From Palestine to Kashmir

It was as back as in October 2003, when a young Palestinian girl Hinadi unexpectedly changed into a detached and unruffled girl. Her routine was also gradually altering. This innocent girl, otherwise a law student would not talk much now. However, recitation of Holy Quran soon after the Fajar prayer would become her fondness. She would return home quite late now, yet her parents who had a blind faith on their sibling would not ask for her explanation. Nevertheless one day when she didn’t go to college, her mother did ask her the reason to which she gave some justification. In evening she left her home with a black bag in her hand. After three hours, people heard about an explosion in an Israeli hotel in the town where more than a dozen Jews including some soldiers were killed. Nobody knew who did it until next day when Hinadi’s video prepared just before her suicidal attack was released publicly.

Whenever I recollect Hinadi of Palestine, Master Muhammad Afzal of Al-Mustafa Liberation Tigers who sustained the torture of Inspector Sharma of RAW at Sonawar torture cell, instinctively comes to my mind. But then I miss Nazir Ahmed Lone and many other Kashmiri Mujahideen who would steer towards the Indian torture cells on their feet but few of them could reappear crippled and without their limbs. I am missing all of them today and missing them very badly. Sadly, we have not been able to take care of that Pakistan which those freedom lovers were keeping alive in their dreams. Innocent teenager Waqas also kept independent Kashmir in his dreams. Do we know that who was Waqas? What to talk of our youngsters many of our elders would not know about him. Though they would remember Shahrukh, Abhaishik, Ashwayria and Lara Ditta very well but those who sacrificed their today for Pakistan’s tomorrow are least known to them.

Just to tell you about Waqas, he was that spirited and motivated boy who raised the slogan ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ when a lofty Six was hit by some Pakistani player. Right away he was apprehended and when he was being dragged away for some unknown destination, hundreds of people heard his ear-piercing cry, “Mother! Please save me. They will kill me”, but no one could do anything and unfortunately his cadaver was by his helpless mother.

Few days ago, while doing some research about Kashmir in my library I came across a book, “Raiders in Kashmir”, written by Major General (Retd) Akbar Khan. I am sure General Akbar’s name would be as familiar to our young generation as Waqas’ would be. General Akbar’s name was taken in famous ‘Rawalpindi Conspiracy Case’ but only the Almighty knows that how much truth was there in the gossip. In the chapter seventeenth of this book General Akbar has made some startling predictions. For example about the United Nations role vis-à-vis Kashmir issue, he writes, “Some months after the ceasefire I wrote a paper under the title of “What next in Kashmir”. The paper is in the Pindi conspiracy case documents. The purpose of this paper was to show that since in the ceasefire agreement nothing existed to compel India to hold a plebiscite she would in fact not do so and meanwhile delay and times would favour India, not us. The reason that was being advanced in the higher circles was that we needed time to increase our military strength before we could settle the problem of Kashmir. But it was clear to the simplest of minds that in the same time India could strengthen herself many times more. Basically what was wrong with this philosophy was the idea that anything done in Kashmir would inevitably bring war, and that our strength was to be measured simply by material and numerical comparisons alone”.

After the submission of this paper through proper channel, General Akbar had a detailed meeting with Liaqat Ali Khan, the then prime minister and was hopeful that the latter had understood him but then months passed and nothing happened. Not that the prime minister was not sincere to the cause, rather a number of intermediaries like IG police Qurban Ali Khan who stopped the scheme of local production of small weapons, played a negative role. General Akbar further writes, “About a year later I wrote another paper under title of ‘keep the pot boiling in Abdullah’s Kashmir’ (This too is in conspiracy record). In this I suggested that as we could no longer violate the ceasefire in the presence of UN observers, the right and necessary course of action for us was to help the people of occupied Kashmir to strengthen and accelerate their own internal freedom movement against the Indian occupation. On this too, no action was taken and those in authority seemed satisfied with merely repeating their requests to the UN in the matter”.

The time period for Kashmir and Palestine’s liberation is not known to anyone since the most important thing for the success of such freedom movements is the crack proof unity of the nations while here the ruthless disruption of the Muslim unity is the ill fortune। The Palestinian freedom movement is already thwarted where one can easily find Hamas and Alfetah blood thirsty for each other. One thing is for sure that Yasir Arafat will never be absolved and forgotten for the failure of Palestinian freedom movement and whosoever would think of even serving the Kashmir Cause the same way, would definitely meet the same fate.

