It was after many years that I was meeting my mentor, a General who, back in the day, was a young officer and I a cadet. Our paths crossed many a time after my commissioning. Since he was an inspiration to me, I opted to join his arm of the service.
Over a cup of coffee at his sprawling office, I asked him the question which had been bothering me for long. I knew the newly appointed Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan, HE Nong Rong had come to see him a few days back. So without wasting any time, I asked him how the Chinese saw Kashmir and how willing they were in supporting us in our endeavours to get occupied Kashmir free from the clutches of India. Knowing my inquisitive nature, the General smiled at me and asked me not to quote his name due to the nature of our discussion. Off the record, he gave me the insight into his one-on-one meeting with the Chinese Ambassador, where they discussed the Kashmir issue in detail.
Kashmir is a highly volatile issue. The Chinese, he said, believe in handling it pragmatically. The General told me without particularly referring to the Ambassador that the Chinese often cite the example of Hong Kong for which they waited a hundred years. They say likewise, it might take even another one or two hundred years, China would eventually take back Taiwan as well, being their rightful claim.
This is exactly how the Chinese view Kashmir. They say a part of Jammu and Kashmir has been under the Indian occupation for seventy years. Let it take another seventy years. Their advice is that our diplomatic and other efforts should steadfastly continue in the direction of liberating Kashmir.
China will extend all-out support to Pakistan in its efforts to free Jammu and Kashmir from the illegal occupation of India, recognised as such by both China and Pakistan. But it will take time which requires patience and forbearance while deploying a diplomatic and military strategy based on pragmatism rather than emotions.
The argument by critics to this approach would be to remind you about the Indian efforts to follow an Israeli model in Kashmir: forcing a demographic change on Kashmir through Hindu settlements. It has already begun by India’s unilateral move to dissolve the special status of the occupied J&K. China’s response over the move was very clear. China not only categorically rejected India’s unilateral action but also moved its troops seizing critical land mass having strategic importance in Ladakh, which is a part of Jammu and Kashmir. Through this consequential move, China got in a position to launch an offensive in Indian occupied Kashmir. India was forced to seek a ceasefire on Chinese terms as a result.
What made the situation even more interesting is the fact that previously pro-India Kashmiri leadership suggested the Chinese intervention after the Indian annexation of occupied Jammu and Kashmir. China has the capability and capacity to settle it permanently with India but that’s not how the Chinese operate.
Let us remind ourselves that there are around nineteen separatist freedom movements currently spread across India. After Kashmir, the most potent of them are in the seven sister states beyond Indian ‘chicken neck’ between Nepal and Bangladesh. Chinese influence is fast developing in both these countries. As per Indian media reports, these North East states’ freedom movements have their top tier leadership living in the bordering Chinese province. Recent media reports also show the construction of modern villages, possibly housing these separatists on the Indian borders with China.
Going back a few decades, USSR, which happened to be the chief ally of India, was one of the two superpowers in a bipolar world order. In comparison to India, USSR had manifold military muscles and resources. The erstwhile USSR, like India, consisted of different states having separate ethnic identities, forged through military might and run by an enforced political ideology to be called one nation. However, when the time came, no amount of modern weapons including the world’s biggest nuclear arsenal could save USSR from its disintegration and subsequent balkanisation.
India, with its multiple freedom movements, is not much different from where the USSR stood a few decades ago in terms of crisis and it’s nowhere near how mighty the USSR was. These freedom movements in India are mainly seen in J&K, the North East, the massive Red Corridor which is the geographical landscape of Naxalites and various leftist movements spread across a number of states, Punjab, Southern states in India and West Bengal.
Out of these nineteen prominent movements, Jammu and Kashmir is being supported by Pakistan, Khalistan by the Sikh Diaspora and China supports the seven sister states in the North East of India forming the above described ‘chicken neck’ of the geographical frontiers of the Hindutva establishment’s regime running India like the communists were running USSR. It is no secret as to what kind of relationships India has with China, Pakistan or the Sikh Diaspora supporting these freedom movements.
The way Stalin’s brand of communism caused the disintegration of USSR, the seemingly unstoppable tide of Hindutva will lead India to the same path of balkanisation. It would be naive to consider that China has not noted this situation and won’t exploit it when the time is right.
We must understand why Hindutva has the potential to break India apart ultimately. In my previous articles I explained it in detail. The all-pervading Hindutva is a diabolical concept responsible for the systematic genocide of minorities in India. The political ideology of Hindutva is the soul of this system, which was carefully kept under wraps and employed subtly by successive Congress regimes because of its nature, which is based on racial supremacy of the higher caste. But with the rise of a more assertive and violent Hindutva under BJP, it’s being used as a badge of honour in India. The more you curse and terrorise the minorities, the more your chances of growth are, whether you’re a politician, bureaucrat, policeman or a soldier. Allegiance to Hindutva is the golden key to rise and success in today’s India. It’s a mirror image of the pre-WW-II Nazi Germany and democratic centralism which formed the basis of communist party ruling erstwhile USSR.
It is hardly any rocket science to see where India is headed with Hindutva forces at the helm.
The way Pakistan alongside USA played the pivotal role of a catalyst in the process of the disintegration of USSR, once again it would be Pakistan but with China this time around playing its part in the balkanisation of India. This is a fact cast in stone. It’s inevitable; it can’t be undone.
Facilitating the nineteen freedom movements in India beckoning for support is the best way forward for the freedom of Jammu and Kashmir, without invoking a nuclear holocaust in the region. India’s geography, society and politics is fraught with faultlines that must be tapped.
The recent initiatives for peace by Pakistani leadership, which has the backing of our Chinese partners, should be seen as a step in the same direction to avoid mutually-assured destruction. Let’s wait, let’s be patient while being focused at the same time with our eyes locked on the target and let the miracle of time do the trick.