The opposite poles of human sense of belongingness are represented by the positive aspect of personal life on the one end and the entire imaginable world we live in, on the other end.The human territorial organization has expanded slowly and steadily from family, through extended family, clan, community, nation, supranational confederation to international organization presently known as the United Nations Organization. The basic question which arises is that: Is there any specific level at which we should be more loyal to our collective cause? Obviously, as on the ladder of territorial organization, we go higher and higher, our social commitment decreases proportionately. We are highly committed to our personal cause, to the extent of sometimes compromising the comforts and our duty towards our own family members not to speak about the larger society around us.That is the case when we are either highly self-centred or committed to some cause dear to us more than everything else. Contrary to it, we pay lip service to highest order universal issues like human rights, animal rights and environmental conservation because be wrongly believe that these are concerns remotely related to our personal or local level of experience. In between these two extremes of human concern, namely immediate and ultimate, we express our somewhat purposeful collective concern towards our specific national and supranational issues. However, the national and supranational identity consciousness is more often an imagined reality than an actual reality.The geographical proximity, historical continuity, cultural uniformity, lingual communicability, ethnic similarly and ideological compatibility are the ideal conditions under which one can imagine about a human collectivity to qualify as a nation.The nation occupies a proper territory, whether small or large in size, but not too small required by a clan of a few hundred people, nor too large required by a civilizational realm of billions of people.The ideal territorial and population size necessary for a nation-state can vary from time to time and place to place. However, for a well defined nation-state the geographical territory should be enough to fulfill the basic requirements of the national life and the population size must be large enough to serve the purpose of threshold necessary to sustain the social, economic and political spheres of national life. The neighborhood geography usually determines the actual manpower needed to defend the national territory against the adversaries as well as the resources needed to sustain the national life. Having said that, higher the level of national development, higher is the international interdependence of nation-states giving birth to a well defined world-system regulated by a common world market, political economy and international order. So the nation-state is not a self-sufficient and self-contained entity but a part of the well integrated system of many nation-states operating on the principle of international interdependence.The interaction among local experience, national ideology and the international phenomenon give birth to the world reality impacting the human life in every part of the world.
The identification of the exact level at which the people of erstwhile Dogra princely state of Jammu and Kashmir must operate is a very essential prerequisite.There are two broad options available with the people of the state, which include the territorial principle and the national principle. According to the territorial principle, the state territory delimited through the Treaty of Amritsar on 11th March 1846 and the subsequent areas brought under the Dogra control by the autocratic rulers inherited by the last Dogra ruler Maharaja Hari Singh forms the exact territory, the political future of which has to be decided by the people of the state.This approach can said to be legally sound but it is neither democratic nor therefore legitimate one because the Dogra dynasty represented the aspirations of Dogra nation only.The other nations such as Paharies/Gujjars, Ladakhies, Balties, Dards and Kashmiries were incorporated in the Dogra Kingdom with the help of military might rather than their own willingness. Thus the territorial principle is not applicable to the former Dogra princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. This leads us to find solution of the problem on the basis of national principle.The Jammu and Kashmir State is the meeting point of three civilizations namely Muslim civilization, Buddhist civilization and Hindu civilization, so the Dogras of Jammu region are part of the adjoining Hindu civilizational realm, the Buddhists of Ladakh region are part of the larger Buddhist civilizational bloc and the remaining Muslim dominated territory of the state is the part of the Muslim World. So the practical question arises that how can three distinct civilizational communities exist as a single nation and not instead of that become part of the respective civilizational bloc’s? So the logic of supranational identity consciousness works against the territorial integrity of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. Since, in 1947, the Dogra Hindus of Jammu, Kashmiri Muslims, Shina-Balti Muslims, Pahari/Gujjari Muslims and Ladakhi Buddhists have discarded supranational state formation but instead worked for their distinct ethnolingual nationalism, so the establishment of different nation-states on the territory of former Dogra Empire is more logical and viable. Kashmiristan as a sovereign country is more appropriate in the peculiar geographical setting of Kashmir Valley and its adjoining Muslim majority districts and tehsils in general and the Kashmiri speaking areas in particular.
Approaching Kashmiri nationalist movement from the world-systems perspective, the efforts have to be made to not only sustain the political struggle at the local level, but also to garner the international support to achieve the desired national objectives.The national goals and strategies have therefore to be formulated in such a way so as to make the people at local levels stakeholders on the one hand, and at the same time seek international support necessary for the creation of a sovereign nation-state of Kashmiri people on the other hand. Ignoring the local participation in the nationalist cause or the international support for independence can both prove counter productive for the ongoing freedom struggle in Kashmiristan.The path of violence eschewed by some militant organizations and the use of religion in politics by some political parties of Kashmir are both the negative means employed to distance away the nationalist struggle from the international power corridors. These are the biggest hurdles in the path of seeking international support for the creation of sovereign Republic of Kashmiristan. Similarly, the collaborators of India and Pakistan in Jammu and Kashmir mislead the public to grind their own axe and sebatoge the nationalist cause of the Kashmiri nation.The people of Kashmiristan need to understand the nefarious designs of the collaborators of outside imperial powers bent upon assimilating Kashmir with their own territories. Therefore the sacrifice of personal interests upon the altar of national cause is the need of the hour for every Kashmiri citizen to achieve the lofty goal of national independence. Prof. G.M. Athar
Prof.G.M.Athar can be reached at ghathar@yahoo.co.in
