Special report. Arif Chodhry
Malik Jawaid Iqbal was first appointed overseas advisor to Prime Minister Sardar Tanveer Ilyas Khan in June 2022, Jawaid was a first Asian Councillor elected in Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council in 1987, He is also founding member of Aqsa Housing Association in Oldham, and worked in local government and with First Choice Homes largest housing association in Oldham.
1} Tell us about your role as overseas advisor to Prime Minister of Azad Jammu & Kashmir?
I am honoured and proud to take on this role, my role is to inform Prime Minister of the challenges overseas Kashmiris face and inform Kashmiri diaspora of the business opportunities in AJK. I have travelled across the country meeting community members and businesses to listen to people and explain how I and the prime minister office can help overseas diaspora; I believe when government provides supportive environment to its citizens results in everyone thriving, The citizens are one of the foundations which represent the uniqueness of AJK. Keeping this in mind the Prime Minster also set up overseas commission for overseas residents any grievances can be taken up with overseas commission. Prime Minister also appointed an overseas commissioner from the United Kingdom for the assistance of its citizens overseas. My role is also to assist in raising awareness and highlight the plight of Kashmiri’s suffering under Indian occupation for last 75 years.
2} On 5th August 2019 Indian government revoke some articles of its constitution which given special status to Kashmir what’s your views?
After revoking Articles 370 and 35-A of the constitution, which ensured the state limited autonomy and territorial sovereignty, the Indian government put Kashmir under an intense military siege. It deployed tens of thousands of troops to the state, started arresting anyone daring who voiced their dissent, imposed curfews, shut down the internet and phone lines. This suffocating military siege and communications blackout lasted so long that Kashmiris could not comprehend when it ended – if it ever did – and the COVID-19 lockdowns began. Of course, the erosion of Kashmir’s territorial sovereignty and the rights of its Indigenous residents did not start with the revocation of Articles 370 and 35-A. Indeed, no Indian government has ever fully honoured the constitutional promises made to the Kashmiris under the auspices of the UN. Over the years, while paying lip service to the constitution, they gradually eroded the already limited autonomy of Kashmir and the rights of Kashmiris through presidential decrees, statutes, and legal verdicts.
In this context, what happened two years ago in Kashmir was nothing but the completion of a decades-old Indian settler-colonial project to “legally” annexe the state. Now, with no constitutional impediments, the Indian state is free to impose outright settler-colonial policies on long-suffering Kashmiris with impunity and erase their identities. The Indian fascist government is committing a demographic terrorism based on Israeli project, while West and America are protecting their economic interest before Kashmiri’s human rights and freedom. It appears that the legacy of Western government and its portrayal of itself as a promoter of freedoms and civil liberties have quite placed their core values into the shadows when it comes to the rights of certain communities which have been exchanged for trade and geopolitics.
3} What is India attempting to do in occupied Kashmir?
The Indian government is already working on new delimitation laws that will transform Kashmir’s Muslim majority into a tiny political minority within the rubric of Indian electoral politics. This will further obscure India’s colonial policies in Kashmir in addition to triggering a demographic shift and ending any semblance of democracy in Kashmir, the Indian state also took unprecedented steps to silence Kashmiri voices in the last two years most recently being Zakir Naik who I was informed had been offered friendship from the Indian government in exchange for support for their actions in Indian administered Kashmire.
4) What role can media undertake?
Today, certain journalism has been reduced to a government PR exercise in Kashmir. Even basic reporting of facts is being perceived and handled by the Indian state as a threat to the country’s national security. A draconian media policy introduced in June 2020 gave unelected bureaucrats the power to decide what is false news or incitement and to de-empanel (deny official recognition and access to) journalists and media outlets. Moreover, it allowed them to prevent “non-compliant” outlets from obtaining government advertisements – a major source of funding for many newspapers. Censorship and surveillance have been rife in Kashmir for decades but, since August 2019, it is fully institutionalised and legalised. Journalists are routinely being incarcerated, beaten, humiliated and harassed for merely doing their jobs. Recently some have even been booked under terror charges after being accused of incitement, sympathising with the resistance movement and spreading “fake news”. Not only journalists, but all Kashmiris daring to voice their dissent to the Indian state’s colonial policies and unlawful actions are being silenced. Indeed, ordinary social media users are routinely being threatened and jailed for refusing to toe the government line. The local administration is monitoring the social media activities of its employees and penalising those it perceives as violating its policies. Some have faced criminal charges and even been dismissed from service because of what they said on social media.
5) what new initiatives has been interduce to create jobs for people in AJK?
Prime Minister Sardar Tanveer Ilyas Khan has introduced a number of initiatives just to mention few such as tax-free industrial zones for up to seven years, I would encouraged overseas diaspora to invest in these zones to take full benefit of these tax breaks. He also made ad hoc workers permeant. As part of a bringing in new investment, the government has promoted the tourism industry to create jobs for local people. dry port for Mirpur, pink bus service for females and for climate change interdice !00% tax breaks on buses and Cars imported into AJK the list goes on.
6) did pakistan help Modi and If Mr Modi expecting to create a legacy for himself?
I think it comes back to Kashmiri leaders expecting better situation under Modi, because the last time a BJP government was in power, it was under Vajpayee who was willing to negotiate and prepared for dialogue. But it seems Modi has betrayed that legacy and wants to forge his own, believing in his roots of Hindutva and extremist RSS ideologies. Pakistan may have also held the same hopes as the Kashmiri leaders, but let us also not forget, in the greater political scenario, India and Pakistan have a long-standing bad blood which through external forces increased the animosity towards each other. It is very possible that Pakistan was extending an olive branch of peace, offering a friendly hand to start a fresh and cordial friendship with India which would benefit everyone economically, politically, diplomatically, but India is still yet to show that they are willing and committed to better relations between the two nations.
7) Indian troops routinely committing human right violations on daily basis in Kashmir yet world is silent?
Under Indian rule there has been reports of rape, extrajudicial killings, widespread use of torture, mass graves in the mountains of Kashmir which are unmarked which raises questions as to why they were killed and who these people were. Indian is yet to provide an answer. In addition to that, there are thousands who have disappeared. More than 10,000 people. Mothers searching for their sons who (as young as 13) have disappeared. There have been many cases of fake encounters where they would take innocent Kashmiris to a forest, murder them, mutilate their faces, and then dressed in a way so they could be passed off as the dreaded militants. The Indian army denies most of these claims but the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society has documented hundreds of cases of people being abused or killed. Most recently it was the case of Farooq Ahmed Dar, who in 2017 was used as a human shield to protect an Indian army jeep from stone throwers. Iron pellets are also used to disperse protesters continues to blind Kashmiris children despite condemnation from human rights groups. Indian responded by commending the Indian officer and not taking on the human rights violations by the Indian officer. world leaders can not continue to look other way they must take action against india if they stay silent history will remember all the names who put their ecomomic interest before our human rights and freedom.
8) what’s the solution in your opinion?
My personal view is Kashmiris should be allowed to put their own case to the United Nations and OIC and request a Kashmir member seat on both of these forum’s overseas diaspora can play an amportant part in this here in United Kingdom we can elect approx. 55 members of parliament with our votes which ever political affiliation we swing towards they can have extra 55 members of parliament in return but they have to back our case in parliament and at other forums that Kashmiris should be allowed to exercise self-determination vote in kashmir, world leaders must supports Kashmiris in their freedom struggle in occupied kashmor.