Al-Qalam 
February 5th marks Kashmir Solidarity Day to protest against India’s Occupation of Kashmir – and also to protest against the revocation of the autonomous status of the Muslim-majority region, writes Mian Muhammad Zakria.
Just like the dispute in Israeli-Occupied Palestine, the Indian-Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOJK) dispute spans over seven decades – and in both these Muslim-majority regions, the occupation forces continue to inflict atrocities without meaningful intervention by the international community.
While the entire Muslim world is highly disturbed and indignant over what Israel is doing in Palestine, the situation is no different in Indian Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IOJK).
Today, as we painfully witness Israelis tormenting helpless Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, we also see India forcibly changing the demography and geography of IOJK through illegal actions like the revocation of Article 370 and 35a of the Indian Constitution, which gave a very limited autonomy to IOJK under the Indian occupation.
Under these provisions, IOJK had a special status and no non-Kashmiri person, i.e. any Indian national, could have property or get jobs in the State. However, India shamelessly abolished it to invite Indian nationals to populate the IOJK region. Their objective is to occupy its lands in order to change its demographic and geographic profile. This Indian move is completely illegal in the backdrop of UN Resolutions on Kashmir as India, as a party to the dispute like Pakistan and the people of Kashmir, cannot alter the status quo unilaterally.
As India revoked Article 370 on 5 August 2019, the decision was internationally condemned and even challenged in Indian courts of law. However, on 11 December 2023, the Indian Supreme Court endorsed the Indian Government’s decision of 5 August 2019 to revoke Article 370, making it convenient for the Indian government to alter the Islamic profile of IOJK and gradually make it a Hindu majority area.
The decision of the Indian Court was not unexpected: the BJP, which is hell-bent on obliterating Muslim identity and history from India, is notorious for using its judiciary to get anti-Muslim verdicts, such as in the case against the demolition of the historic Babri mosque, Hindu atrocities in Gujarat and many sensitive matters related to Islamic jurisprudence.
The BJP government, which is the political face of the Hindu extremist organisation RSS, has been particularly uncomfortable with the Muslim majority IOJK, which has never accepted the Indian occupation and is continuously campaigning for the plebiscite to determine its political future as mandated by the UNO. Therefore, now, by abrogating Article 370, India has started the disgusting process of altering the demographic profile of the State from a Muslim majority to a Hindu-dominated area with the Kashmiri lands stolen and jobs taken by the Hindus and non-Kashmiris from India.
This Indian strategy is similar to Israeli policies in occupied Palestine. The timing that India had chosen for this decision is also crucial. Now that the World is silently witnessing the Palestinian genocide in a fast-forward mode, India has made this move to take advantage of the fact that today’s world is almost completely inactive on the plight of Muslims, be it Palestine or Kashmir, and the international bullies like Israel and India enjoy the full backing of the superpowers to kill as many Muslims as they like and occupy as many lands as they can.
India is living in a fool’s paradise – the people of Kashmir and the world will never accept Kashmir as part of India.
The history of the Kashmir Freedom Movement tells us that no matter what, Kashmiris have never accepted the Indian occupation of their lands. History also indicates that Jammu and Kashmir were never and will never be a part of India. Just like in Palestine, the Kashmir freedom movement is continuing and will continue with even stronger force until the complete end of the Indian occupation and all Kashmiris have the right to self-determination. All that is needed is a sustained campaign against the Indian and Israeli oppression of Muslims and international efforts to take collective measures against these rogue states.
The history of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa exemplifies that only international pressure can force both Israel and India to stop their atrocities and give the Palestinians and the Kashmiris their due rights.
South Africa has already taken the lead in taking legal action against Israel at the ICJ. A similar action is needed in the case against India. It is therefore important that as we express our support and solidarity with the struggling people of IOJK, we also ask our government to raise its voice in favour of Kashmiris and force India to implement UN Resolutions on Kashmir.
*Mian Muhammad Zakria is the Chairman of the Kashmir Committee, Pakistan Association of Southern Africa (PASA).
