& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

Gen Musharrafs Interview with CNN on Kashmir

He Could Not Part with the Typical Mindset

by A. R. Shamsul Islam
PAKISTAN'S military ruler General Musharraf Hossain. in a recent Interview with the CNN on the Kashmir issue, said that India nakedly interfered in "East Pakistan" in 1971. He had shown every indifference and insolence to deny the weight of the Liberation War launched by the valiant people of Bangladesh against the most brutal genocide indulged in by the occupation forces.
Musharraf could not part with the peculiar mindset of many haughty Pakistanis who still eye Bangladesh as an integral part of Pakistan or at the maximum a protege of the "green and crescent."
Of course, there are pleasant exceptions to this ill-conceived belief. In the Dhaka Tripartite (India. Pakistan and Bangladesh) Business Summit held in 1998 the deposed PM of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif announced that had the mandate of 1970 elections been accepted the history of that region would have been different Further he uttered that those responsible for the sad events of 1971 in Bangladesh would be brought to book. In the statements and write-ups of some retired generals of Pakistan it has been admitted that Pakistan govern-
ments military actions'll! East Bengal in 1971 were erratic and cruel accounting for the dismemberment of the country. But when asked to offer apology to Bangladesh for the genocide of 1971 a minister of Pakistan government replied a categorical NO'.
What a pathetic brand of psychological perversion rules when Musharraf says that the creation of Bangladesh is nothing but a machination of India.
Kashmir problem and Bangladesh issue of 1971 are not anyway related to each other. Any discussion on Kashmir need not call for a reference to Bangladesh affairs of 1971. Yet the latter came up during Musharrafs interview with the CNN on Kashmir as a slanting reference probably because in both cases Pakistan supposedly suffered, inter alia, 'a common loss of territory.'
But it must not be lost sight of that 'loss of Kashmir (part)' and loss of Bangladesh are not the like things. The first was due to the machination of India. aided by (he betrayal' of Hindu Raja Hari Singh of Kashmir to his vast majority Muslim subjects, to 'grab the land of Kashmir following the
departure of the British Raj from the sub-continent. And the second was due to failure oi the West Pakistani rulers to continue their machination to exploit East Bengal. In the first case. Pakistan could not resist the machination of India and in the second case. Pakistan could not restrain her machination to ruthlessly exploit her much-professed brothers of the eastern wing.
In fact, rulers' of Pakistan have little grain of democracy in their vein. Dead drunk in authoritarianism they love to believe that anything can be achieved by the application of force. Pakistan steadfastly pursued this policy to rob East Bengal of her (East Bengal) due shares in economic, social, political etc. sectors till she (Pakistan) was defeated in the Liberation War of 1971 in which the most shining weapon of the victors was the unbending moral force of the people of East Bengal despite the fact that Indian help to their cause was immense.
Almost the same paranoia drove Pakistan army to infiltrate into Kargil miscalculating
that the Kashmir problem, till then localised, would be raised to an international problem and solved by world powers against Indian obstinacy and intransigence. General Musharraf was the mastermind of this operation.
Alas! in the end Pakistan had her design rudely thwarted with tremendous loss of prestige that Die people of Pakistan could not stand. Pakistan could not break the tragedy of Kashmir that continued to be unilaterally ruled by India by virtue of her commanding a larger force. Pakistan's calculation that she had a daring force fit to draw decisions in her favour was blasted in both the issues of Bangladesh and Kashmir. In the first, al the hand of the greater moral force of an awakened nation and in the second by a country* possessing numerically superior military power.
What is more tragic is that the Musharrafs do not have any penchant to learn from their mistakes of the past. That is why they still hold that Bangladesh, despite being a full sovereign state, can be cut into
something like a "Muslim Bengal by piloting a c hain of conspiracies and sabotism inside the country by agencies h>>in within and without.
The Musharrafs suffer from an inner contradiction. On one hand they believed they could rule East Bengal the way they liked because they commanded greater force. On the other as and when India retains Kashmir through her bulkier volume of arms and ammunition they deny to acknowledge this fact. How funny indeed!
They should get through long-cherished mistaken beliefs and damaging obstinacies. They should no longer fall short of realising certain established facts. First. Bangladesh has come to stay and there is no sanity to try to turn it into Pakistan's protege. Second, approach to resolve the Kashmir problem Ues not in confrontation but in dialogue. The latter, though to be varyingly vexed by India s sophisms and dilatory-tactics, is bound to culminate, sooner or latter, into producing a solution purporting to be just and true. But what is really a just and true resolve of Kashmir may lie in the womb of the future because affairs of Kashmir have developed a lot by this
time. What was considered a just resolve of the Kashmir dispute in the fifties may not hold good now in the new millennium
The Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Force (JKLF) are fighting to free the country from the rule of India. The Ail Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC) Chief and Chairman of JKLF charismatic Yaseen Malik has said that both India and Pakistan cherish Die same kind of desire of swallowing Kashmir for themselves ignoring the wishes of the people. India is ready to sit with APHC leaders on Kashmir dispute provided the latter abandon their agenda and accept a solution within the framework of the constitution of India. The APHC leaders observe that if the people of Kashmir are allowed to decide their future in a free and fair manner and if they opt for union either with India or Pakistan they will respect ft Can the right of self-determination of the people of Kashmir be kept shelved for ever? Who knows where the anchor will be chopped if the people of Kashmir are ever given the right to choose their own future through a plebiscite.