A Comprehensive Note on Jammu & KashmirINTRODUCTIONIn recent years Jammu and Kashmir has been the subject of international focus. Unfortunately,discussion on the issue has largely been flawed by misunderstanding of the State’s history andits present situation. Pakistan, in promoting its own territorial ambitions, has deliberately soughtto project a distorted version of developments in the State since 1947 when the State joined theUnion of India, in an attempt to disguise its own sustained effort at undermining the tranquillity ofthis "Eden of Bliss".Pakistan continues to look upon the issue of Jammu & Kashmir as one that lies at the very coreof India’s relations with Pakistan. This is manifested by Pakistan’s pronouncements and itsrepeated aggression against India, initially in the form of conventional wars and then bysponsorship of terrorism. This strategy is born of Pakistan’s non-acceptance of the accession ofJammu and Kashmir to India, made with the full support of its people then led by SheikhMohammed Abdullah. The fact that the two communities had coexisted for centuries, that asizeable section of India’s Muslims chose to live in India, that a princely state with a sizeableMuslim population like Jammu and Kashmir acceded to India of its own volition, and that theMuslim majority wing of Pakistan separated and became independent Bangladesh, are aspectsof history that challenge the principle that peaceful and beneficial co-existence was not possible.Jammu and Kashmir became an integral part of the Indian Union in 1947 through final accessionin accordance with the legal framework determined by the British Parliament for theindependence of the Indian subcontinent. This was sought to be undermined by the use ofmilitary force in 1947, which though successfully resisted by the Kashmiris with the support ofIndia’s army, resulted in a portion of the State remaining under Pakistan’s occupation. Again, in1965 Pakistan sought to capitalise on local disturbances to foster insurgency, but on failing tosuborn the local Kashmiri population, infiltrated armed personnel into the State leading to warwith India, ending with the Tashkent Declaration of 1965. In 1971, under threat of an insurgencyin its own eastern wing Pakistan again sought to divert world attention and extend the conflict intoJammu & Kashmir. This brought about defeat and the loss of its eastern wing with theemergence of independent Bangladesh.In complete contravention of the Tashkent Declaration of 1965 and the Simla Agreement of 1972,signed after two wars, Pakistan, still addicted to its quest to wrest Jammu and Kashmir by force,changed strategy and embarked on a programme of sponsoring terrorism in the State. Since1989, with over 20,000 people killed, Pakistan continues its proxy war against India. Even afterthe Kashmiris voted for democracy and again elected their own government in 1996, signallingtheir disenchantment with terrorist violence, Pakistan has not given up its policy of trying todisrupt the free democratic polity of Jammu and Kashmir. Disappointed with the response of theKashmiris to its calls for what it sought to promote as a "holy war" in Jammu and Kashmir,Pakistan has taken recourse to sending in battle hardened Pakistani, Afghan and othermercenaries who have distinguished themselves only by drenching the soil with the blood of thevery people whose interests they claim to champion in the name of religion.India remains committed to dealing with all matters pertaining to its relations with Pakistan, withinthe bilateral framework of the Simla Agreement. Solutions that entail a rewriting of history or aredrawing of geographical boundaries and possible population transfers can, however, never becountenanced.GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORYThe terms "Kashmir" and "Muslim" are often loosely, and erroneously, used when referring to theState of Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistan has deliberately fostered this misrepresentation to stakeits claim to what it terms a "Muslim State".

Indeed, the State of Jammu and Kashmir has a Muslim majority but is by no means ahomogenous religious or ethnic entity. Like the rest of India, it represents a mosaic of differentreligions, different ethnic groups and cultures as do many other States of India. In its entirety, theState consists of Jammu to the south, Ladakh in the northeast and geographically the smallestsegment Kashmir, comprised mainly of a river valley, surrounded by lofty mountains. All threesegments are distinguished by their diversity. Jammu has a majority Hindu population(60%), butwith substantial Muslim and Sikh minorities. Poonch, Rajouri and Doda, three of its six districtshave Muslim majorities. Variations of Punjabi like Dogri and Pahari, are the languages mostwidely spoken , together with a smattering of Kashmiri. Ladakh has two districts; one, Leh,overwhelmingly Buddhist and the other, Kargil, overwhelmingly (73%) Shia Muslim. Thelanguages there are Ladakhi and Balti. Kashmiri is not indigenous to this geographically largestconstituent of the State. The Kashmir Valley itself is predominantly Muslim, with smallcomponents of Hindus and Sikhs. Kashmiri is the predominant language, but with entire regionsspeaking Shina and Pahari.The constituent units of the State of Jammu and Kashmir still retain many of their distinctivereligious, ethnic and linguistic features. This heterogeneity was not lost even when they wereincorporated in one or the other empire - Maurya, Kushan, Mughal, Sikh or British, and today itreflects the ethnic, linguistic, cultural and religious diversity of IndiaHISTORYAncient Kashmir is steeped in legend. It is said that the Kashmir Valley was once the great lakeSatisar (the Lake of the goddess Sati, also known as Durga), home to ferocious demons.Responding to the penances of the great sage Kashyapa, the grandson of Brahma himself, thegods destroyed the demon of the lake, with a pebble divinely caste, which today stands as the hillupon which towers the fortress built by the Mughal Emperor Akbar, and known today as HariParbat. The water of Satisar was drained through a breach in the mountains at what is now themouth of the Valley, beyond the northern town of Baramulla (or the Sanskrit name of VarahaMukh, the visage of the boar). From then on the Valley has carried the name of its founder. Likethat of the rest