Understanding kashmir and kashmiris
Author- Christopher Snedden
Publisher- Speaking Tiger, Rs 699
DEBRAJ MOOKERJEE examines fresh perspectives in Christopher Snedden’s celebrated book on Kashmir that is now available in an Indian edition
Sometimes, to solve a problem, we need to step out of it. Kashmir remains an unsolved problem for India, Pakistan, and most importantly, the people of Jammu and Kashmir. There is a dominant narrative that shapes our current response to the problem. That narrative begins at the inflexion point when India and Pakistan were created in 1947. Maharaja Hari Singh, in his letter of October 26, 1947, addressed to lord Mountbatten (wherein he attached the Instrument of Accession), clearly states his hand had been forced by the invasion of “Afridis, soldiers in plain clothes, and desperadoes with modern weapons (who) have been allowed to infilter into the State at first in Poonch and then in Sialkot and finally in mass area adjoining Hazara District on the Ramkot side,” adding that the “result has been that the limited number of troops at the disposal of the State had to be dispersed and thus had to face the enemy at the several points simultaneously, that it has become difficult to stop the wanton destruction of life and property and looting.” Whatever shape that narrative has taken in the past 70 years, it has always referred to this Instrument as the point of departure.
In his 2015 book Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris, Australian academic and political and strategic analyst Christopher Snedden, who has maintained an abiding interest in Kashmir, attempts to step out of the problem and relook it from other antecedents, broadening, in the process, the terrain of the debate that centres on the Kashmir problem. That book has recently been republished as an Indian edition. The book was well received and reviewed at the time of its initial publication, but because of the protean nature of the subject of its interest — namely the unresolved settlement of the Kashmir problem among the parties involved — a revisit after two years is neither without context, nor sans interest.
Snedden’s five part book— Important Antecedents; Jammu and Kashmir 1846–1947; From Princely State to Disputed State; Contemporary and Divided J&K; and Resolving the Kashmir Dispute — spreads the contours of the debate to not only explore the different historical points at which Kashmiri political identity becomes manifest in one form or the other, but to also situate and foreground Kashmiri identity and its moorings. This effort achieves, in a sense, something major — the possibility of reading a storyline that goes beyond the ‘India or Pakistan or Aazadi’ straightjacket that shapes present day narratives on Kashmir. It allows readers to understand the problem from outside of the entranced political terms that have tied down the imagination with key words like ‘UN Resolution 47’, ‘Plebiscite’, ‘loC’, ‘Instrument of Accession’, ‘Art. 370’, and so on. Not to mention the immediate flash points like terrorism, the Hurriyat Conference, stone pelting and rubber bullets, and so on.
Kashmir’s inheritance is myriad. Buddhism found early root in Kashmir: “the Kashmir region was once a major and important centre for both Hinduism and Buddhism. The latter set was prevalent, and ascendant, in Kashmir from around the third century BC to the fourth century AD. The revered lotus Sutra was apparently ‘set down’ in Kashmir in the first century AD … in the second century AD (when) a major ‘world’ Buddhist conference convened by the great Kushan leader, Kaniska, was held in the Kashmir Valley.” And later, “Buddhism waned in Kashmir as ‘Brahmanism’, or orthodox Hinduism, re-asserted itself throughout the subcontinent and surrounds, including in Kashmir, around the fifth century AD.” Snedden continues to add that later, “the infusion of Islam added to Kashmir’s rich religious past and complexity.” But while “Islam ultimately became the predominant religion in Kashmir, this region has always been a spiritual place whose residents appear to have tolerated a range of different religious beliefs and practices.” Snedden investigates these antecedents in the early chapters with rigour and dispassionate analysis. While most reviews of his book have stressed strategic imperatives, this reviewer has found a mountain of wealth in the little narratives that enrich the book. like the story of the pheran, for instance. Akbar had established his dominion by 1586, whereas Kashmir had weakened, not the least due to internecine Shia-Sunni conflict. Akbar’s final victory put paid to Kashmir existence as a separate kingdom. But here’s the gem of a nugget: “The finally victorious Mughals also allegedly sought to diminish the Kashmiris martial instincts and skills by compelling all Kashmiris to wear … (the) pheran.” The garment, considered effeminate by many, was meant to restrict movement, like extracting a scabbard from under the sleeve (well, the pheran has no sleeves!).
To return to the thesis, namely: that the Kashmir problem, to be understood differently, needs us to look differently. Snedden provides a way in by taking us back and forth through minutely researched antecedents, leading us thereby to the contemporary pieces of the problem. The strategic affairs trajectory notwithstanding (in the chapter on ‘Contemporary, and divided, J&K’, Snedden dissects treaties, strategies, the collapse of the Plebiscite idea [because of the new great game of the Cold War], various Kashmiris, and so on), Kashmir and the Kashmiris, as the title suggests, attempts to frame both the subject (Kashmiris) and the object (Kashmir).
It is the chapter on ‘Resolving the Kashmir Problem’ that presents the real challenge in the book. Snedden’s broad point is let the people of the state decide. Not very different from the tenor of his earlier work The Untold Story of the People of Azad Kashmir (2011), which applies to the other half. The problem, to one’s mind, is this. What might otherwise have been an obvious proposition, is in truth a non-sequitur — whereas the premise appears logical and sustainable, upon investigation it reveals its own contradictions. So much has changed in terms of demography, global geopolitics, Indo-Pakistan relations, and forms of representation within the Kashmir Valley itself, that the obvious, while apparently self-evident, it itself a mystery wrapped in an enigma. Which, to be entirely frank, brings us almost to square one. But the journey is never wasted. Snedden might not have the perfect solution (why would an Australian academic in any case be expected to provide oneIJ), but he does manage to take us far away from the tightly packed immediacy of it to enable us to engage in rewarding reflections. You might wish to be tempted to substitute the headlines with Snedden’s Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris.
The reviewer is an Associate Professor, University of Delhi