KNOW THE REAL PROBLEM OF KASHMIR & POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS

I reiterated in my recent FB post that Kashmir problem is not political rather religious fundamentalism. This post is in line with my article titled 'What is exactly the problem with Kashmir today' published on merinews.com on September 9, 2016. (http://www.merinews.com/article/what-is-exactly-the-problem-with-kashmir-today/15919366.shtml)

In that article, I had clearly explained why the Kashmir issue is neither political (freedom struggle or plebiscite) nor for autonomy or for abrogating AFSPA. The problem is purely the radicalised Wahhabi Islamic movement that was seeded by late Pakistani military ruler President Zia-ul-Haq. Their first step was to compel Kashmiri Pundits to flee from the Valley. And then, planting radical Wahhabism through madrasas and mosques. The situation is now such that the Wahhabi revolutionaries have taken full control over the Valley and their radical movement can no longer be quarantined through dialogue.

From the time of writing of that article (September 2016) until last week, when I wrote the FB post, many of my friends are still unconvinced with my opinion. Most of my friends, albeit did not react to my FB post or the article, but did personally message me that my facts were incorrect and the source from where I had gathered them was probably biased. Some even alerted me against believing in false RSS propaganda, although my analysis was purely based on various opinions provided by expert contributors from India and abroad, who are neither supporters of the RSS nor enemies of Pakistan.

But, as it is said, truth never remains buried for long and at an opportune time, it props up from anywhere. On May 12, 2017, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen terrorist Zakir Musa aka Zakir Rashid Bhat, who had succeeded the slain terrorist Burhan Wani, issued a video message threatening Hurriyat Conference of dire consequence if they termed the Kashmir issue as a 'political struggle' instead of 'Islamic uprising'. Earlier too, Zakir Musa had explained that their armed struggle was neither for Kashmir nor for any freedom/autonomy. Their fight was for Islam read Wahhabi Islam.

In the meantime, some media channels have also exposed how the terror network is being coordinated and organised through social media. Republic TV too, exposed recently that Zakir Naik apart from radicalising Muslim youth had also been involved in mass conversion to Islam of people from poor sections of non-Muslim communities. They have been extremely successful in their ulterior motives in Kerala and parts of Mumbai, UP & Bengal. It is just the beginning for these radicalised Wahhabi groups towards establishing their dream caliphate of 'Khurasan'. For those unaware, Khurasan was a historical province of the pre-Islamic period that spread from Iran to Burma, including North India.

Now the question is, what would be the possible solution to the Kashmir issue? Is resumption of dialogue between India and Pakistan a solution?

I don't think so because even Pakistan internally does not want Kashmir. No doubt, they have been sowing the seeds of Wahhabi terrorism in India, but the situation has now gone even beyond Pakistan's control. Pakistan's intention is to let this radical movement be restricted to Kashmir only, harming India for long. I also feel that Pakistan wouldn't like to go to war with India over Kashmir as they no longer want it. The stone-pelters of Kashmir who often raise Pakistani flags in addition to the flags of ISIS are also aware of it. A journalist asked a stone-pelter as to why he was raising the Pakistani flag if he didn't want Kashmir to become part of Pakistan? The simple answer that the journalist got from the stone-pelter was that he had raised the Pakistani flag only to irritate India. Pakistan is India's enemy and an enemy's enemy is our friend, he further said.

Should there be any talks between the Indian government and Hurriyat and other separatists?

The answer is now clear from Zakir Musa's message to Huriyat as explained in the beginning of this article. Even the politicians of Kashmir are so terrified with this Wahhabism that they are under compulsion to take anti-India stance in fear of risk to their lives.

Is India actually losing Kashmir as claimed by many anti-BJP political parties?

Again, I don't think so. This problem is limited to just five districts of the Kashmir Valley surrounding Srinagar. In rest of the areas, people are not supportive of this radical movement and rather seek government action to curb this menace. The Shia communities of Kargil are very worried over this Sunni Wahhabism. Thus, the government of India should take some stern steps as mentioned below:

1) Either dismiss the Mehebooba government or at least bring these five districts under direct control of the Central government.

2) Stop all telecommunication networks that these radical forces depend upon.

