Prof Hari Om
Dogras of Jammu remained at the helm of affairs in J&K State between March 1846 and October 1947. All the four Dogra Maharajas – Gulab Singh (1846-1851), Ranbir Singh (1851-1885), Pratap Singh (1885-1925) and Hari Singh (1925-1947) – left no stone unturned to eradicate social evils, provide a just and fair administration to the people and improve the economic life of the people, including agriculturalists/small and marginal farmers. The credit for reforming and abolishing completely the centuries-old inhuman Begar system (in 1919) also goes to the compassionate Dogra Maharajas. And, this, notwithstanding the fact that J&K was a princely state. It was the Indian Prime Minister, J L Nehru, who didn’t like Hari Singh and who was a very close friend of the Kashmir-based National Conference (NC) of Sheikh Abdullah of Kashmir ended the 101-year-old Dogra rule in October 1947, when J&K was acceded to the Indian Dominion. Ever since then, Jammu has been groaning under the yoke of Kashmiri rulers or living under the Governor’s/President’s rule. The Kashmiri rulers included Sheikh Abdullah, Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad, Shamsuddin, G M Sadiq, Mir Qasim, Farooq Abdullah, G M Shah, Mufti Sayeed, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti. J&K remained under Governor’s rule/President’s rule between Mar 17, 1977 and Jul 9, 1977; Mar 6, 1986 and Nov 7, 1986; Jan 19, 1990 and Oct 9, 1996; Oct 18, 2002 and Nov 2, 2002; Jul 11, 2008 and Jan 5, 2009; Jan 9, 2015 and Feb 28, 2015; and Jan 7, 2016 and Apr 3, 2016. And J&K has been under the Central rule since June 19, 2018.
Jammu was not responsible for the imposition of the Governor’s rule or President’s rule. The Kashmiri leadership — with which the Congress and other governments at the Centre entered into agreements/accords in 1947, 1949, 1952, 1954, 1974-75, 1986-87, 2002, 2008-09 and 2015 in what they called national interest – was responsible. Suffice it to say that the Governments at the Centre – instead of controverting the baneful influence of the Kashmiri leadership’s separatist and communal ideology on the state polity – accorded it what could be legitimately termed as dangerous respectability. The result: on the one hand, the nation and the nation’s paramount interests suffered immense losses, and on the other, the gulf between Kashmir and Jammu and between the former and Ladakh – instead of being bridged – was further widened. The gulf was widened to the extent that both Ladakh and Jammu from time to time demanded political emancipation from Kashmir, saying that they had nothing common whatsoever between them and Kashmir. Of course, Ladakh was fortunate because the Narendra Modi Government, which undid the Nehruvian wrongs on August 5-6, 2019 by abrogating the pernicious Articles 35A and 370, segregated Ladakh from Kashmir and granted it the status of Union Territory the same month. It’s a different story that the people of Ladakh have now upped the ante and have been demanding full state status for the entire Trans-Himalayan region and the under-the-pressure Union Government has been in touch with the Ladakhi leadership in order to mollify and conciliate it. Even on Wednesday, November 2, the Ladakhi leadership held protests at both the district headquarters, pro-2019 reforms Leh and anti-2019 reforms Kargil. To be more precise, the Buddhist-majority Leh and the Shiite-majority Kargil, like all the Gupkaris and ilk in Kashmir, are one as far as their demands are concerned: The Ladakhi leadership is for full state status for their region and the Gupkaris and others in Kashmir, without any exception, are for the restoration of the pre-August 2019 position to start with and their ultimate objective is greater autonomy/self-rule/Indo-Pak joint control over J&K. Reports emanating from Kashmir on a daily-basis suggest that the Gupkaris and ilk in Kashmir are committed to what they have been saying and demanding since August 2020. The situation has now climaxed to the point that they have been openly supporting the targeted killings of the innocent Kashmiri and other Hindus in Kashmir, saying that such killings would continue to take place until and unless “justice is done to Kashmir” and “Pakistan is cultivated”. This is the stark reality. The question to be asked is: Why should Jammu, which suffered immense socio-economic and political losses during all these years of the J&K’s accession to India and which stands rigorously excluded from all walks of life or which has been rendered voiceless, be denied the right to have a dispensation, which is of them, by them and for them? What is the fault of the Dogras of Jammu province? They have not committed any sin against India. They are religiously committed to India. They have made supreme sacrifices for the nation in the region. They have consistently opposed the politics of separatism in Kashmir. The fact of the matter is that the history of Jammu province post-1947 is one of supreme sacrifices and woeful tales.
It’s hoped that the Narendra Modi Government, which took cognizance of the woes of the Ladakhi Buddhists and conceded their age-old demand seeking UT status for Ladakh in August 2019, will also appreciate the fact that the Dogras of Jammu province legitimately deserve a dispensation of their own and accomplish the unfinished agenda of August 2019. Separate dispensation will, on the one hand, strengthen the nationalistic constituency in the sensitive border region, and on the other, help New Delhi defeat the sinister agenda of the Gupkaris and others of their ilk in Kashmir as well as Pakistan, whose single-point agenda is to establish monopoly over the Jammu’s precious Chenab Waters.
