SC Resume Hearing Art 370 : Lalit k kaul

The Ultimate Farce: The SC to resume hearing Art 370 abrogation from August 2022

Lalit K Kaul

 

Farce: An event or situation that is absurd or disorganized. Regarding Art 370 the situation is absurd. 

 

With the SC of India resuming hearing on a non-existent situation since more than half a century, the Black Coats will make lots of money to demonstrate their capabilities to play with the words as found in English Dictionary; their Lordships will display their keenness in delivery justice for a non-existent cause. The drama shall go on because 1) the politicians have lots of money to spare that they made in their political career and 2) because Politics is the “Art of The Possible”. 

 

Enlivening the Dead and Buried Horse: 

 

The dead are decreed to rise from their graves on the “Day of Judgement,” but here the attempt is to do it before “Qayamat Kae Roz”. We are told that only Allah can enliven the dead, but in this scientific world the mortals are attempting to do it. May Ishwar rescue the Nation.

 

The Rant of Special Status: 

 

The year 1965 was a watershed in the political dispensation of the erstwhile J&K State in that an event occurred that not only changed the course of political dynamics in the erstwhile State, but also redefined its relationship with the Indian Union. 

 

That event was relegation of the Chair of PM in the State to the CM of the State. At that time, the PM was Ghulam Mohd Sadiq. The Art 370 Horse was dead, but its skeleton was buried through a political agreement known as “Indira Sheikh Accord 1974” that enabled Sheikh Abdullah to become the CM and not PM of the erstwhile State. Earlier he had been the PM of the State and his acceptance of CM’s chair was indeed a Statement that he had agreed to bury the dead horse.  

The “Special Status” ceased to be. Why? 

 

The PM to CM Transition: 

 

A sovereign Nation State has a PM or a President as its Chief Executive; because it is sovereign it has its own Constitution and Flag including the military, judicial system etc.  

A CM is not Chief Executive of a sovereign State; he is of a subject State that is fully integrated with its Mother Nation State. Therefore, the said transition made the separate Constitution and Flag of the erstwhile J&K redundant and defunct.  

 

The Instrument of Accession as signed between the then Maharaja & the Indian Union and the equivalent of 35A that was in vogue during Hari Singh’s rule incarnated as Art 370 and 35A. The erstwhile State of J&K was deemed to have a degree of independence insofar its administrative affairs were concerned & therefore it was to be governed by its Constitution. 

 

Discrimination against other Indian States not possible: 

 

If CM of erstwhile J&K State were to enjoy “Special Status” as dictated by its defunct Constitution and its torn-out Flag fluttering over the New Secretariat roof top, then all other Indian States could not have been discriminated against. Once the tallest leader of Kashmiri Muslims, Sheikh Abdullah post acceptance of CM’s Chair declared publicly that Art 370 was not important, development was; it for the last time closed the chapter of Art 370. 

 

The Degenerate Political System: 

 

It facilitates politics based on falsehoods to flourish. So, the Abdullahs Muftis et al in their bid to exploit the emotions of the gullible to grind their political axe continued to speak of “Special Status” and not to be left behind the party of the “Sapoots of Bharat Mata” the BJP continued to speak of abrogation of Art 370. The Vajpayees Modis and Shahs were/are not so naive as not to understand that the horse they were flogging was already dead and buried. The compulsion of keeping the political rhetoric “One Nation One Constitution”, alive and kicking to foster Nationalism as a very potent counter to depraved “Secularism,” the BJP endlessly talked about Art 370.  

When Sri Vajpayee formed NDA government it removed abrogation of Art 370 from its manifesto; it only showed how every other political outfit wanted to exploit this dead issue because all knew that common voter is not too well informed to challenge their narrative on it.

  

Lal Bahadur Sastry & Indira Gandhi abrogated Art 370 & not BJP:  

 

Sri Lal Bahadur Sastry by relegating Sri Ghulam Mohd Sadiq to the chair of CM on March 23, 1965, had terminated Art 370 and the much-maligned PM of India by those who never measured up to the dust of her feet, very quietly and subtly obtained political sanctity for the relegation of the Chair of PM to that of CM by persuading Sheikh Abdullah to accept the Chair of CM. I remember the buzz among the educated young & old: making Sheikh Abdullah to accept CM’s chair was politically a master stroke as J&K had now fully integrated with India; post occupying the Chair of CM by Sheikh Abdullah, many subsidies were immediately removed; remember the price of rice shot up from 35 paisa/ Kg to more than Rupee 1 a Kg. 

 

Thereafter the successive governments at the Centre did not facilitate CAG to operate and the writ of the SC to run in the erstwhile state of J&K. So, the politics of blackmail in the name of non-existent special status took roots that saw unaccounted for funds being poured in the state and that was to eventually help in funding the terrorism that ensured exile of the Kashmiri Pandit Community and homogenize Kashmiri society.  

 

Sri SAS Geelani’s take on Art 370: 

 

In his interview to Kashmir Life on April 28, 2014, conducted by Muhammad Raafi, he said: 

“Terming the statement of National Conference President Dr Farooq Abdullah about the article 370 as ridicules and politics of deceit, chairman Hurriyat Conference (G), Syed Ali Geelani Monday said that the article 370 is recorded only in papers and the father of Farooq Abdullah has buried this article in 1975, when he accepted chief-ministership instead of Prime-ministership and surrendered the plebiscite movement which was nourished with the hot blood, merely for the chair.” Hurriyat chairman said that it is a meaningless and needless statement of Farooq Abdullah that the state of Jammu and Kashmir has its own constitution and flag. 

 

What did NDA government do in 2019? 

 

It very brilliantly smeared the faces of Abdullahs Muftis Hurriyat et al with the same stinking mud they had been splashing on Indian government since decades now. When BJP led government moved the bill in the Parliament to abrogate Art 370, all politicians across the political spectrum went through the process after making some noises as they knew that an empty glass was being emptied.  

 

The political master stroke was not abrogation of non-existent Art 370 but changing the geography of the erstwhile J&K State; demarcating the UT of J&K and creating UT of Ladakh. It swept the carpet from under the feet of Pakistani and China and their paid agents in India like, the Italian Sonia Congress (pact with CCP) and the “mainstream” paid agents of Pakistani supported by the likes of Kejris Mamtas and not to forget the Communists. 

 

The UT status unambiguously defines its inseparable bond with the Indian Union, the reason Pakistan and China were unnerved. 

 

 

The SC should know:  

All that the Indian leadership did, starting with Indira ji – Modi ji, one was with the consent of Kashmiri political leadership and the other through the Act of Parliament.  Therefore, their Lordships may understand that there was nothing unconstitutional about it & therefore the pending petition need be dismissed without wasting taxpayers' money and rousing passions.