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Friday October 13, 2006

Kashmir Autonomy and Muslim Ghettoization

By Chinna Karuppan

Recently there is an autonomy resolution passed in Kashmir assembly for granting the same autonomy as it existed before 1953. By this request Kashmir assembly is asking for powers to enact its own laws and to have president, prime - minister and  the  cabinet the same way  as  it exists in Delhi. The army, communications and currency are the only ones that will be the responsibility of India  to Kashmir. Also, none of the laws of Indian constitution   will be applicable to Kashmir.

Let us see what this means. This means that the Kashmir constitution is a separate one. The only link between the Kashmir and India will be the common army and common currency. The Kashmiris will continue to be allowed to settle and buy properties in rest of India and other Indians will continue to be discriminated in Kashmir. This situation will be very much like Germany and France where the common currency Euro exists and there is a move for common European army. Right now there are talks in Europe to have NATO (without US Army) as the common army of Europe. (Though the destination seems same, the directions are opposite. European independent nations move closer to forming a single nation and the autonomy ideologues are supporting the move away from each other)

DMK which has been pushing for Autonomy  similar to the one demanded by Kashmir for the last half-century,  should have been very happy.

But Murasoli Maran , the DMK bigwig,  who is  in  the cabinet ,  the person who was most vocal on this issue  a few years back did not even note his dissent when the move was rejected by the Central Government.  He wholeheartedly supported the rejection of the autonomy proposal from the Kashmir Assembly.  The only person, it looks like, who did not want to reject the autonomy proposal is Ram Jethmalani.

What happened in 1947 is happening again. Despite the protests from Sindh and Baluchistan and Pakhtoonistan, the Pakistan was created and given to Jinnah. The only assembly that unanimously accepted the partition was Punjab Assembly. Rest of the states of Pakistan never completely accepted the partition. Baluchistan and Pakhtoonistan opted for vote and by  just 1% vote difference ,  they chose Pakistan. Sindh legislative assembly was cheated to accept the partition. (and there was a murder of an influential congressman to achieve this end). Congress leaders (even Gandhiji) never went to these Muslim provinces to canvass for the pro-india vote in the referendums.

The strong Hindu lobby of Rajaji and Patel came to accept partition almost instantaneously and the last one  to give in to the idea  was

Nehru who fell in line  later . Mahatma  Gandhi  and  Khan Abdul

Gaffar Khan  were sidelined  and  were made irrelevant. There used to be a

myth that had the congress leadership knew that Jinnah is in deathbed, the independence

would have been postponed and the India would have been united. I think the congress

leadership might have known that thing and yet they had opted for partition.

Why Hindu part of the congress leadership did not want even

a single state which had Muslim Majority? The Muslim leadership of congress wanted to stay

in India and the unpopular Muslim league  (  among  majority of  

Muslims) was given prominence by Hindu part of Congress leadership while discussing the

communal problems. This was resented by the Muslim part of the congress leadership

(particularly by Abdul Kalam Azad  as stated  in his memoirs)  

Hindu leadership of  the Congress viewed the Muslim

areas as ungovernable and problem prone. This  notion  was cemented by the

continued riots in the areas of Muslim majority against the  Hindu minority. The

British records show that the Muslim majority areas of Punjab and Bangladesh had  

religious riots almost one per month. It is very likely that the Hindu part of the

congress leadership wanted the partition more than the Muslim part of the congress

leadership. It is also possible that the congress leadership thought  that India thus

partitioned will be having less problems than the one where the Muslim population is

almost equal to the Hindu population. It is very much possible that the Hindu Congress

leadership thought that the Muslim areas would be a burden on Indian development rather

than a need for fast development of the country.

At the time of partition, the most fertile lands of

undivided India went to Pakistan. The entire mighty  Sindh river was and  the

  fertile  Punjab and Sindh  regions were  given to Pakistan. (Hindu

Sindhis did not get the Sindh partitioned.  There are reasons to believe that the

Punjab would also be not partitioned had not the Sikh punjabis insisted). The most fertile

part of undivided Bengal went to East Pakistan. By this I believe the Hindu part of the

Congress leadership viewed the parition as a father sending  away his daughter with

dowry.  

Despite the enormous advantages with which Pakistan came

into being, Pakistan went into a spiral of ungovernability and despair. Almost the entire

east and west Pakistan can be considered as the states that are always under either

foreground or background military dictatorship for their entire history. The name of Islam

was continually abused by the dictatorships to cement their regime ; they created the

religious fundamentalism and that in turn made these states into terrorist training camps

to attack the neighboring states.

Though it looks irrelevant to India, the religious

fundamentalism of Indian Muslims (now called Pakistanis and Bangladeshis) is the direct

result of the Ghettoization of Muslims by the Hindu part of congress leadership.

The congress leadership wanted the India to be Majority

Hindu state. That is why they continually segregated the Muslims either in the newly

created states or in the autonomous Kashmir state. The result? It is easy to see that.

