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Does Self-Rule Have
New Delhi 's Backing?

By Zafar Choudhary

30 October, 2006
Countercurrents.org


History makes a full circle on Jammu and Kashmir at United Nations when former Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed will address the UN General Assembly next week. But what exactly will Mufti say there involves a crucial question on Government of India's Kashmir policy.

The PDP patron says that he will explain to the United Nations the self rule proposal as lasting solution to Kashmir issue. Political scheme of things suggests that either Mufti will not speak on self rule at all and if speaks so the self-rule formula has blessings of the Government of India.

"He simply cannot talk what he wants. Every full stop and comma has to be read out exactly as it is handed down to him by the Indian mission to the United Nation", says National Conference president Omar Abdullah taking a cue from his stint as a Minister of State for External Affairs in Vajpayee government.

Mufti is the second leader from Jammu and Kashmir after Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah to make a speech on this state at the United Nations. Sheikh had presented himself and addressed the United Nation's Security Council meet in February 1948 while Mufti will be addressing the General Assembly.

In his opening paragraph at the UNSC, the Sheikh had said, "the Security Council will concede that I am probably the one man most concerned in the dispute because I happen to come from that land which has become the bone of contention between the two Dominions of India and Pakistan". 58 years later when Mufti goes to UN as second leader from Jammu and Kashmir nothing seems to have actually changed much on the ground.

Ever since Mufti's name was declared to head the non-official Indian delegation to the United Nation's General Assembly session, the Peoples Democratic Party leader has been making a clear point that he will offer self-rule as plausible solution to the Kashmir issue.

It was after the invitation to the United Nations that constituted a committee to prepare a draft on self rule which he is supposed to present at the UNGA. The self rule drafting committee and the political affairs committee of the PDP had final touch meeting on the proposal in Srinagar on Friday.

It was also in the aftermath of this invitation that Mufti, his daughter and PDP president Mehbooba and party veteran Muzaffar Hussain Baig launched a vigorous campaign across the state touching even hitherto unexplored areas of Kargil to build a public opinion on self rule proposal.

Not only this, last week Mufti met three former Prime Ministers: Atal Behari Vajpyee, VP Singh and IK Gujral –apparently to discuss the self-rule proposal and ramifications of its discussion at the United Nations. As already reported in this newspaper, Mufti also had meetings with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

A strong opposition to the self-rule formula for Jammu and Kashmir across the country is based on the origin of this proposal from Pakistan President Gen Pervez Musharraf. In a drastic climb down from five decades old stated position of Pakistan on Kashmir (referendum or plebiscite) General Musharraf was first to suggest in December last year that a mechanism of self rule on both parts of Line of Control can be a mutually acceptable solution to the conflict. A month later the Peoples Democratic Party picked it up as a plank.

However, last month in an interview to a leading Indian fortnightly Frontline, President Musharraf said that self-rule formula is not his creation but that of Government of India. He said in interview that diplomat JN Dixit, who passed away earlier this year, had handed him the self-rule proposal at the behest of Government of India in course of back channel diplomacy.

If General Musharraf's statement is anything to go by, self-rule seems to be a formula having full concurrence of the Governments of India and Pakistan. In such case Mufti's campaign on self rule appears to be backed by New Delhi. But yet again a stiff opposition to self rule by Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and state unit of Congress is un-understandable.

"I have been in the government and I can tell you how it functions. Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh is sending Mufti to the United Nations as the head of the Indian delegation. He simply cannot talk what he wants. Every full stop and comma has to be read out exactly as it is handed down to you by the Indian mission to the United Nation", maintains Omar Abdullah.

Abdullah said Mufti was drumming up support to cater to his constituency in Kashmir.

"He cannot tell the Kashmiris that he is going to the UN as the head of the Indian mission and would talk what is handed over to him.

"If he does so, he loses support in the valley. He wants to please the government by saying what the Government of India wants to project in United Nations. On the other hand, his daughter Mehbooba Mufti is speaking out against the Congress-led coalition in Kashmir. Mufti wants a win-win situation," he said.

Omar's views reflect some strength if one reverts back to his grandfather Sheikh Abdullah's visit to the United Nations.

In his capacity as Prime Minister of Jammu and Kashmir and delegate to the United Nations in 1948, Sheikh Abdullah stirred citizens and outsiders alike with patriotic oratory. Concerning the nation's constitution, enacted in 1944, he reminded Kashmiris that their assembly was "the fountain-head of basic laws laying the foundation of a just social order and safeguarding the democratic rights of all the citizens of the State." He championed free speech, a free press, and a higher standard of living for the poor. At the core of his speech lay his belief in "equality of rights of all citizens irrespective of their religion, color, caste, and class."

The author is resident editor of the Jammu edition of the English daily, Kashmir Images, and executive director of the Center for Media Research and Documentation at Jammu. He can be contacted at [email protected]

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