On Kashmir problem
In support of Abdulah Ghalib's letter titled Pakistan and India (The Jakarta Post, June 6, 1996), I want to emphasize that the continuing insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir is essentially a legacy of the high-handed policy of the Indian government following the August 1947 partition of the subcontinent.
When the princely states of the former British India were given the option to join either India or Pakistan or remain independent, the Hindu ruler of Kashmir at that time, Maharaja Hari Singh, initially wanted to choose independence.
But, in October 1947, he was arm-twisted into acceding to India, although at the end, he insisted that such an accession was conditional upon a plebiscite by his mainly Moslem subjects.
In any case, after the undeclared war that soon followed between India and Pakistan, the Security Council of the United Nations passed a resolution in January 1948, calling for a cease-fire and a plebiscite.
India, as a matter of fact, agreed initially to such a plebiscite, but apparently, out of arrogance and in defiance of the United Nations, unilaterally renounced the idea in 1954.
Historical background aside, the most ominous development in the Indian subcontinent in recent years has been the rising tide of Hindu extremism in Indian politics and its implications and repercussions in Kashmir.
For instance, followers of the extremist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which came out through last month's general election as the single biggest political party in India, thought there was simply nothing wrong in literally demolishing the historic 16th century Ayodhya mosque of Uttar Pradesh in December 1992.
Furthermore, these BJP zealots, together with their equally fanatical allies, also want the Kashmir Valley to be resettled with millions of Hindus, to outnumber the Moslem majority and even advocate an open war against Pakistan over Kashmir.
They seem to think that Kashmir and in reality Pakistan and Bangladesh as well, were the integral parts of a mythical united India,
While the Indian government is expediently espousing a policy of national secularism, the Indian army, rather understandably, has found it fit to appease those extremist groups by retaliating against the Kashmiri Moslems with particularly brutal force.
Cases of Indian violations, rapes, arson and torture have been frequently reported in the world media during the past four years. Kashmir, therefore, is not just a major irritant as the United States seems to think, but an ongoing human agony which urgently needs to be rectified.
The solution to the problem seems obvious to me, given the historical background and following persecution and Hindu chauvinism. Let the people of both occupied parts of Jammu and Kashmir exercise their right of self-determination through a plebiscite.
After all, such a plebiscite was both stipulated by the former Hindu ruler of Kashmir and agreed to initially by India, as well as subsequently demanded by the United Nations.
India, which often prides itself as the largest democracy in the world and a leading moral force in the international arena, should at least listen to the wishes of the people of Kashmir and abide by the Security Council resolutions.
Indeed, a peaceful settlement of the problem is becoming quite urgent, not only because the dispute has already caused three major wars between India and Pakistan, but because the specter of a devastating nuclear confrontation between them is now looming as a distinct possibility.
MASLI ARMAN
Jakarta