By Sean Healy
MIRPUR, Azad Kashmir — Kashmir is a nation in torment — partitioned, brutally repressed, its people the victims of a vicious proxy war between India and Pakistan. The Kashmiri people want an independent, free Kashmir, beholden to neither India nor Pakistan.
For the two governments which occupy Kashmir, the region is a perpetual source of conflict over rich mineral resources, strategic geography and eminently marketable natural beauty. Neither government shows any sign of relinquishing its claim, in spite of heavy western pressure.
Washington wants a "negotiated solution", most likely to formalise the partition of the country. For the US, the "Kashmir issue" is a threat to regional stability and a waste of a very profitable tourism resource.
Before 1947, when Britain pulled out of the subcontinent, Kashmir was a "princely state", subject to the British crown but ruled by a maharaja. When India and Pakistan gained independence, many Kashmiris also believed their country would become independent.
However, in 1948 Pakistan and Indian troops fought a brief war and partitioned Kashmir at a "line of actual control" — the uneasy, unofficial border. That did not quell the independence struggle on either side of the "line of actual control". Upsurges of national sentiment occurred throughout the 1960s, '70s and into the '80s against both Pakistani and Indian rule.
In Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (perversely named "Azad Kashmir" or Free Kashmir), central to these struggles were the students led by the Jammu-Kashmir National Students' Federation (JKNSF). JKNSF still has a massive following among the youth of Azad Kashmir for its uncompromising pro-independence stance. This contrasts to most of the "recognised" parties, which favour a Kashmir "unified" under Pakistani rule.
The JKNSF has units on all the colleges and universities in the region; the letters "NSF" can be seen daubed on walls throughout Azad Kashmir.
In the late 1980s, there was another upsurge in the national struggle, particularly in Indian-held Kashmir. In the 1990s, however, this upsurge was hijacked by the Pakistani intelligence services and military.
Left nationalist forces operating underground in Indian-held Kashmir were starved and crushed, often with the Pakistani military tipping-off their Indian counterparts. As a result, the left in Indian-held Kashmir has been decimated — and has lost all contact with its colleagues on the Pakistan side.
Instead, the Pakistan military has financed, armed and trained Islamic militants and mujahideen groups, frequently from Afghanistan. These groups are helped across the border by the Pakistani military (one of the training camps of Osama bin-Laden hit by US air strikes on Afghanistan was a Pakistan-run training camp for militants to be sent into Kashmir).
For these reactionaries, the goal is not a free and independent Kashmir but a jihad, a holy war, against Hindu India. They have carried out brutal atrocities against the Hindu minority in Kashmir and the Hindu majority in neighbouring Jammu, as well as against leftist and secular Kashmiris. In reply, India has carried out is own atrocities against the Kashmiri people.
In an attempt to reorganise and revitalise the left (at least in Azad Kashmir), in 1997 the JKNSF launched a new party, the National Awami Party (NAP). This was bitterly opposed by the pro-Pakistan "recognised" parties.
The NAP (and the JKNSF) operate semi-legally. Whilst not banned, it is constantly watched and occasionally repressed. On universities, the JKNSF is frequently threatened and sometimes physically attacked by Islamic fundamentalists.
In the last elections, in 1996, the NAP announced a list of candidates for all 36 seats in Azad Kashmir's puppet assembly. All were disqualified for not signing the oath of loyalty to Pakistan.
Nevertheless, the NAP is rapidly gaining support. According to general secretary Ali Zaman Raja, new units are being established all over Azad Kashmir. Many other left groups are now discussing unification with the NAP. The JKNSF also continues to grow.
The main problems Kashmir's left nationalist movement face are lack of resources, constant interference by the intelligence services and a complete lack of contact with Indian-occupied Kashmir.
Given the intransigent opposition of the Indian and Pakistan governments to the right of self-determination for the Kashmiri people — and the western powers' interest in a "quick solution" — the left nationalist forces in Kashmir need international solidarity to ensure that a "solution" cannot be imposed on them against their will.