About five years back Osama Musa, the Palestinian ambassador in India, while giving interview to an Indian magazine “The Week” made a disgraceful statement that there was no resemblance between the Kashmir and the Palestinian issues and that the Palestinians do not consider the Kashmiri militants as Mujahideen. In the same interview Osama declared the Indian atrocities against the Ill-fated Kashmiris as rightful action. I wonder where that ignorant and ill-bred Osama Musa is now but I frenziedly and from the bottom of my heart want him and the other members of the ‘Arafat Gang” to closely watch the fate of Palestine liberation movement, for the failure of which only and only they are responsible and if still they have any doubt then the best thing for them is to consult their conscience.

Misfortune to the Kashmiris is that they are the flag bearers of a Muslim freedom movement so we should be rest assured that they would always be interrupted and ignored. Well if they would have had even a faintest semblance to East Timor, an area with the Christian majority then the sole super power of the world would have had ensured their freedom long time back.

In my library I have a book titled, “The Israel Lobby & US Foreign Policy”, written by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt. An astounding disclosure has been made in this book about the fact that the most significant events and actions taken or taking place in the world have more of the Israeli lobby’s hand behind them then the Israel itself. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt have finally said what has been cleared to many for years. About a couple of years back the Atlantic monthly a reputed journal invited them to write a feature article on the Israel lobby and its effects on US foreign policy. Knowing that the subject was controversial and the scrutiny of US Israel lobby would provoke some harsh reaction, both these writers had some reluctance and reservations. Since it was instant post 9/11 era so in the light of the twin towers drama, Afghan invasion and the looming war with Iraq both the gentlemen decided to take on the issue, basing on the logic that “If US support for Israel was significant source for anti-Americanism in the Middle East and a source of tension with key strategic allies, and if pro-Israel groups and individuals were a major influence on US foreign policy in this vital region, then it was important to raise the issue openly and encourage public discussion of the lobby’s action and impact”. The poor fellows worked on the article for almost two years in close collaboration with the Atlantic’s editors but when the manuscript conforming to their agreement with the journals management and incorporating virtually all of latter’s suggestions in January 2005, the editor surprisingly informed them that the Atlantic had decided not to publish the work. Some months later someone else contacted them and showed the interest for publishing it in some other paper by the name London Review of Books. The importance of the paper could be gauged that when the documented version of it was posted on the Faculty Working Papers website of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, the response to the essay was breath taking and about 275000 downloads were reported.

My aim to mention about this book here is just to show that how strong this “US Israel Lobby” is in the global affairs. For several decades America’s foreign policy in the Middle East has operated under a single awe-inspiring theory – support for Israel – merely for the reason that a loose coalition of some individuals and organisations has literally hijacked the US foreign policy and the worrisome fact is that this US Israel lobby is completely dominating US foreign policy. Not only that this lobby is damaging both to the United States and Israel but also jeopardizing America’s own national and strategic interests in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and in relation to the Israel – Palestinian conflict and the naked truth is that it is not Israel who is responsible for any injustice and violence anywhere in the world, but exclusively this US Israel lobby, may that be Palestine, Kashmir, Iraq, Iran or Afghanistan.

Interestingly Israel has also realised this fact and predominantly for this reason there is tinge of indifference and coldness between the relations of both the states which world is clearly observing. Just look back into the history and find that it would always be the Chrétien armies whom the Muslim military would meet head-on and not the Jews directly. The looting, rapes and ruthless killings would always be done by the Christians during the Crusade wars and the Jews usually played into their hands. Israel has a golden opportunity and if it sincerely desires the revival of centuries old historic Muslim–Jewish relations then besides giving the Palestinians their right to live should openly support the Kashmiris for their birth right of self determination and then see that how the magic works but the irony is that the Israel lobby is more powerful and influential then Israel itself.

As far as the trampled Kashmiris are concerned, someday their sufferings and woes would also be over and history bluntly vouches for this verity.

Women of India – India of Women

Women role models of Indian society can be counted on the fingers. Most of them are Muslims such as Razia Sultana and Sania Mirza। Not that women having Hindu beliefs are not there. Rani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi, Sarojini Naidu and Indira Gandhi are also held in great esteem along with Nur Jehan, Mumtaz Mahal and Jehan Ara Begum. But that is the story of yesteryears. In modern times, scarcely would one come across icons from divergent fields like the first woman (super) cop of the Indian police Kiran Bedi, Roopa Mishra, the first Oriya lady to top the All Indian Civil Service Examination of India at the same time being the first married lady in India to attain this feat in 2004, and Sania Mirza, the professional female tennis player from India who has made a place in the international rankings.

