An Open Letter To Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Don't cling to power, dismiss secessionist J&K Govt

By Prof Hari Om

Jammu Tawi, Dec 14:

Dear Prime Minister,

Disturbing developments which have been unfolding on a daily-basis in the sensitive border State of Jammu & Kashmir after you met PDP president Mehbooba Mufti on March 22, 2016 to break the impasse over government formation in Jammu and Kashmir and (in the words of Mufti herself) extended your “unconditional support” to what she and her party had been striving to achieve since 1999 have led the already abandoned nationalists in the sensitive border State, especially in Jammu and Ladakh, to believe that some insidious influence is at work to defeat the great object the founder of Jan Sangh, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee, and other patriots and throw in the lot of the nearly 60 lakh Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs with the Pakistan-backed Kashmir-based fanatics and votaries of “Nizam-e-Mustafa”.

They have come to believe that there is some kind of hidden unholy alliance against the minorities of Jammu and Kashmir and the nation as a whole between certain element in New Delhi and the hostile nations like Pakistan and United States. The objective behind this hidden alliance, they believe, is to ensure a compromise on the age-old national stand on Jammu and Kashmir and appease the votaries of pernicious two-nation concept or those in Pakistan and Kashmir who consider Jammu and Kashmir “an unfinished agenda of partition”.

Their belief has stemmed from some highly objectionable statements made by many BJP national spokespersons and RSS ideologues, who have on occasions more than one stated while participating in TV debates that “it would not be politically prudent to treat Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh like other states of the Union”. This was never the approach of martyrs like Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee. They were for the complete integration of the state into India and they laid down their precious lives for the national cause in the state.

Their belief has particularly stemmed from some highly inflammatory and unsettling statements made by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti after your historic statements that there shall be no talk with Pakistan until it stopped exporting terror into India, that your Government will take all steps to retrieve Pakistan-occupied-Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan and that your Government will take up the issue of human rights violations in Balochistan.

Mehbooba Mufti never missed an opportunity to contradict your pious statements and reiterate again and again that talks with Pakistan were imperative, notwithstanding the fact that she had no locus standi to speak on how Delhi managed its foreign policy vis-à-vis aggressor Pakistan. Only the other day, she in the presence of Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh virtually questioned your government's policy towards Pakistan by suggesting you must pursue the Vajpayee line to end the conflict between the two nations. Only those would support this line who consider Jammu & Kashmir a disputed territory and also believe in “supra-State” measures – shared sovereignty or India-Pakistan joint-control over Jammu & Kashmir.

Mehbooba Mufti Government crossed the red line the other day when it announced compensation for the family of slain terrorists Burhan Wani and his over ground worker and horbour of terrorists Khalid Wani. The atrocious decision cleared all the cobwebs of confusion and established that her government was all out to promote terrorism and separatism in the state. Her decision has shocked the entire nation in general and the 6 million powerless Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Jains in the State in particular. How could she loot the poor Indian taxpayers' money to feed terrorists and separatists?

Earlier on December 14, 2015, Mehbooba Mufti had also shocked the nation when she publicly said that the PDP-BJP formed coalition government only after the Hurriyat Conference agreed.

Speaking at the Agenda AajTak, she had said and I quote verbatim: “Her party had sought approval from the ‘Hurriyat party', for the government formation with the BJP. With (former prime minister, Atal Bihari) Vajpayee the experience was good, but forming an alliance with the present BJP was not easy for us. It took us two months to decide the agenda of alliance. Hurriyat party was also called and getting its consent on most of the issues the government is working.”

Prime Minister, certain elements in the BJP and the RSS may not appreciate the belief of the nationalists in Jammu and Kashmir. They may say that they are making mountains out of a molehill. They may say that their belief is unfounded. But the fact is that the alarmed, disturbed and frightened minorities in the state do believe that their very existence in the state is at stake. They do believe that the attitude of New Delhi towards the unfolding developments in Jammu province is similar to the one which compelled the hapless, unprotected and frightened Hindus and many Sikhs to quit Kashmir in January 1990.

It may appear preposterous but it is a fact that many in the nationalist camp in Jammu, which is also called the capital of refugees (all Hindus and Sikhs and all victims of radical Islamists and Pakistan), have come to believe that if the situation remained the same as it is today for some more time, the minorities in the state would have only a choice between conversion or migration.

It is this issue of a great national import that needs to be addressed at the earliest so that a right message goes that New Delhi under your leadership means serious business in the state and those striving to achieve for the state Azadi or autonomy or self-rule or Pakistan on purely religious and sectarian grounds will be brought to justice and the state integrated into India completely and comprehensively.

Prime Minister, we the nationalists and victims of fanaticism and Jihad have full faith in your inspiring and effective leadership. In fact, we consider you the country's last hope. We sincerely believe that you will undo the past wrongs committed by JL Nehru and ilk and integrate Jammu & Kashmir completely into India by abrogating Article 370 of the Indian Constitution.

We also believe that you would appreciate the nationalist sentiment in Jammu and Kashmir, which favours 4-way split of the State and creation of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh States and creation of separate homeland in the Valley for the internally-displaced Kashmiri Hindus. 4-way split of Jammu and Kashmir would not only limit the area of communal strife to small part of the Valley but would also puncture the balloon of Jihadis in Kashmir.

Besides, we the nationalists in Jammu and Kashmir would be grateful to you if your government dismissed forthwith the pro-separatist Mehbooba Mufti government. Her government is not an elixir to life of the bleeding Indian nation; it is a deadly poison.

With regards,

Sincerely yours'

Prof Hari Om

Convener, Jammu for India