Saturday, December 13, 2014

J&K- the symbol of incompetence

India, a home to 1.21 billion people is the largest democracy in the world. It is the seventh largest country by area & a renowned emerging superpower. In India, we have almost every kind of technology that the world knows and those that we don't have, we have the brains that could make even better than what the world possesses. Despite of having this much potential, there are some problems or issues which this generation cannot solve. One issue that is very familiar to every Indian, which has existed from the day this nation was created, for which we have fought 4 wars (3 direct 1 indirect) yet we are not at all near any solution; the Kashmir issue.
                                                        It all started when Pakistan violated the rules of the 'accession treaty' given by the Britishers and tried to capture a princely state i.e. J&K by force through a tribal incursion assisted by its army. Since the situation went out of control, the Maharajah asked India for help. India agreed to give a conditional support to the king, if and only if he agreed to accede J&K to India. After his affirmation, J&K became a part of India. But at this point of time, Pakistan army had already reached Srinagar. After a few days of war and heavy retaliation from Indian side, much of the lost land was recaptured. But then Pandit Nehru, the then prime minister of India out of nowhere decided to approach United Nations and cease fire was announced. The point where armies of both side stood at that point, is where they stand now (except in SiaChin glacier), which is known as the line of control or LoC; which is the most dangerous border in the world. Now the present state of Jammu and Kashmir is an Indian state for the Indians, India occupied Kashmir for the Pakistanis and a disputed territory for the World. In status quo,  the actual state which India has claimed since 1947 is divided in three parts:  the one controlled by Pakistan (known as Azad Kashmir in Pakistan and POK in India) which is approximately one-third of the actual state's area, the one controlled by India (known as the state of Jammu and Kashmir in India) which is almost half the area of the actual state and the rest is the territory controlled by China (as Aksai Chin and part of the Karakorum range which was gifted by Pakistan). The story of this issue has many climaxes, twists and turns. A feature film ends after the climax with a happy ending but this film seems to have no ending. The issue has come to a deadlock, which either party (India and Pakistan) cannot resolve.  Now the question arises, If the war had continued, would we had reached a conclusion? Was cease fire necessary? Pandit Nehru thought that war between two 'brother states' just after their birth was a waste of time, resources and money. But same was with United Nations! Going in United Nations was then a 'failed strategy' because United States along with two other nations (which belong to the powerful security council) were against India's stance. Pakistan has never accepted India's control over Kashmir, it has claimed that the treaty of accession was signed under pressure by the king and hence it is not valid. Since 1947, this issue has taken a lot from both the countries in terms of blood,lives, money, emotions but given nothing.

Why any solution is not possible?
Because the solution in this case would be either in the favor of India or in the favor of Pakistan & since both the nations have come a long way ahead from the state of favoring each other's interests, technically this option gets eliminated. Hence bilateral talks at least for this issue would always be inconclusive. There was an another possible solution that would have been in the favor of Kashmiris, but frankly that cannot happen now because no two sovereign nations in this modern world with a war mongering population would leave a single piece of 'barren land' from their control, why would they even think of leaving the 'heaven'? So, UN plebiscite is likely to be conducted only in the imagination of Kashmiris. War is a tried and tested anti solution, because all it has done is to aggravate the things. We already have had four wars and the fifth one might drag other super powers in it. With India coming closer towards United States and its allies; and with nail-biting Russia allying  ever-aggressive dragon; the world has polarized in teams of two, pointing their weapons at each other. A small spark will set the world on fire and we don't want another mushroom cloud. Factually right now this problem has got no solution. We must accept our incompetence on this issue and think of establishing peace in the valley.   
             Best thing for now is to leave the issue on our future generation on a positive note that they might find a solution that will be accepted by all. Time has healed many wounds, maybe it could heal a border problem, which actually isn't just a border problem.

Thursday, December 4, 2014

The Game of Power

Janata Dal is an Indian political party which was formed through the merger of Janata Party factions, the Lok Dal, Congress(S), and the Jan Morcha led by V. P. Singh on 11 October 1988 on the birth anniversary of Jayaprakash Narayan. From the day of its formation, this party had possesed the decay rate of Francium. It broke away in so many small as well as large parties which are fighting (because contesting is a very modest word) each other in present day elections. The breakage was a chain reaction and presently the actual janata dal doesn't even exist. Reasons for the breakage may be any of these: that the party had many power centres and although it worked on the same ideology of mandal based politics, it was never stable; that the leaders were hungry for power and had personal ambitions etc. This disintegration of janata dal into the janata parivar have led to emergence of vicious vote bank politics in India, because these parties have no different ideology, so to find a political ground and to differentiate themselves from others they have pampered and appeased a particular section of society and have been completely or to be precise politically loyal to it. Various parties like SP, BSP, BJD etc which actually are regional parties (but have been in and out of the list of national parties given by Election commission) have contested elections against and with each other in state as will as centre elections. Few 'have been' political rivals. The reason to point out these facts is that the political scenario in the country has changed.

Enemy of Enemy

After the emergence of, (as many of the leaders of these parties quote)  a 'tea seller', who currently serve as the Prime minister of the country, their political ground is under threat. The threat has loomed so large that even their existence is in question. It was shocking to find out about the Nitish-Lalu patch up in Bihar (who forgot their differences and came together for 'the development of Bihar' and 'to protect it from communal forces') which was slightly less celebrated than Sharukh-Salman patch up. Evidently, these enemies of their time have decided to join hands to fight against a mutual enemy (who they consider is a danger to society as well as the communal harmony) whome they will fight as a secular team. If they succeed in this move it will be a match between the 'Secular XI and Communalist XI' ; with Secular XI having all eleven as captains in their team! Is this possible? Can they come together? and even if they come together, Can they stay together? And if they come together why did they break anyway? Where have the ideological differences gone? Does any ideology even exists or are they just a bunch of men fighting for power? Because power is what i suppose broke them and now they are coming together to come back in power!
Let's see, what this game of power yields to?