12 December 2004	Sunday	29 Shawwal 1425

LAHORE, Dec 11: A documentary on sufferings of Kashmiris and emotions of people of Pakistan and India on the issue was shown here on Saturday.

The Mashal Books, a non-profit publishing house, had arranged the show of the 45-minute film Crossing the Lines: Kashmir, Pakistan, India, prepared by Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy and Zia Mian for the Eqbal Ahmad Foundation.

Introducing the documentary, Dr Hoodbhoy said his work had received criticism from some elements both in Pakistan and India who rejected it as propaganda of the other country while he had tried to present the issue from an absolutely different aspect.

Admitting he was unable to give any solution to the Kashmir conflict, he, however, said he wanted peace between the two neighbouring nuclear states in the larger interest of people on either side of the Indo-Pakistan border.

Interestingly, the documentary neither mentioned root cause of the conflict nor did it throw light on its all important legal aspects.

Answering a question by political analyst and columnist Ataur Rahman, he would just say that summarizing 57 years of history in 45 minutes would not leave much room for covering all aspects of the dispute.

Advocate Birjees Nagy, a former history academician, objected that the film had also overlooked historical perspective of the issue.

According to him, accession of Kashmir to India was aimed at providing a corridor to New Delhi to reach the NWFP in the hope that people of that province, under influence of Dr Bacha Khan, would vote for India in the referendum.