Kashmir, to those who wish to close their eyes to oppression and injustice, is “Paradise on Earth”, a tourist destination. For Kashmiris however, the reality of freedom and justice seems all too distant. Kashmir is the most obscure militarised zone in the world with Kashmiris having been denied their right to self-determination for the last seven decades.
REVOCATION OF ARTICLES 35A AND 370
Kashmir is a textbook example of what happens when the colonised becomes the coloniser.
In early August, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) made the executive decision to strike down Articles 35A and 370 of the Indian Constitution. The entire operation was overseen by Home Minister Amit Shah, a hard-right politician who is known for his orchestration of the massacre of 3,000 Muslims in Gujarat. This decision split Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) into two separate Union Territories and Ladakh as a separate union territory, ruled directly from Delhi. The last time Kashmir was ruled directly from Delhi from 1990-1996, it witnessed human rights violations on a massive scale with extrajudicial killings, torture, firing on unarmed demonstrators and the most well-known massacre—the 1991 Kunan Poshpura massacre.
Article 370 gave a special status of autonomy to the residents of J&K, allowed a separate constitution and flag and subsequently prevented outsiders from obtaining property rights in the region. The article also states that any changes made to Kashmir’s status must be made in consultation with the region’s Constituent Assembly. The fact that this was disbanded in the 1950s reflects India’s long-term goal of revoking these important pieces of legislation.
Article 35A, known as the ‘Permanent Residents Law’, was introduced to permit the local legislature in Indian-administered Kashmir to define permanent residents of the region – this forbade outsiders from permanently settling, buying land or holding local government jobs.
The main problem with these articles is that they were historically a temporary status protection. This is why Kashmir has remained in limbo for seven decades, at the mercy of a state that has time and again disregarded its responsibility to uphold peace and security in the region. Doing away with Articles 35A and 370 opens the door for a prolonged, Palestine-like independence struggle that will result in the rise of hostilities and tension between Kashmir and India, Pakistan, and even China.
WHY KASHMIR?
Since the 1947 Great Partition of subcontinental India, Kashmir has been the subject of heavy conflict between two nuclear states, India and Pakistan. Its northern and western portions are occupied by Pakistan and the southern and south-eastern portions are occupied by India. China occupies approximately one fifth of the region after Pakistan ceded a sizable portion of its own region of Kashmir to Beijing in 1963 months before China humiliated India in a surprise military attack.
However, the issue here is that Kashmiris have struggled to find a voice of their own in the political arena. Whether it be due to the mass expulsion of Kashmiri pandits in the 17th century, or the years of repression faced under the Sikh empires of the 18th and 19th century, Kashmir has perpetually been ruled over and never ruled itself.
The recent revocation of these articles is yet another testament to this fact.
COMMUNICATION CLAMPDOWN
It has now been over four months since India revoked the articles from the Constitution and imposed tighter curfews on Kashmiris in an attempt to muzzle political dissent. Over the past few months, Kashmiris have been denied the right to medical facilities, education, marketplaces and places of worship. Landline phones and cable TV have been disconnected, with very limited movement allowed at night.
Whilst this is not the first time India has blocked all forms of communication in Kashmir, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression David Kaye told the Guardian, “there’s something about this shutdown that is draconian in a way other shutdown usually are not”. This communication blackout has made it difficult for journalists to document the abuse conducted by the Indian Armed Forces against the people of Kashmir.
WHAT NEXT?
The implications of removing constitutional autonomy presents an array of moral and legal challenges. If India fails to respond to the international outrage, Kashmiris will be prompted to take up arms. If state repression persists, it is conceivable that the movement for non-violent dissent will erode. This will have detrimental effects on the Kashmiri people, because if Kashmir descends into widespread violence, India will take advantage of this situation and justify its increasing militarisation and occupation with the ‘protection from Islamic militancy’ as it has been doing so for the past seven decades. Pakistan, if it presents itself as the peacemakers, must continue to condemn the policy of incitement that the BJP is relying on.
For the past 70 years, India has continued to commit human rights violations in the region. It is clear that in these dark moments, Kashmiris have kept the fires burning. It is not only peace they yearn for, but freedom too.
Amara is in her final year of a Bachelors of Laws and Communication majoring in Social and Political Sciences at the University of Technology, Sydney. She is incredibly passionate about human rights and social justice and intends to pursue a career in international human rights law in the near future.