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SRINAGAR, July 15: The head of Indian-occupied Kashmir said on Monday that New Delhi had appointed a representative to start talks on granting autonomy to the held state.
The move would mark a major shift for Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s government, which had previously opposed autonomy.
“The prime minister has appointed a gentleman to discuss the issue (of autonomy) with us,” chief minister Farooq Abdullah told reporters after casting his vote at the legislature in Srinagar to elect India’s new president. He did not name the person appointed for the job.
Abdullah’s National Conference party had passed a resolution in the held state’s assembly in July 2000 asking New Delhi to grant autonomy to occupied Kashmir except in matters of finance, defence and communications.
The resolution was summarily rejected by the Indian government. The Srinagar government had enjoyed such autonomy until 1953.
Mujahideen groups categorically ruled out autonomy as a solution to the dispute, saying Kashmiris had no desire to stay under Indian rule.
They called it a ploy by Abdullah before elections expected in early October, which India is hoping will take place peacefully but which the freedom fighters have vowed to disrupt.
“The issue (autonomy) may be important for Abdullah who wants to woo Kashmiris ahead of the farcical elections,” Syed Salahuddin, head of the Hizbul Mujahideen, said in Muzaffarabad.
“The Kashmiri struggle is not for autonomy but for freedom (from Indian rule) for which they have sacrificed 80,000 lives,” he said
Abdullah has already appointed a senior party leader and minister, Ghulam Mohiudin Shah, to discuss autonomy with the Indian government.
There was no immediate reaction to Abdullah’s statement in New Delhi.
India is hoping a significant number of Kashmiris will vote in the held state elections, thereby easing criticism that it has not allowed Kashmiris to choose its own leaders.
Mujahideen groups, most of which plan to boycott the polls, have alleged that past votes in held Kashmir have been rigged in favour of Abdullah’s National Conference.
Abdullah reiterated his refusal to put the held state under New Delhi’s direct rule to ensure a free vote.
“No one can thrust presidential rule (on Kashmir),” Abdullah said, adding: “I will not allow anyone to rig the polls.”
India’s deputy prime minister, Lal Krishna Advani, told the India Today magazine in an issue published on Saturday that the chief minister and his son Omar Abdullah, who heads the National Conference, had both indicated “willingness” to put Srinagar under New Delhi’s rule before the vote.
Advani, who is also India’s home minister, said direct rule from Delhi would “help the credibility of the whole poll process”.
STRIKE IN JAMMU: Occupied Jammu was paralysed by a strike called by Hindu nationalists on Monday in the wake of Saturday’s massacre which claimed the lives of 28 people.
Most shops downed their shutters and buses stayed off the roads in the city after the strike call by the local chapter of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Residents said there was widespread concern about the security situation after gunmen disguised as Hindu holy men attacked a shantytown on Saturday.
Residents say held Kashmir’s government cannot provide adequate security and claim the authorities arrived more than 90 minutes after the attack.
New Delhi on Monday delayed by a day its formal response to the massacre after parliament, which Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani had been expected to address on the issue, was adjourned soon after the start of its monsoon session.
Advani, who has described the killings as “terrorism in its most naked form”, said afterwards he would now deliver his comments when parliament reconvenes on Tuesday.
But BJP spokesman V.K. Malhotra alleged at a press conference in New Delhi that the massacre was carefully calculated to make Hindus feel vulnerable in the held state.
“It seems that after the Kashmir valley, the minority Hindus are being pushed out from other parts of the (held) state also. This cannot happen without the help or involvement of Pakistan. It seems to be a conspiracy to drive Hindus out of the state,” said Malhotra.
Police believe the killings were aimed at deterring people from taking part in an annual Hindu pilgrimage to the cave shrine of Amarnath, in occupied Kashmir, that starts on July 22. —AFP
