A Strategy to Deter Terrorism continues....

By the Indian Independence Act, 1947 (from
which the new nation of Pakistan draws its own legitimacy) and the Indian Constitution, once the Instrument of Accession was signed by the Maharaja of Kashmir in favor of India, there remained no legal claim of any other nation or peoples, to any part of Kashmir. In this, legally speaking, even the people of Kashmir have no voice. Also Article 103 of the UN Charter has no application here since the Instrument of Accession is not a treaty but a part of the statute that created Pakistan out of an undivided India. Nor does the relevant or any of the UN Resolutions recognize any right of the people of Kashmir, except the right to decide in a plebiscite whether to be a part of India or of Pakistan. There is no third alternative proposed in the Resolutions.

Following the 1947 merger of Kashmir with India, India had recovered two-thirds of Kashmir after sending troops with the intention to clear the Pakistan Army, and before the UN mandated ceasefire, from the whole of Kashmir. Subsequently, in the late 1950s, India lost half of that area to China when the PLA built a highway through Aksai Chin connecting Tibet with Sinkiang. By the time India woke up to it, or took notice of it, it was too late—the road had been built and PLA vehicles were traversing to and fro. The war with China in 1962 made it amply clear that China has no intention to clear out from Aksai Chin. Thus today, of the total area of Kashmir, India, Pakistan and China have a third each under their control. Since 2013, Chinese troops have clandestinely encroached and occupied Indian territory in Ladakh.

Paradoxically, despite a conclusive legal basis for the India’s claim to Kashmir, the Indian Government has inexplicably diluted its case on Kashmir by acknowledging that it was a “dispute” between India and Pakistan. This was admitted by India first in the United Nations in 1948.

To be continued....