Pakistan and India

This is in reference to Mr. H.V. Suman's letter which appeared in your daily on May 10, 1996. I am surprised to note how a presumably literate person could so easily miss the real essence of Prime Minister Bhutto's article, titled Bombing the innocents, a thing of the past. The entire thrust of the article was to advocate peace and to condemn violence as outdated and a cruel tool for getting political mileage. In the article, the prime minister neither made any allegations nor pointed at any particular country as being an instigator of violence. She simply stated that time has now come to seek new avenues of mutual cooperation and economic growth.

I would like to tell the learned author of the letter that it is not Pakistan that is suffering from India-phobia, it is in fact the Indian leaders, who frequently resort to blaming Pakistan for domestic unrest in India and for diverse acts of violence and insurrection in various parts of the country. These false allegations are propagated to divert attention from the real causes of unrest and violence in India. These obviously include social tensions arising from economic disparities, overpopulation and caste and creed consciousness. Likewise, political tension within Indian society explains much of the violence. The state of perpetual conflict between the Hindu majority and non-Hindu minorities and the exploitation of the latter by the former continues to fuel the fires of turmoil.

It may be further clarified that the concern of Pakistan for the plight of its Kashmiri brethren is not the real impediment in the path of the rapid development of SAARC, it is actually India's hegemonic foreign policy posture towards its smaller neighbors which is the real hindrance in the path of meaningful progress. The blame should be apportioned where it belongs i.e. to the deception and lack of concern for regional sensitivities that form part and parcel of India's entire approach to regional issues.

Pakistan is fully within its rights to express solidarity with the people of Kashmir in their just demand for the right to self- determination, as pledged by the United Nations. The innocent Kashmiri people are being punished for their unflinching resolve to continue their struggle for the right to self-determination. They have suffered some of the worst known and violent crimes against their person and property inflicted by the Indian security forces. As India has totally failed to intimidate the Kashmiri freedom fighters despite having unleashed a regime of terror and repression it is blaming Pakistan whereas, the state sponsored harassment of the Kashmiri people and their leaders continue unabated.

The Security Council resolutions determine the nature of the Kashmir dispute and are a permanent stay order of the highest body of the United Nations against Indian attempts to subjugate a nation and occupy its land. The Security Council resolutions are a certificate of nationhood to the people of Kashmir. It is not without reason that the Jan. 5, 1948 resolution says: "The question of the accession of the State of Jammu and Kashmir to India or Pakistan will be decided by the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite." Besides giving the Kashmiris the choice to decide for themselves what is best for them, this one sentence establishes the invalidity of the instrument of accession of the state the Indians arm-twisted out of Maharaja Hari Singh in October 1947. In other words the resolutions are the biggest deterrent to Indian plans to incorporate the state in its territory.

ABDULAH GHALIB

Bogor, West Java