3) Enforce a search and eliminate operation, to be carried out meticulously cleaning each and every square inch of the affected region. There are some liberated zones, as per claims, which need priority attention. The point to be noted is that a majority of people want peace but remain helpless and fearful of just a handful of terrorists. Once these terrorists are eradicated, common people will come out in the open against these radical forces.

4) The media must be advised to stop giving space to separatists and agents of Pakistan. Our news anchors while blasting such Pakistani stooges, fail to realise that they are indirectly giving a platform to these anti-nationals. Hysterical debates on Kashmir should be stopped for sometime giving our security forces sufficient time to fix the real problem.

5) There should be proper investigation to identify the terror funding network through illicit money trail and each and everyone involved in it should be booked without considering the outcome due to the status in the Valley of that particular individual.

6) If Pakistan really wants a war, give it to them and this time a decisive one, wining back PoK and liberating Balochistan.

Will the Narendra Modi government take such courageous steps?

I think that Prime Minister Modi has already started preparations and soon we will see some action on the ground. One thing that must be noted is that only Narendra Modi can cure this chronic disease of Kashmir dispute. If he fails, then nobody knows how long will India continue to bleed over Kashmir.

Captain Amarinder Singh Should Send a Thank You Note to Akalis for His Spectacular Win Over AAP in Punjab

In Punjab, Congress got more than two-third seats. It's good news for Captain Amarinder Singh who prior to the elections had already declared that these would be his last elections.

One of my friends immediately called me over the phone and said that Congress should get some solace in the fact that it won over BJP in clear terms in at least one state. My answer was, since when was the BJP a player in Punjab? After all, the party is just a minor entity in Punjab politics. I would also not agree that Congress defeated Akalis because after 10 years of anti-incumbency SAD was ready to lose this election.

So, whom did the Congress really defeat? Definitely, it defeated the debutante Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for which Congress should thank the SAD-BJP coalition. But how and why? Let's do an analysis to know what happened in 2017 Punjab Assembly elections, a state where electoral mathematics is very complex and a bit strange as vote share is not necessarily directly proportional to the seats won.

In my of my articles published in various platforms I have clearly mentioned how strange the electoral mathematics of Punjab is. In 2014, Congress got around 33.1 per cent vote share where as it got least number of MP seats (3). AAP got 30.4 per cent vote share and got 4 MP seats. SAD-BJP got 29 per cent votes yet got highest number of MP seats (6).

Thus, to beat this complicated mathematics, Congress had to get at least five per cent more votes and AAP should have fell behind SAD-BJP's vote share. The exit polls showed otherwise. They put the vote shares of AAP and Congress almost equal while putting SAD-BJP's vote share at less than 10 per cent allowing it to have just 4-7 seats. Had the exit polls been right then it would have led to the formation of a government in the state under AAP.

But in reality, Congress did get a vote share of 38.4 per cent which is exactly 5 per cent more than what they got in 2014. Also SAD-BJP got 30.7 per cent votes, an increase of 1.7 per cent votes from 2014 vote share, thus making AAP get 23.7 per cent votes which is 6.7 per cent less than their 2014 vote share. (source: http://eciresults.nic.in/)

That means that these 2017 Punjab Assembly elections were a direct contest between Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party. Had the SAD-BJP combine put up a poorer performance then AAP could have formed the next government there. Isn't the present electoral mathematics of the state too strange if you go by the seats won vis-a-vis the vote share? But that's what Punjab's politics is all about.

What are the takeaways for different political parties post the results?

For Congress it should be a learning lesson that in future elections it should trust more of regional leaders than depending on Central leaders. Rahul Gandhi shouldn't feature in any election campaign. They need to allow growth of local leaders. Congress could never have won Punjab had Captain Amarinder Singh not been made in-charge. Rahul Gandhi many a times wanted to remove Amarinder Singh, but it was Sonia Gandhi who didn't accept Rahul Gandhi's proposal.

For BJP, I think there is nothing in this election. Some would be thinking that BJP should have contested independently abandoning the coalition with SAD. But I think the top leadership made a good decision of not ditching SAD because it shouldn't dump long time allies in states where it doesn't have that much organisational structure.

For Akalis also it wasn't that bad an election as they got around 25.3 per cent votes (BJP – 5.3 per cent). They should now wait for 2022 to get back to power.

