions to the plight
of people of Kashmir and liberation struggles in Kashmir. The Muslim countries
including Iran had with one voice assured Pakistan of support on Kashmir once it
introduces a resolution in the 50 th session of the UNHRC. Those days Washington
was favourably disposed towards Kashmir and its Kashmir policy was as good as
during the times of Eisenhower and Trueman. To see Islamabad not pressing its
resolution, New Delhi made all-out diplomatic efforts and succeeded in winning
over Iran President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani to use his influence and prevail
upon Benazir Bhutto. The then Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir believing that
Iranian President would mediate a solution of the Dispute withdrew the resolution
to her disappointment New Delhi saying it never asked Rafsanjani to mediate. It
was a great diplomatic victory for New Delhi and a big fiasco for Islamabad.
Had the Kashmir leadership on both sides at the time been robust enough to prevail
upon the then Pakistan leadership, the contours of Kashmir struggle would have
internationally changed to the advantage of people of the state. It would have taken
out the Kashmir Dispute out of the diplomatic cobwebs of bilateralism and
internal matter that New Delhi has woven around it during past few decades and
restored its international status that of allowing people of Jammu and Kashmir
exercising their right to self-determination.
There is a need for institutionalizing of the struggle at the international level for
seeing the sacrifices of people translating into the resolution of the 67-year-old
Dispute.
Published in Greater Kashmir on 25 July 2016.