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| Kashmiri separatists' propaganda based on falsehood, eggegerations | | | RUSTAM
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, June 8: It was also at the behest of the Kashmiri Muslim leadership (and much to the chagrin of the people of Jammu and Ladakh and others in Kashmir) that Article 370 was incorporated in the Indian Constitution in October 1949 in the form of Article 306-A. Article 370 curtailed the powers of the Central Government to the extent that it could not bring the state within the purview of any Central law or institution without the "concurrence or consultation of the State Government" even if there is breakdown of the constitutional machinery and chaos in the state.
The June 14 to July 24, 1952, parleys between the Jammu and Kashmir Wazir-e-Azam and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru on the state's political future, the 1975 Indira Gandhi-Sheikh Abdullah accord and the 1986 Rajiv Gandhi-Farooq Abdullah agreement and the resultant political concessions like the one which empowered not the state but an individual (Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah) to seek withdrawal of any of the Central laws extended to Jammu and Kashmir between 1953 and 1975 further demonstrated that Kashmiri Muslims had a prominent place in the New Delhi's scheme of things.
Those who accuse the Union Government of "brutally subverting the state's autonomy" are simply concealing the truth for reasons best known to them. That they are not revealing the true story can be seen from their oft-repeated vague statement to the effect that "some of the Central laws have been applied to the state without legal warrant or propriety".
It is very significant to note that the Union Government has at no point of time during all these 63 years of accession imposed any Central law on Jammu and Kashmir against the state's will. It can be seen from the Report of the State Autonomy Committee, April 1999 (page-63), where the then ruling NC, an ardent votary of greater autonomy, admitted in unambiguous terms that the state was brought within the ambit of over 260 central laws with the "concurrence of the State Government".
Similarly, the charge of the Kashmiri leadership that New Delhi consistently ignored the state's financial needs appears to be misplaced and motivated. Jammu and Kashmir is a "Special Category" state, which receives Central Assistance on the basis of 90 per cent as grant and the remaining 10 per cent as loan. The state was given this status in 1990. Besides, as a "Special Category" state it receives the highest per capita central assistance after Nagaland. The per capita Central Assistance for the state in 2000 was Rs. 3010, as against Rs. 385 for Uttar Pradesh, Rs. 305 for Tamil Nadu and Rs. 190 for the highly backward Bihar. According to Vir Sanghvi of The Hindustan Times (August 17, 2008), "Bihar gets per capita Central assistance of Rs. 876 per year" and "Kashmir gets over ten times more: Rs. 9,754 per year". His article "Think the unthinkable", besides virtually recommending the "right to self-determination" to the Muslims of Kashmir, said, "Kashmir's entire Five Year Plan Expenditure is met by the Indian taxpayer. In addition, New Delhi keeps throwing more money at the state: in 2004, the Prime Minister gave Kashmir another $ 5 billion for development". Besides, New Delhi spends hundreds of crores of rupees in the state every year on what are categorized as the "centrally-sponsored schemes". (To be continued)
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