• Union Minister Kiren Rijiju recently accused Nehru of indecision when Maharaja Hari Singh proposed the merger of Jammu and Kashmir with the Indian dominion as early as in July 1947.
  • In fact, it was the Maharaja whose mind wavered on the question of accession, as attested by diplomats, historians and the Maharaja’s own son Karan Singh.
  • During the 73 days when Kashmir was independent, from August 15 to October 26, 1947, measures were taken to upgrade the communication between India and Jammu and Kashmir. Nothing suggests inaction on Nehru’s or India’s part.
  • Kashmir was a complex feudalistic society with a wide economic gap between its ruling Dogra and Pandit elite, and the impoverished Muslim majority. In that unruly landscape, Nehru turned to Sheikh Abdullah of the National Conference, who believed he could find ways to end Kashmir’s autocracy and mitigate wide-scale economic deprivation.
  • Mountbatten was among those who advocated a UN-monitored solution and Nehru had no reason to doubt his sagacity. The reason why India was eventually let down by the UK and the US, could be, as Yashwant Sinha put it, “the world powers having created Israel, perceived as an anti-Muslim State, had to set the optics right”.
  • There is endless bickering about Nehru’s decision to grant autonomy to Kashmir. The natural counter is to ask: So what should have he done in a situation where a vast Muslim population was filled with misgivings about its future in a predominantly Hindu India?