of India, the ancient history of the State lacks detailed documentation althoughstuff and legend have been indistinguishably mired in the work of Rajatarangini by Kalhan whoseidentity remains a source of conjecture. In the 3rd Century BC, the state was incorporated intothe Maurya Empire under Asoka, founder of the city of Srinagar. Buddhism became the principalreligion which continued into the times of the Kushanas (1st and 2nd centuries AD), the names ofmany of whose rulers several towns in the Valley were named and continue to be borne byseveral towns in the Valley, such as Kanispora after Kanishka, and Hushkora after Huvishka. Itwas in Kanishka’s time that the 3rd Great Buddhist Council was held in Srinagar, formalising thesplit between the schools of Hinayana and Mahayana Buddhism. Thereafter Buddhism declinedin the Valley though it retained its vibrancy and continues to thrive in Ladakh.In the 8th century, Kashmir rose to become the centre of a great kingdom , spanning much ofNorth India and parts of Central Asia under Lalitaditya Muktapida, who was builder of theMartand (sun) Temple, and founder of the Valley’s irrigation canal irrigation system which hassurvived for centuries, helping water rich harvests of the finest rice, a variety of temperate fruitand exotic crops such as saffron.Islam came to India through traders, warriors and missionaries from the eighth to the twelfthcenturies. The faith came to Kashmir through the Sufi saint Bulbul Shah in the early fourteenthcentury, finding wide acceptance. The ruling monarch Rinchen Shah converted to Islam andassumed the name of Sadruddin in 1327 AD. Thereafter, beginning with his former generalShahmir, a series of Muslim dynasties ruled the State with brief interludes of annexation intoneighbouring States, to become a part of the Mughal Empire in the late 16th century, under itsgreatest ruler Akbar. The State was fully incorporated into the systems of administration and landsettlement which long remained a legacy of that Empire in India, well after its own disintegration.

All through this period the religious activity of the Shaivites and Sufis continued to flourish, andfed the vibrant stream of Kashmiri culture. Lal Ded, Kashmir’s great poetesses was also amongher foremost Shaivite ascetics and mentor to one of Kashmir’s greatest Sufi saints, SheikhNooruddin, whose school of Sufism is called ‘Rishi’ and who is revered by Hindus as Nand Rishi.The songs of Habba Khatoon, queen to the last Sultan of Kashmir before it fell to the Mughals,who retired to the life of a hermit in the hills of Gurez after her husband’s deportation, stillresonate with the peasant women harvesting rice in Kashmir’s fields.The rule of the Mughals has been coloured by romance, the modern remnants of which are to befound in the masterful architecture and layout of their world famous gardens in Kashmir:Shalimar, Nishat, Chashme Shahi, Chinar Bagh. A graphic account of the pomp and panoply ofthe Emperor’s cavalcade to Kashmir has been left to us by the French physician Francois Bernierwho was in the court of the Emperor Aurangzeb.The Imperial Court called on the Kashmiri Pandits, famed for their scholarship, to man courtlypositions in Delhi. Thus it was that the ancestor of the Nehrus was recruited by the EmperorFarrukhsiyar in the early 18th century to serve as imperial scribe.The defeat of the Empire at the hands of the Afghan brigand Ahmed Shah Abdali forced theceding of Kashmir to the Afghans in 1753 AD, leading to a period of unmitigated brutality andwidespread distress, which remained cruelly etched on the public memory, reinforced by thehappenings of 1947. The greatest of the Sikh rulers Maharaja Ranjit Singh won Kashmir in 1815.On the defeat of the Sikhs by the British, the latter annexed and then sold Kashmir to the localfeudatory Gulab Singh, who then assumed the title of Maharaja. His dynasty continued to rule theState under British paramountcy till the events described hereafter.THE ACCESSIONSince the partition of the Indian sub-continent in 1947, Pakistan has sought to project theaccession of Jammu and Kashmir to India as invalid and that, as a state with a Muslim majority, itshould have somehow become part of Pakistan. The Pakistani argument is that since the statehad a Hindu ruler he was surreptitiously persuaded to accede to India, whereas if the wishes ofthe people had been considered, they would have opted for Jammu and Kashmir acceding toPakistan. This patently false hypothesis has been used by successive leaders in Pakistan to referto Jammu and Kashmir as the "unfinished business of Partition" and to justify Pakistan’spretended "concern" for the Kashmiris’ rights, and its continued meddling in Jammu and Kashmir.Successive Pakistani leaders have referred to Kashmir as the "jugular vein" of Pakistan, ademonstration of the fact that it is the strategic importance of the state that has fashionedPakistan’s actions and not any regard for the rights of the Kashmiris. Major General Akbar Khanwho organised the raids in 1947 intended to forcibly seize Jammu and Kashmir writes in his book‘Raiders in Kashmir’ that it seemed that Kashmir’s accession to Pakistan was not simply a matterof desirability, but of absolute necessity.History proves the malafide nature of Pakistan’s arguments which are designed only tocamouflage its territorial ambitions. The two nation theory was proved fallible even at its inceptionwhen a sizeable Muslim community chose to live, and continues to live and prosper, in secularIndia rather than go to the newly created Pakistan. In 1971, the Eastern Wing of Pakistan brokeaway after a war of liberation fought by the Bengali Muslims against the oppression of their co-religionists who had hitherto monopolised Pakistan’s governance. India’s role in that war wassupportive of the liberation forces.Given the ethos of Jammu and Kashmir and the liberal and secular philosophy that provided thefoundation for the Indian Union it was natural that the leaders of the people of Jammu andKashmir would seek to identify with a polity that enshrined the same values that they cherished.India, since its independence, has been a vibrant, secular democracy providing to the people ofall its states, including Jammu and Kashmir, free and equal participation in political life andgovernance that has enabled them to determine their own destinies. It was this awareness of