Kashmir's Accession to India is Undisputable; India Cannot Afford to Lose the Kashmir War

Pakistan as a state was formed on the basis of religion, whereas India was formed on the basis of equality and acceptance for all religions. Pakistan’s claims to Kashmir are based on the premise that Kashmir is predominantly Muslim dominated and that’s why it should annexe it by force. India’s claim to Jammu and Kashmir is based on historical facts and the treaties of accession. Even if Pakistan imagines in its figment of imagination that India could be brought around to another viewpoint, this very thought would set a dangerous precedent for the territorial integrity of India. That’s why the current political leadership in NDA is working towards a secular notion of India as opposed to pseudo-secularism and has rightfully kept the concept of a Hindu Rashtra in the backburner. Even the concept of Akhand Bharat can only be based on the principles of secularism as roughly 40% of the population of South Asia is Made up of Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, Christians etc.

India is not fighting a battle for territory. It is fighting a battle for those principles which constitute its very existence. If we allow territories to cede on the basis of religious majority it will strike at the very notion of India. Almost every district of India has a moderate percentage of minority population. It is for this reason that India cannot afford to lose the battle for Kashmir. As said earlier, India must launch pre-emptive strikes on Jihadi launchpads on the Pakistani side even at the cost of escalation to a full-fledged war. If we are made to get across the unequivocal message to Pakistan that we will do everything possible to assimilate and integrate Kashmir in India and will not hesitate to fight repeatedly if our sovereignty is endangered, will Pakistan back off. The big problem is that India is a divided house in Parliament and in media and in the electronic and digital age this notion keeps leaking out to the world repeatedly and our enemies take advantage of it.

Prior to partition, the Hindu, Muslim and Sikh population of J&K freely intermingled with each other and their was communal harmony. But over the last one and a half centuries, the predominantly Muslim population in Kashmir has complained about high handedness in treatment at the hands of the Maharajas of Jammu and Kashmir and post 1988 at the hands of the Indian state. However, given the facts quoted from a prominent website, the Maharaja and the National Conference headed by Sheikh Abdullah voluntarily acceded to India as is enshrined in the J&K Preamble to the Constitution. Further two prominent surveys conducted recently give a hung and a fractured mandate. These facts are borne below by excerpts from a prominent online website.

The Kashmir conflict between India and Pakistan started just after the partition in 1947. India and Pakistan have fought three wars over Kashmir, including the Indo-Pakistani Wars of 1947 and 1965, as well as the Kargil War of 1999, and the proxy war that Pakistan has unleashed on India since 1988 through state-sponsored Jihadis. As of 2010, India administers approximately 43 per cent of the region. It controls Jammu, the Kashmir Valley, Ladakh, and the Siachen Glacier. India's claims are contested by Pakistan, which administers approximately 37 per cent of Jammu and Kashmir, namely Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. China currently administers Demchok district, the Shaksgam Valley, and the Aksai Chin region. China's claim over these territories has been disputed by India since China took Aksai Chin during the Sino-Indian War of 1962.

The present conflict is in the Kashmir Valley. The root of conflict between the Kashmiri insurgents and the Indian government is tied to a dispute over local autonomy and based on the demand for self-determination. An opinion poll conducted by the Chatham House international affairs think tank found that in the Kashmir valley – the mainly Muslim area in Indian Kashmir at the centre of the insurgency – support for independence varies between 74% to 95% in its various districts. Support for remaining with India was, however, extremely high in predominantly Hindu Jammu and Buddhist Ladakh. Kashmir remained under Muslim rule for five centuries. The Pashtun Durrani Empire ruled Kashmir in the 18th century until its 1819 conquest by the Sikh ruler Ranjit Singh.

The Raja of Jammu Gulab Singh, who was a vassal of the Sikh Empire and an influential noble in the Sikh court, sent expeditions to various border kingdoms and ended up encircling Kashmir by 1840. Following the First Anglo-Sikh War (1845–1846), Kashmir was ceded under the Treaty of Lahore to the East India Company, which transferred it to Gulab Singh through the Treaty of Amritsar, in return for the payment of indemnity owed by the Sikh empire. Gulab Singh took the title of the Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir. From then until the 1947 Partition of India, Kashmir was ruled by the Maharajas of the princely state of Kashmir and Jammu. According to the 1941 census, the state's population was 77 percent Muslim, 20 percent Hindu and 3 percent others (Sikhs and Buddhists). Despite its Muslim majority, the princely rule was an overwhelmingly Hindu state.

Preamble and article 3 of part 2 of Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir says 'Jammu and Kashmir is and shall be an integral part of the Union of India'. This constitution has been adopted by elected Jammu and Kashmir Constituent Assembly in 1956 when Nehru was Prime Minister of India.