Was Nehru responsible for Kashmir problem?

Mythmaking is common in every society. But spinning lies is, altogether a different game, and this is usual for the Hindutva flag bearers, who more often than not indulge in it. The first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, has been the worst victim. Recently, Nehru was the target of a campaign that held him guilty of making grave mistakes on the Kashmir issue. None other than the Law Minister of the country, Kiran Rijiju, has written an article on the topic in an English daily, and since then, several opinion pieces and stories making Nehru the villain of Kashmir have appeared in digital and print media.

It needs no elaboration that manufacturing history has been an important agenda item for the RSS family. The industry has grown out of bounds in this era of post-truth, and a major part of it survives on the condemnation of Muslims, their history, their culture, and their role in contemporary India. Naturally, those who believe in composite culture are in the line of fire. Nehru, being the foremost among them, is a prime target.

Is Nehru really responsible for making the Kashmir problem complex? What exactly is the root cause of the problem? What were the RSS, the Hindu Mahasabha, and its leader VD Savarkar actually doing at the time? Why was Kashmir's Maharaja delaying accession? Were the British neutral observers or the real culprits?

All these questions need to be examined in their proper context. The examination should be based on facts, not lies. If we have to search for the real cause of the Kashmir problem, we need to analyze the Partition of India and the roles of different players involved in implementing it. In terms of Hindutva forces, they played a significant role in dividing India.

It is true that Nehru played a bigger role in addressing the Kashmir problem, but others, including Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Patel, were equally involved. Gandhi visited Kashmir in the first week of August 1947 and saw a beacon in the valley amidst the communal conflicts across India.

"It is on the soil of Kashmir that Islam and Hinduism are being weighed." If both pull their weight correctly and in the same direction, the chief actors will cover themselves with glory, and nothing can move them from their joint credit. "My sole hope and prayer are that Kashmir should become a beacon light to this benighted subcontinent," Gandhi remarked.

Delhi was still tense when Sheikh Abdullah visited Mahatma Gandhi on November 27, 1947. Gandhi mentions it in his prayer meeting that same evening:

"Though there were just a handful of Hindus and Sikhs in Kashmir, Sheikh Saheb took pains to carry them with him. He had been to Jammu, too. What had happened there was most shameful for the Hindus and Sikhs. But that did not make Sheikh Saheb lose his balance. His visit to Jammu also bore good fruit. "And if the harmony continued as it promised to, it would be a lesson in communal harmony for the whole of India," Gandhi said.

Though many may not agree with Sheikh Abdullah's attempt to secure autonomy for Kashmir, his confronting Jinnah and the Muslim League, and standing for a united India should not be undermined. We find his parallel only in Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan.

And we should not forget that Nehru was the man who groomed Sheikh Abdullah as a staunch nationalist and secularist leader.

"In 1937, I met Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru for the first time. He was on his way from Lahore to the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). At his behest, I accompanied him and spent several days in the Frontier where I was introduced to Badshah Khan (Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan) and others. Pandit ji took interest in our movement and suggested that we throw open our membership to members of every community," Sheikh Abdullah writes in his autobiography, Aatish-e-Chinar. The result was that the Muslim Conference was converted into the National Conference.

The truth is that Maharaja Hari Singh was blocking Kashmir's integration with India. He wanted to remain independent and avoided accession. He even made a standstill agreement with Pakistan and entrusted the latter with the task of running its postal and telegraph services. It was in line with the British policy of allowing big princely states such as Hyderabad, Travancore-Cochin, and Jammu and Kashmir to remain independent. However, by April 1947, the British government abandoned this policy, and princely states were left with the choice of joining one or the other dominion—India or Pakistan. Even then, Maharaja did not give up his ambition of remaining free. In this venture, he had the support of the Muslim Conference and the Hindu Sabha. The former functioned under the aegis of the Muslim League, and the latter was an affiliate of the Hindu Mahasabha.

Contemporary documents reveal that Lord Mountbatten and the UK were not in favour of Kashmir's accession to India, and even sabotaged the project of expelling invaders in 1947 from the soil of Kashmir. In these dire circumstances, the Maharaja was unwilling to share power with Sheikh Abdullah, the man who, with his National Conference, was fighting alongside the Indian Army. It was Nehru who integrated Ladakh with the Indian Union. The Maharaja was too weak and lost Gilgit, the region's most strategic area.

It should also be kept in mind that a plebiscite was offered to dissuade Jinnah from claiming Kashmir because he was afraid of losing a referendum. How could he expect the state to vote for Pakistan, which had never supported Partition? Nehru had to offer it because he was demanding a plebiscite in Junagadh and Hyderabad, where there was no possibility for Pakistan to win a referendum.

Is it fair to hold Nehru responsible for a mistake he never committed?

(The author is a senior journalist. He has experience of working with leading newspapers and electronic media including Deccan Herald, Sunday Guardian, Navbharat Times and Dainik Bhaskar. He writes on politics, society, environment and economy)