SHAFAQNA PAKISTAN (Shia News Agency)
Kashmir has been a bone of contention between India and Pakistan. Both the countries are infact lack will to resolve this issue. Apart from the will, there are numerous interests of several elements in unresolved issue on both sides of the border. Pakistan is playing a long-term game. It realises that it cannot take Kashmir from India by force. The two wars have shown this. After the defeat in 1965, then Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto told me in an interview that they have “learnt the lesson from history” and would not challenge India on Kashmir on the battlefield.
However, by mentioning separatists and elements from across the border, Mufti has tried to placate the valley where pro-Pakistani elements thrive. Similarly, his demand for the return of Afzal Guru’s remains is aimed at placating the Muslims in the valley. Radicals among them are pushing even the pro-Islamabad line on the plea that Pakistan is essentially a Muslim country. Mufti’s own election campaign was not bereft of Islamic streak or the identity politics. Over the years, the Kashmiris’ alienation from India on the one hand and the feeling of helplessness of its population in becoming an independent country on the other has left the field open for the Islamic propagandists. The liberals are depleting in strength literally every day. The main reason is that the Kashmiris have not yet realised that India would never accept another division in the name of religion since the Hindu majority Jammu would like to either integrate with India or become a union territory. But New Delhi would never allow yet another Muslim country on India’s border. The Kashmiris’ demand for independence is suspect since the general perception is that it is another ploy to join Pakistan ultimately. The separatists’ proximity to Islamabad has deepened the suspicion. India’s cancellation of a meeting between its foreign secretary and that of Pakistan may have been an overreaction. Yet it was meant to convey that the nearer Islamabad goes to the separatists, the farther it will be from New Delhi.
pakistan.shafaqna.com