While India prospered, these Ghetto areas of Pakistan,

Bangladesh and Kashmir continually lagged behind. They became the haven for the terrorists

and fundamentalists. The fertile Bangladesh is now the world's poorest country. The scenic

Kashmir is the terrorist haven. Pakistan is living with the fear of being called a failed

state. But  Hyderabad which integrated with India has become the IT capital of the

world . Imagine what route it would have gone if it was independent like Pakistan? Now, if

anyone want a job, where would he go? Bangalore or Bangladesh?  In their misguided

enthusiasm the Muslims welcomed the creation of Mallappuram district as a victory to them.

Now this district is lagging behind in almost every quality of life criteria in Kerala.

This divisionist approach by the Hindu majority state should be seen more as a way of

dividing the Muslims from the rest of the people rather than giving them a privilege.

Indira Gandhi displayed the continuation of this Hindu mindset when she eagerly annexed

Buddhist majority Sikkim but, though East Pakistan was liberated mostly by the Indian

troops, did not show thew slightest intention of annexing the Muslim majority East

Pakistani  territory to India . Rather, she was eager to help form a separate nation

of Bangla Desh.

I don't think that only Muslims were thus victims of

Ghetto-isation.  Northeast tribals and the villages of entire India were in one way

or other ghettoized. Whereas the tribals of northeast were willing victims, the villagers

of India refused to be ghettoized.   After independence the high-caste Hindus

mass migrated to the cities and the beaurocracy which was filled at that time with only

upper castes made sure that the villages were deprived of even the basic amneties. Cities

became places of learning, better life and  with  modern  amenities and the

villages became first the colony of the absentee landlords of the cities. Though this did

not happen as a calculated conspiracy, this did put the villagers at a disadvantage.

  Add to this the land-reforms, though well intentioned and necessary to wipe out the

inequality, made the villagers dependent on the village. But in a progressive society this

did not stay that way. Many villages became mini-towns and the city expanded encompassing

the nearby villages. But this benefit was not available to Muslim ghettos. Also lower

castes and middle castes refused to be thus ghettoized and made every effort to mainstream

themselves. Though they respected Ambedkar, they did not convert to Buddhism (which would

have made them more marginalized). They fought for equal representation in the teashops of

villages, the entry and representation in the temples and their administration, the

government jobs and the places in the Supreme Court. Whereas Muslims always tried to

segregate themselves from the society and insist on their special privileges such as

grants to Madrassas and Haj journeys  and Shariyat, the village dwellers, who were

mostly depressed classes, fought for what was theirs in the economic and social sphere.

And the Muslim leadership and the secular left are

continually failing to understand this. Either that or they don't want to see the writing

on the wall.

We can see this as either the prophetic view of the Hindu

part of the Congress leadership . Or the Muslim leadership and failed left policies made

the efforts of the Hindu higher castes  a self fulfilling prophecy.

Let us see why DMK does not want  a  separate

state. Why  ,  it does not even want an   autonomy for TamilNadu?

Tamil businessman and the workers are working all over India. Tamil Cinema is running

packed houses in Belgaum.

Sun TV  (owned by Maran - Karunanidhi family)  is

  operating in all the regional languages of south

India. They are planning to  establish channels in

   other languages of India. Leave alone TATA and Birla, TamilNadu needs investments from GE and Toyota. In an unstable  and

exclusionist state, you cannot think or even dream of

these things.

D M K thinks that even if the Tamils are stupid enough to

vote for Jayalalitha once again , the Indian

constitution will guarantee that there

will be another election in 5 years.  Then,

    DMK can think of coming back to

power. In the absence of Indian constitution to guarantee the elections, Jayalalitha ( or

any similar teapot dictator)  would change the constitution to have her /him  as

the eternal leader of Tamilnadu. ( Well, that is exactly  what happened in Pakistan

and Bangladesh). If Tamilnadu was granted the freedom as it asked  for , some 50

years back, we can imagine where it would be by looking at Bangladesh and  Pakistan.

Still there are some well meaning advocates of

"freedom" from Kanyakumari to Darjeeling who think that once they have the

absolute control over a province they would change that to another Singapore, Taiwan or

South Korea. Though well intentioned, they fail to understand the global geopolitics. All

those model states did not achieve prosperity on their own. Without a giant US economy to

back them, they would be as poor as the small African states. There could be some states

that may leech on the giant economies and such small nations can always be touted as model

of the development. But the better option is to be a giant economy ourselves. So that

other small nations can leech on us. And that time we will have the cards.

My opinion is that the Hindu leadership of congress wanted

the Muslims states to self destruct by granting them the powers they asked for. And the

Muslims are gullible enough to view that as the success for them. In my opinion, Kashmir

is integrated to India for the sake of Hindus and Buddhists living there rather than for

the sake of entire Kashmiris  or the "protection" of secular values.

By playing into Pakistan's hand the Muslim leadership's

struggle for independent Kashmir, plays right into the hands of the Hindu leadership,

which intends to portray the Muslims as terrorists and divisionists and keeps them in the

ghettos. Muslims of Kashmir, if they want a secular, democratic and development oriented

life,  should ask for the removal of article 370 and tighter integration with India.

  Then, the Hindu leadership would then be shocked to death