Open Letter To Prime Minister
Dr. Manmohan Singh
By Seema Kazi
02 November, 2009
Countercurrents.org
Mr. Prime Minister Sir,
I write to you as an Indian citizen committed to India’s founding ideals of democracy and liberty which I hope shall inform your government’s Kashmir policy. Towards this end, I applaud Home Minister P.C. Chidambaram’s statement calling for a peaceful resolution of the Kashmir conflict through democratic dialogue. It is a refreshing change from the obsolete positions on Kashmir that have been a trade mark of successive regimes in New Delhi.
Peace between India and Pakistan is a fundamental pre-requisite for a lasting resolution to this conflict. I have every confidence that meaningful diplomacy with Pakistan under your stewardship can achieve the desired result. At the same time, however, your government must right the grievous wrongs in the Valley that have little to do with Pakistan and much to do with India’s poor record of democratic governance in Kashmir. In a public statement on 28 December 2008, you hailed Kashmir’s Assembly elections as “a victory for democracy”. Notwithstanding the importance of these elections, I am sure you agree that democracy is not merely about holding regular and fair elections: it is equally, if not more importantly, about upholding the rule of law, safeguarding citizens’ right to speech and assembly, protecting citizens from institutional violence and abuse, ensuring institutional integrity and accountability, and maintaining the supremacy of civilian authority over the military. It is precisely on these very counts that official claims to democracy in the Valley are gravely undermined by a very different local reality.
Democracy in Kashmir is ill-served by a two-decade long military occupation, the suspension of civil rights and liberties, official disregard for the writ of habeas corpus, legislatively-sanctioned subversion of the rule of law by the military, and the resort to illegal detention, extra-judicial killing, enforced disappearance and sexual violence against women by security forces. Such a policy is the source of an accumulated and overflowing reservoir of collective anger, anguish, despair and misery in the Valley. I appeal to you, Sir, to end this grim chapter that is a dark stain on Indian democracy and an indignity and affront to the people of Kashmir, and restore to Kashmiris the civil rights and political freedoms to which they are legally entitled, and which your government is morally and constitutionally bound to protect.
India’s democracy is based on, and informed by, her founding vision of pluralism and tolerance. I appeal to you, Sir, to acknowledge and respect Kashmiri Muslim identity and aspiration that successive regimes have sought to discredit and deny. Kashmiri Muslims have a legitimate right to wish to be identified as Kashmiris, and the right to determine a political future based on this particular self-identification. India’s faltering credibility in the Valley can be redeemed by democratic reconciliation with, rather than coercive rejection of, political difference. In so doing, you and your government shall reaffirm India’s original commitment to democratic engagement that is at the heart of any democratic state.
Sir, I applaud your rejection of war in Parliament and your vision of peace between India and Pakistan. It is my earnest hope that this vision is tempered with the political will to ensure justice and dignity for Kashmiri Muslims. Nations can make terrible mistakes: Kashmir is India’s own tragic mistake that can be rectified by an act of political courage and generosity. Sir, you possess the mandate and political capital to right a historic wrong and craft a peaceful, more promising future for India and South Asia. Failure to move forward is simply not an option: a wronged and bitterly resentful people, continued violence, and a ruinous and destabilising impasse with Pakistan. In this regard, I can think of no better words than those of Austen Chamberlain in 1921: “Now and again in the affairs of men, there comes a moment when courage is safer than prudence, when some great act of faith touching the hearts of men and stirring their emotions achieves a miracle that no art of statesmanship can encompass. Such a moment may be passing before our eyes now”.
I appeal to you Sir, to grasp this moment and undo the present status-quo so that the people of Kashmir and indeed, the people of India, Pakistan and South Asia can live a different future.
Sincerely,
Seema Kazi
Seema Kazi is a New Delhi based researcher and writer. She has worked with NGOs and women’s groups in the area of Muslim women, human rights, and minority rights and subsequently, on gender and militarisation in Kashmir. She has a PhD from the Gender Institute, London School of Economics, and is presently Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Studies in Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Email: [email protected]
