It is ironical that when the Partition Debate raging in India and Kashmir being the core issuie of Partition, not only the political class, but intellegentia as well has completely ignored Pakistan's new move in Kashmir.
Pakistani Parliament has passed a resolution to altered the status of Northen Areas in Kashmir. This is how the news has appeared in Pakistani Newspapers on 30th August 2009.
Zardari government approved on Saturday, 29th August 2009 a self-governance package for the Northern Areas aimed at giving it full internal autonomy, but without the status of a province, and changed its name to Gilgit-Baltistan.
The People’s Party, Pakistan Muslim League-N and PML-Q have supported the decision, but
Amanullah Khan, chief of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), said the move had robbed the Northern Areas of a special status, virtually converting it into the country’s fifth province.
Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani briefed newsmen after obtaining approval from the cabinet for the ‘Gilgit-Baltistan Empowerment and Self Governance Order 2009’, which will replace the Northern Areas Legal Framework Order of 1994. Under the order, Gilgit-Baltistan Assembly will formulate its own Rules of Procedures, while legislation on 61 subjects will be done by a council and an assembly in their respective jurisdictions. In reply to a question, Mr Gilani said the Council did not need the parliament’s shelter as it will have its own Rules of Business, while a boundary commission has also been set up.
Elections for a new assembly and a chief minister will be held in mid-November.
Qamar Zaman Kaira, the federal minister for Kashmir and Northern Areas, will act as governor till a new system is put in place. He said the order would now be sent to President Asif Ali Zardari for final consent before its implementation. The legislative assembly will have 24 directly elected members, six seats for women and three for technocrats.
Qamar Zaman Kaira said a ‘supreme appellate court’ shall be headed by a chief judge who will be appointed by the Chairman of the Council on the advice of the governor.
Other judges shall be appointed by the chairman on the advice of the governor after seeking views of the Chief Judge, Mr Kaira added.
The number of judges has been increased from three to five and the tenure of the present judges of the Supreme Judiciary has been protected in the draft.
The new set-up will have a public service commission, a chief election commissioner and an auditor general.
CONDEMNATION Amanullah Khan, chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), said Islamabad had lost support of the Security Council over the years due to a ‘wavering stand’ on Kashmir and now it was squandering whatever goodwill it had by merging Gilgit-Baltistan with Pakistan.
Sabir Ansari, Raja Latif Tahir, Nazir Ahmed, Mushtaq Ghazali and Ghulam Ahmed Butt, all office-bearers of the Front, said that Jammu and Kashmir, including Gilgit-Baltistan, was an indivisible unit and Islamabad had no right to slice off any part of it.
They said every government had usurped fundamental rights of these areas and the present one had outdone its predecessors by turning the region into a fifth province.
They expressed fears that ‘real powers’ would rest with the governor, the president’s nominee who will not be answerable to Gilgit-Baltistan Legislative Assembly. Local people will have no constitutional protection, the JKLF statement said.
Nationalist parties in Hunza-Nagar rejected the Self Governance Order, describing it as old wine in a new bottle.
Hafizur Rehman, a member of the Northern Area Legislative Assembly, termed the package a gimmickry of words and said once again the centre was trying to hoodwink the people of the Northern Areas.
The Northen Areas are an integral part of former J & K State. As per the resolution passed by our Parliament the whole J & K State belongs to India as it has acceded lawfully to India in Octocer 1947. Of course Pakistan has bever accepted this postion and has kept saying that Partition has remained uncomplete beccause Kashmir has benn grabbed by India.
Hence the dispite.
In last 60 years this problem has seen many ups and downs. During Mushraff's regime a solution to give Self Rule to bothe the Kashmis's was mooted and Mushraf has been saying that a solution was at hand, but he lost power and cicilian government has not moved forward.
On this background the attempt by Pakistan to alter the status of Northen Areas is siniste. The Areas have de facto benn mabenn made a fifthe province of Pakistan. The Northen Areas are where borders Afghanistan, China and Pakista meet. It a strtegically important location. Whenever the the Kashmir dispute is solved and whatever may be the solution, it is possible that Pakistan would not accept that the the formula should also apply to Northen Areas. This seems to a meaning of the resolution passed by Pakistani Parliament.
Taking into consideration this st6rategic location of Northen Areas and our's rightful claim to whole J & K State India should have raised a diplomaticobjections immediately.But we have kept silent. Similarly we kept mum when Pakistan gave some area of former J & K state to China.
So much for our Patriotism and Sovereignty
