Public resentment against New Delhi’s proposed plan to abrogate Article 35-A of Indian constitution is growing day by day in occupied Jammu and Kashmir. Though the resentment over the issue first came from the region’s powerful political nerve center-Srinagar-but a wave of protests started spreading in Ladakh against the mischievous attempt to temper with the article 35-A and now similar voices emanating from Jammu province call for the protection of constitutional provision that guarantees special rights and privileges to permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir.
A civil society group, Jammu and Kashmir Civil Society Coordination Committee (JKCSCC), has threatened mass agitation across the state if Article 35-A of the Constitution, which is facing a legal challenge in the Supreme Court, was tinkered with. The JKCSCC, which claims to have members from all three regions of the state– Jammu, Kashmir, Ladakh– is an intervener in the case in the apex court. The JKCSCC said if the constitutional provision – which relates to the special rights and privileges of permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir – was removed; the relation of the state with the Union “will be broken”. “If anything is done to Article 35-A, the relation with India will be broken there and then. If that happens, there will be a mass agitation,” Muzaffar Shah, a member of the JKCSCC told reporters here at a joint press conference with other members of the civil society formation. “We will come out on the roads right from Lakhanpur (the gateway to the state in Jammu region) to Leh (in Ladakh region of the state)… There will be bloodshed. Then peace will not be established,” Shah added. He, however, expressed hope that the SC would dismiss the petition filed by an NGO. Suhail Kazmi a member of the group from Jammu said the constitutional provision was an issue of the identity and dignity of the people of the state and it was the duty of every citizen to safeguard it. “The people of Jammu region will bear the maximum impact if it goes away. We are with the people of Kashmir on this. The people of Jammu want Article 35-A and Article 370 to remain intact,” he said.
Almost every section of society in Jammu and Kashmir is against the revocation of article 35-A & article 370 of the Indian constitution, which guarantee special status to Jammu and Kashmir. There is a widespread consensus among all stakeholders on the subject, not only the pro-freedom political parties but pro-Indian parties as well as the civil society groups too have expressed their resolve to foil any such attempts aimed at undermining the state’s constitutional position and ‘political autonomy’. Even there are voices within the Indian society who believe that these constitutional safeguards should remain intact. Of them Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyer is one such leading voice who talks sense. Mr. Aiyar has rightly pointed out the sensitivities and advised New Delhi to hold talks with Pakistan and the people of Jammu and Kashmir. It is quite astonishing to note that instead of making efforts to normalize situation in the region BJP government has been trying to whip-up public sentiment thereby touching most sensitive issues, attached to the emotions of people in occupied territory. Rather than complicating the problem by weaving cobwebs of confusion around it the Indian government should heed the clarion calls emanating from within the Indian civil society and initiate a dialogue with Pakistan and the leadership of Kashmir to resolve the dispute peacefully. Just palming off is no solution to the problem, this is what the rulers in New Delhi should realize. How long will the Indian rulers betray the world and their own people? Kashmir is an internationally recognized dispute, people of Kashmir have been demanding their inalienable right, the right to self-determination, and 70 years down the lane Kashmiris have not accepted the Indian dominance and forcible control over their territory. New Delhi has miserably failed to win hearts and minds of people of Kashmir; holding them forcibly or altering the constitutional provisions won’t really change the reality and status of the Kashmir dispute.
