A small but influential section of public opinion in India has been pleading for “flexibility” in the Government’s approach to the Kashmir issue. Some important opinion makers have, in fact, gone on record to suggest that India will gain, not lose, stature if it gives up the Kashmir Valley in order to buy peace with Pakistan. At any rate, we will stop bleeding in the Valley and the world would look upon us as a mature, self-assured, emerging global power once the “thorn” of Kashmir is removed. They argue that none other than Jawaharlal Nehru internationalised the issue by scurrying to the UN in 1948 and pledged India to conduct a plebiscite in the State.
After losing nearly 1,00,000 lives in 22 years of insurgency, isn’t it high time that Delhi considered this “out-of-the-box” solution? And if that is not quite practical yet, what about joint sovereignty? Why can’t undivided J&K have a united quasi-Parliament thereby abolishing borders and giving equal say to India, Pakistan and the “people” of the State over its destiny? Washington, which loves such complex arrangements that facilitate a permanent foothold for itself in strategic regions, (erstwhile Yugoslavia being a case in point) has privately pushed this line for long. There may not be too many takers for such abject capitulation, but the fact that these views are increasingly aired in public appears to have put the Government on the defensive. Under pressure from Washington, New Delhi stonewalled the legitimate demand to call off the proposed Foreign Secretary-level talks despite last week’s blast in Pune.
This section of appeasement peddlers are, therefore, certain to overlook the menacing threat conveyed earlier this month by Jamaat-ud-Dawa (euphemism for Laskhar-e-Tayyeba) deputy chief Abdur Rahman Makki. Speaking at a Kashmir Day rally in Islamabad on February 5, the fire-spewing Makki not only let slip that Pune was on their radar, but also declared that jihad was also to be waged against the alleged denial of river water to Pakistan. This is a very significant addition to Pakistan’s agenda, doubly important because it is a “secular” inter-governmental matter rather than emotional or Islamist. The annexation of Kashmir on grounds of its denominational character is a declared jihadi objective. But Talibani/jihadi forces had so far refrained from dovetailing this issue with other disputed matters between India and Pakistan.
The specific reference to river waters suggests that despite pretending to have no truck with jihadis, the Pakistani Government is covertly in cahoots with them and could well have prompted the hardliners to raise the water issue to bring additional pressure on India. Further, it is also likely that the jihadis believe it is a matter of time before Pakistan’s civilian Government collapses and hard-line groups seize power in Islamabad with the support of ISI. They have thus initiated the process of understanding matters of statecraft so they can play an effective role in a future Government — a chilling prospect indeed.
This brings us to the fundamental question: Will Pakistan’s blood-feud with India ever end? Will Islamabad be satisfied even if, for argument’s sake, Delhi agrees to part with the Kashmir Valley? All these years, Pakistani leaders across political hues kept harping primarily on Kashmir, former President Musharraf candidly declaring it to be the core issue. After resisting this classification for some years, India succumbed, saying it was ready to discuss Kashmir if Pakistan addressed our concern over cross-border terror. At Sharm-al-Sheikh, India bent down further agreeing, first, to delink terror from talks acknowledging Pakistan too was a victim and, second, to bring Balochistan on the table. Events of the last few months culminating in Delhi’s latest genuflection clearly establish that the Sharm-al-Sheikh joint declaration was not a case of “bad drafting” as the Government wanted us to believe. It was, in fact, a formal statement of India’s revised position which also amounted to quietly admitting Pakistan’s charge that we have fomented disaffection in Balochistan.
A pattern is now rapidly falling into place. First Pakistan forced us to agree, howsoever reluctantly, that Kashmir was indeed the “core issue”. Second, it got us embroiled in the problem of Balochistan whose mere mention in an official document was sufficient for Islamabad to claim victory.
And finally, by getting jihadis to talk about the water dispute, Pakistan has ensured that the arena of its conflict with India continues to widen. As it gets its way on one, it pushes forward a second and then a third. Shrewdly assessing the Obama Administration’s burning desire to exit Afghanistan soon, Pakistan is cunningly seeking to get more and more pressure mounted by Washington on Delhi.
Meanwhile, India’s humiliation at the London conference and the conclave in Turkey confirms Islamabad’s resounding diplomatic success in excluding India from the core group on Afghanistan. Having convinced the West that it is as much a victim of jihadi terror as India, Pakistan has also managed to put India on the back-foot over Kashmir. The US is breathing down our neck to concede “something” on J&K without insisting on visible progress in clamping down on the masterminds of 26/11. It is a measure of Delhi’s pathetic helplessness that JuD/LeT supremo Hafiz Sayed, his No 2 Rahman Makki and all luminaries of the Rogue’s Gallery of terror **** a snook at us and hold public rallies pledging a bloodbath for Kashmir’s “liberation”, while India meekly pleads for immediate resumption of talks with a triumphant Pakistan!
As far as the issue of water is concerned, there is frankly nothing to discuss. The Baglihar Dam on the Chenub was referred to the World Bank by Pakistan and the independent arbitrator gave a go-ahead to India with a few suggested modifications. Under the Indus Water Treaty of 1955, India is entitled to the use of the waters of Ravi, Beas and Sutlej while Pakistan has legitimate rights over Jhelum and Chenub, but the usage is subject to certain conditions. India has adhered to these in constructing the Baglihar Dam, which will generate 450 MW of electricity for power-starved Kashmir, but the flow of Chenub waters to Pakistan will not be blocked.
The jihadi threat to forcibly extract more water from India clearly flies in the face of international agreements and counter-guarantees. In any case, jihadis probably neither comprehend the details of such binding agreements, nor do they care for international opinion. The opening of the water front by jihadi groups is aimed solely at aggravating alleged Pakistani angst against India, thereby legitimising their ongoing campaign of terror. Makki’s bloodthirsty diatribe, saying that “denial” of water justifies targeting cities like Delhi, Kanpur and Pune, that is, places way beyond Jammu and Kashmir, gives the game away.
Who knows what more will be added to the jihadi wish-list in the years to come? Hyderabad, Junagadh, Assam, Kolkata? Jinnah complained in 1947 that he had been tricked into accepting a “moth-eaten Pakistan”. The jihadis are carrying forward the promised 1,000-year war to reduce India to a moth-eaten entity, within and without.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/237426/A-‘moth-eaten’-India.html