20/05/2023
Home Minister Mr. Amit Shah has once again reiterated in a recent statement that Article 370 was temporary. Therefore, according to him, it was easy to abrogate it. In other words, he meant to say that nobody had made it permanent and saved it forever. According to him, it was bound to be abrogated one day so they have not committed any wrong act to abrogate it. BJP is building up this narrative to normalize the constitutional changes made to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir. Time has proven that abrogation of the Article was not in favor of India. It was believed that the abrogation of the Article will put an end to militancy and it will integrate J&K fully with the rest of the country. That has not happened. The seeming silence is the result of the use of brute force which has become a permanent necessity for India after the abrogation of Article 370. The silence exhibited nowadays is not natural but enforced. This could have been done without the abrogation of Article 370. Three main implications of the abrogation of Article 370 have emerged so far which are worrying New Delhi. First of all the abrogation of the Article has brought in huge political instability in the UT. The second implication is that the act of 5th August 2019 has not gone well in the international community to the extent that China has used the issue to its advantage in Ladakh UT. The third implication is that Article 370 was a constitutional guarantee of the Treaty of Accession. In the presence of this agreement, it was not justified to declare Jihad as per the Sharia law. The separatist leaders knew this prohibition very well. Its unilateral abrogation by the Indian government has instead made it an obligation upon Jihadi forces to declare Jihad officially as per Sharia law. Global Jihadi forces, which is the reality of the day, have scored an important point in this regard. It is pertinent to mention here that the Article was protecting the identity of Kashmir. In other words, it was protecting the centuries-old composite culture of Kashmiryat. As an ideology, Kashmiryat is based on the Sufi secular ethos which is against the ideology of Muslim extremists. Nobody other than a handful of Muslim radicals has been pleased by the BJP government by abrogating the Article. BJP is well understanding all these implications, therefore, its leaders are time and again hiding the reality by justifying their wrong act of 5th August 2019 as if it was an obligation of the government of India to abrogate the Article. So far as the utterance of the temporary nature of Article 370 is concerned it is true that the word "temporary" is existing in the Article (in violation of the provision of Instrument of Accession) because it was enacted long before the J&K constituent Assembly was elected and it was the discretion of the assembly to accept this Article or scrap it. Therefore, it was temporary for the period between the enactment of the Article till its endorsement by the J&K constituent assembly. Once it was endorsed by the constituent assembly it had legally and constitutionally become permanent. This is the reason why Hon'ble SC is reluctant to hear this case. The court wants to settle this issue politically. It is apprehended that the major political parties of J&K are wittingly or unwittingly developing a consensus on this political settlement. It is viewed as a travesty of justice if the Hon'ble SC passes a judgment of the "fait accompli" on the said case without any political settlement.
In the end, it is advisable to restore the Article which is a bridge, not a divide between the state and the center. It is the solution to the problem which is political in nature whether it is taken today or twenty years later!