But there's a learning lesson for AAP. You just can't ditch Delhi and camp at Punjab. The Congress will haunt back AAP in the upcoming MCD elections in Delhi scheduled on April 22 this year. A defeat in MCD could lead to end of story for Arvind Kejriwal. His ambitions are good and high, but that doesn't mean you should ignore your roots. AAP's roots lie in Delhi and its neglect of the capital city could spell doom for the party.

Finally, I would say that there is a drastic change in power politics post these five state Assembly elections which will be visible very brightly. But in the meantime Captain Amarinder Singh need to send a big ‘Thank you’ card to Akali dal.

BOOK Review- H.R.Diaries by Harminder Singh

“कुछ नौजवान जिन्होंने नयी दुनिया में कदम रखा, उलझ गये दौड़-भाग के पाटो में। जिंदगी की पेचीदगियों को उन्होंने अपनी तरह से हल करने की कोशिश की, अनेक रोचक मोड़ आते गये , वे हँसे, रोये, घबराये लेकिन रुके नहीं। आखिर में उन्होंने पाया की नौकरी करना कोई बच्चों का खेल नहीं! उनकी जिन्दगी का एक हिस्सा उनसे हर बार सवाल करता है की यह दौड़ यूँ ही क्यों चल रही है? हमें क्यों लगता है की हम एक जगह बंधे हुए है? क्या यह हमारी नियति है?”

यह चन्द पन्कतियां हरमिन्दर सिंह की लिखी पुस्तक एच. आर. डाईरीज मूल तत्व है. लेखक का दावा है कि ये कथानक काल्पनिक है. परन्तु समझने  वाले समझ जाते है कि हरेक कहानि, द्रुश्यपट तथा विभिन्र कलाकार व सम्बाद लेखक कि अपनि अनुभुति है.

मेरा विश्वास है कि हर ख्यण हम किसि ना किसि कहानी कि अग्ं वनते रहते है परन्तु उसे सामान्य बिषय मानके हम भुल भि जाते है. हरमिन्दर जी ने लेकिन हर छोटा बडा घटनाओँ को अपनि द्रुष्टीकोण से विश्लेषण किया . जोभि उन्हे तर्क संगत लगा उन्होने उसे वाख्या कि.

उन्होने जिस तरह से इक रोज़मर्रा की दफ्तर वाली ज़िन्दगी को इस किताब के ज़रिये दर्शाने की कोशिश की है वह वाकई में काबिल ऐ तारीफ़ है। इसका एक एक विषय हमेशा याद दिलाता है उन दिनों की जब हमने पहली बार नौकिरी करने के लिए किसी दफ्तर केअंदर गए थे। किस तरह परिस्थितीयों का सामना किया। नयी नयी चुनोतियों को कैसे अपनेतरीके से सुलझाने की कोशिश की और निरंतर गिरते रहे उठते रहे मगर चलते रहे। यहपुस्तक हमें उन यादों से जुडी हुई सिख दिलाने में प्रेरित करती हैं।आपका यह पुस्तक पढ़के मैं काफी प्रवाबित हुआ हूं, और आशा करता हूँ की यह उन तमाम युवा पीढ़ी को भी अपने ज़िन्दगी में आगे बढ़ने की प्रेरणा देगी।

हो सक्ता है कि आप यह आकलन से असहमत भि हो मगर आप को उनकि वर्णन शैली को दाद अवश्य देगें. पढते पढते आप किसि चरित्र मे अपने आपको ढुन्ड लेगें. यहि मजा है जव आप वास्तव कहानिओँ के रुवरु होते है.

ये तो मानना पडेगा कि मानव स्ंसाधन विभाग वह विभाग है जहां से नौजवानों का स्वप्न शुरु होते है. सवको  कुछ ना कुछ अभिग्ङता है, लेकिन एक अलग द्रुष्टीकोण से रचित यह उपन्यास सभि श्रेणी के लिये पठनीय है.

यह पुस्तक हरमिन्दर जी कि प्रथम रचना है और Blogadda.com कि ‘ब्लागर्स टु आँथर्स’ योजना के अन्तर्गत प्रकाशित हुई है.

मेरा आकलन - 4/5