leave india alone

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LEAVE INDIA ALONE: PAKISTAN AND TERRORISM IN

KASHMIRhttp://www.armyinkashmir.org/articles/lindia.htmlI am an aware, Muslim

Kashmiri woman and a responsible member of society. My husband, also a Muslim

Kashmiri, is an army officer and one among the best in our army. Since I am a

commoner, I am sure my comments would be taken as impartial and devoid of

rhetoric. It is rather unfortunate to witness the steady and gradual

degeneration of Pakistan over the decades sinking into the abysmal cesspool of

India-baiting. One had expected a lot from the rapproachement which appeared

imminent during the Lahore Declaration days in 1999. However, that great leap

forward was soon swallowed by the Kargil intrusions and subsequent increase in

cross border terrorism. Presently, Pakistan is just short of being declared a

terrorist state, a centre of narcotics smuggling and home for wild eyed muslim

fundamentalists. What amazes me is the shamelessness of the whole situation

which Pakistan has itself landed in. This reminds me of the famous couplet by

Mirza Ghalib, "KIS KE GHAR JAYEGI BALLA MERE BAD" (God knows whose home is

going to be the next victim). Since its creation, Pakistan, has tried to become

the self-styled guardian of all Muslims in the sub-continent, which at the

outset has been a flawed assumption. Although ever since 1947, in one form or

the other, Pakistan has made sneak attempts at such portrayal, the first major

signs of it manifested during the late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's Premiership, when

he hosted the first Islamic Summit in Islamabad in 1974; a brilliant piece of

tatesmanship and world-class diplomacy by the astute Bhutto, even when the

nation was still gathering itself from the defeat and genocide of fellow

Muslims in the then East Pakistan( now Bangladesh). During that summit, Mr

Bhutto was much restrained in voicing his so called concern for Kashmir as in

fact he had earlier accepted the Cease Fire Line in Jammu and Kashmir to be the

Line of Control and subsequently to be recognized/adopted as the boundary

between the two countries. But subsequent rulers like the shark-eyed General

Zia-ul-Haq and now General Parvez Musharaf chose to throw caution to the winds

and voice their crocodile concerns over the plight of Muslims in the whole of

India, perceived human rights abuses against them and so called liberation of

Kashmir through the barrel of the gun; in the bargain accumulating the

collective responsibility of massacre and mayhem, disorder and disruption,

desecration and degeneration by employing ercenaries like Afghan hordes,

Sudanese bushmen and Pakistani marauders. Their latest action has been the

sabotaging the of the peace initiatives in J&K. As someone has rightly said,

"BADSHAH DUNIYA KE MHORE HAIN MERI SHATRANJ KE, DILLAGI KI CHAAL HAI SAB RANG

SULAH JANG KE" (Pawns are kings of this world of my game, these ceasefires and

negotiations are but frivolities of my heart). Let me discuss the two issues

about which Pakistan has been kicking up such a shindy: Kashmir and the plight

of Muslims in India. First Kashmir; ever since partition, Pakistan has been a

constant source of trouble in Kashmir. It is well known that Pakistan has no

love for Kashmiris as their so called co-religionists. The necessity is a geo-

political one. It has been a great travesty of destiny that one third of the

Valley came under Pakistan control and remained so ever since. That part

rightfully belongs to India and is the only unresolved issue between the two

countries. Imagine a Pakistan without the POK (Pakistan Occupied Kashmir); no

strategic access to China and Central Asia, no Siachin and no Karakoram.

Second, the so-called pilght of Kashmiris; a Kashmiri Muslim is as divergent

and as far removed from, say, a Pakistani Punjabi or Sindhi Muslim as a German

from a Pole (and the pun is intended). It has been the misfortune of Kashmiris

and one of the greatest cruelties of history that invaders had to enter India

through these parts, thus leaving a stamp of eternal conflict and chaos.

Kashmir is no pocket borough of Pakistan and Kashmiris no pawns on Pakistan's

political chess board. They are a proud, ancient and most cultured community in

the sub-continent; be they Hindus or Muslims. It has been the short-sightedness

on the part of our leadership that we did not wrest POK from Pakistan soon

after that country invaded the valley in 1947. Now for the plight of Muslims in

India; to a very large extent Pakistan is responsible for the ghetto-like

existence of Muslims in India. It is Pakistan who has been constantly reminding

Muslims in India, through poisonous propaganda, that they are Muslims first and

Indians later. The Muslim community has long realised these designs. Muslims

are Indians, as much Indian as are believers of any other religion, as much

Indian as George Habbash is a Palestinian, as much Indian as Boutros Ghali is

an Egyptian or a Tariq Aziz is an Iraqi. Muslims in India are not rented, they

have their own distinct identity and pride and belong to the soil. They don't

require a certificate from an Ishaq Khan, who played dirty with all his

benefactors-a tenet absolutely un- Islamic; or a Zia-ul-Haq who trampled the

Constitution he had sworn to defend- an offence punishable by death in

Islam-and yet went scot-free, and flogged his nation for ten long years, thus

revealing the most ugly face of the faith ; or from General Pervez Musharaf,

who is yet to exchange his kneepants for long trousers in the field of

international politics. On the contrary, Pakistan junta should turn a page or

two in the history of Independent India and they would find that Muslims in

India are Abdul Hamids, Brig Usmans, Idris Latifs or Abdul Kalams or my

father-in-law, a Second World War veteran, a freedom fighter and a pious Muslim

who was assassinated in cold blood by an ISI-hired Afghan mercenary in July 1992

while offering afternoon prayers. Indian Muslims and Kashmiris in particular do

not require to be authenticated by Pakistan. It is therefore, time that the

present leadership in Pakistan woke up to the realities and considered

accommodation instead of confrontation. The court of history will judge

Pakistanis harshly in case they fail in their duties of nation-building and

instead become the instruments of their own destruction, thus perthaps living

up to their late Prime Minister's prophecy when just a day prior to

commencement of the 1971 war, the fierce Zulfikar Ali Bhutto rose like the

legandary Roman General Cassius Gaius in the Security Council facing Indian

Foreign Minister Sardar Swaran Singh and said, "Believe me, Mr Foreign

Minister, this is the lesson of history from the beginning of time......what

belongs to a people will go to that people". By this corollary then, Sind

should go to the Sindhis, Punjab to the Punjabis, Baluchistan to Baluchis and

NWFP to the Pathans so on. There ought to be a limit to trouble- making. "The

malice of the wicked" may have got reinforced by the weakness of the virtuous";

but no more. We shall pray that Pakistanis see the light and leave India's

Kashmiris to their own destiny which is secure in Secular India. One can`t help

recalling legendary Faiz Ahmed Faiz, "HAZR KARO MERE TUN SE YEH SIM KA DARYA

HAI, HAZR KARO KI MERA TUN WHO CHOB-E-SEHRA HAI, JISE JALAO TO SAHAN CHAMAN

MEIN DEHKINGE" (Beware of me for my body is a river of poison. Stay away from

me for my body is a parched log in the desert. If you burn it, you won`t see

the cypress or the jasmine, But my bones blossoming like thorns on the

cactus)". Mrs Hamida Maqbool Shah

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up what yu like from the world

 

Stop cribbing, ACTION is what the Indian scriptures talk aboutTake the battle

into the enemy camp, SET THE AGENDA, be proactiveIn an argument, no emotions,

be detached, get yr facts right, then attack with the precision of a missile