Kashmir

[Waseemtabish]

India does not recognise the Northern Areas and Azad Kashmir as part of Pakistan and refers to them as "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK)". Pakistan's position is to hold a plebiscite in Kashmir to determine the will of the people, according to the three resolutions of the UN Security Council and the United Nations Commission. India, however, questions one of the prime condition of the plebiscite in 1950 and lays claims on the whole Kashmir since then.[1]. India questions the demographic sanctity of the Pakistan part of Kashmir. Since its occupation, the Pakistani Kashmir has been settled by hundreds of thousands from other provinces of Pakistan, which heavily changed its original demography. In Indian Kashmir, the demographic structure is kept unaltered through a special law. India questions the whole process of plebiscite, as the original demography in Pakistan controlled Kashmir has changed since it was occupied. Further, many analysts have questioned Pakistan's moral authority to demand a plebiscite since they have not fulfilled the UN resolution's primary precondition that states that Pakistani troops and tribals which entered Kashmir during the war should withdraw. Nearly 60 years later, Pakistan is yet to pull out its troops but has requested a plebiscite without fulfilling its obligations.
Jammu and Kashmir was a princely state with a Muslim majority ruled by a Sikh Maharaja Hari Singh until 1947. In 1947, when the Indian subcontinent achieved independence from United Kingdom, Hari Singh could not decide whether to join India or Pakistan. Soon after the independence, Pathan tribesman from Pakistan's North Western Frontier backed by the Pakistani Army, invaded the state because of the rumours that the Sikh Maharaja was going to cede a Muslim Kashmir to the Union of India. With no defence forces and a deteriorating human rights condition, the Maharaja was compelled to ask India for military assistance. India's then Governor-General, Lord Mountbatten, favored the state's accession to India, to which the Maharaja agreed. After the Instrument of Accession was signed, the National Conference's Shiekh Abdullah became the head of the Kashmir State government. By January 1948, Indian troops landed in the region and claimed the territory as a part of the Union of India. Pakistan, immediately contested the accession and invaded Kashmir. After months of intense fighting, both the nations agreed on a cease-fire, separating the region into two: Indian-administered Kashmir and Pakistani-administered Kashmir. In 1962, China and India fought over and occupied the disputed north-eastern part of the Kashmir region known as Aksai Chin, which India claims to be its integral part.
Ever since, a bitter enmity has been developed between India and Pakistan. The two countries have been to war twice over Kashmir (1947-1949, 1965), and clashed there again during the Kargil Conflict of 1999. The region remains one of the most heavily militarised zones in the world. The de facto situation, as of 2005, is that Pakistan controls the western third, India controls much of the rest apart from two small regions occupied by China.