The prospects are there but these opportunities are achieved after hopping through hurdles like discrimination, harassment and chauvinism. Women in India are still facing discrimination, at least in the rural parts of the country and in some cultures. The number of women getting their rights has shown very faint change for the better after a steady amble of 100 years. If women have been given the right to vote, to stand for government or allowed to tiptoe into the armed forces, it doesn’t mean that all is accomplished. The truth is that much work still needs to be done for women to achieve complete equality.

If on the one hand we had Indira Gandhi becoming the first woman leader of the country, Sonia Gandhi winning the elections, Justice M. Fathima Beevi being made the first Indian woman judge of the Supreme Court and Kiran Bedi bagging the honour to be the first Indian Woman Police Officer, on the other hand we had Phoolan Devi humiliated and ridiculed ruthlessly and flying cadets Anshu Singh, Sarbjit Jag and Preeti Bhal of the Indian Airforce Academy Hyderabad sexually harassed by a senior instructor who demanded sexual advantages from the three cadets. In return, they were to be declared fit for the commission, which unfortunately they could not pull off.

Although Pakistan is blamed every now and then for crimes against womenfolk, the reality remains that the state of women in India is quite pathetic। In fact, women in India are exposed to various heinous criminal acts and atrocities like rape, torture and suppression। Some grievances females in Pakistan had, have recently been addressed in the Women’s Protection Bill (WPB) passed an year ago The hostilities against the fair sex in the neighbouring country are quite obvious.

According to the 1997 UN report, based on the evaluation of gender ratios in India with those of the developed countries, up to 50 million girls and women are assumed missing from India’s population. Though this ratio dropped to 10 million in 2005-2006, reportedly this is unfortunately the result of a systematic discrimination, including the abortion of female foetuses, which is officially banned in India. According to a survey report published earlier this year in the Indian journal News Age on January 9, 2006, the surveyors conservatively estimated that the reasons for at least 0.5 million of the missing were identified as prenatal sex determination and selective abortion.

This is found to be the main cause for the dropping of the sex ratio also, which slipped from 97 women for every 100 men in 1921 to 92.7 in 1991 and about 89 women for every hundred men now in 2006. It is termed as the most ironic example of slanting the female to male ratio. Just a day back I was going through a report published by the United Nations Fund for Preventing Abortion which was released a year back in October 2005. Only some heartless person would just read this report and toss it away casually. It quotes one Ranu from Northern India who married at the age of 18 and was forced to asphyxiate her first two baby girls merely because her husband, one Muktar, didn’t want the girls and threatened to divorce her. The tragedy didn’t end here because she was forced to terminate two later pregnancies as the foetuses were again females.

This is not the only malpractice to show harassment and discrimination against women. Rape, acid throwing, burning, making sexual advances towards colleagues are a few of the other common aberrations. While the urban legends are diminishing gradually, the rural legends are still there. In rural areas, the upper class Hindus make the lives of the lower caste women miserable. The women belonging to lower castes are often maltreated in the form of mediaeval barbarity at the hands of the upper class Hindus. It happens in India that the poor Dalit girls are forced to run naked on full moon nights and are forced into the Devdasi system of prostitution. Sarita Bai of Kotpuli village was raped by a custodian of the law and in other incidents females are gang-raped at religious places like a temple of Jodhpur.

The Chief Justice of the Madras High Court Justice A P Shah inaugurated a Mahila Court (women’s court) in Cuddalore just a couple of days back, which in fact is the eighth in a row. The worthy judge reminded the audience that India had endorsed the Convention on Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 1993 and also that the constitution not only grants equality for women but also empowers the state to prevent discrimination against women. A P Shah was courageous enough to confess that female sex slavery and forced prostitution, forced marriage and bride burning were still in prevalence. The question is, would it be sufficient just to admit all this and then close one’s eyes?

Merely offering ‘equal opportunity’ is not sufficient. The most important thing is to provide the fair sex, a discrimination- and prejudice-free environment with immense amount of respect and cooperation by their male colleagues, otherwise bosses would keep making sexual advances against girls like fearful Flying Officer Anjali Gupta, who would remain on the run from pillar to post to save their honour.