Subject: [nukkad] Is the March over?

["Mahesh chandra gupta" <>]

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If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it. 
-Margaret Fuller, author (1810-1850)
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Gireesh Dixit - PCS wrote:




Is the March over?


A Hindu renaissance has slowly swept the former Portuguese colony 
of Goa
since its 1961 liberation by India from 400 years of foreign 
rule.

By Mario Cabral e Sa, Goa
==============================================================

1. This immediately reminds me of Kashmir. There was a distinct 
and definite Goan culture with specific Portugese imprint. I was 
there in 1966 when on army posting, and have been there 2-3 times 
more on 10-15 year intervals. The change is huge. But nobody is 
lamenting. Not even the goans. To a large extent, it has been 
because of people from other places going there for business or 
work or for getting settled there.

2. I hear so much about kasmiriyat. The government also, at least 
to be politically correct, sings the same tune: preserving 
kashmiriyat. What is this entity? Is it a sacred cow, not to be 
discused or dissected, but always to be revered like a demigod. 
Are the kashmiris a breed apart? Can we even preserve even 
distinct tribal cultures? Can we sing praises of USA as a great 
melting pot, at the same time trying to maintain kashmir as an 
island? In the process, are we not being unjust to kashmiris 
themselves? Intermingling is the greatest teacher, transformer and 
equalizer. Why are the kashmiris being kept isolated from the rest 
of the country? They do not have even mobile phones, by govt 
order. Even the intenet was denied to them for many months as part 
of anti-terrorist measures.

3. If China can invade and gobble up Tibet and  if the Portugese 
and the French and the British could almost annexe Goa, 
Pondicherry and the rest of India respectively; if the great giant 
of human rights can pulverize Afghan huts with impunity and get 
world support to attack Iraq, why can't the citizens of our 
blessed country simply walk across to Kashmir for living, working 
or earning?

4. People are not fools. They will go there only if they find it 
worth it. Nobody would like to go there just to get killed by 
terrorists. But go they will, no doubt about that, as soon as they 
have legal permission to get jobs, buy land and establish business 
there. The reverse corollary is that the moment these are 
permitted, terrorism, which the government is not able to wipe out 
despite heavy costs, will disappear on its own. Terrorists would 
be nabbed by people themselves, police and military will not be 
needed.

5. I submit, just my wild guess, that the bogey of preserving 
Article 370 and Kashmiriyat are just ploys to keep j & K as a 
separate entity so that funds keep on flowing there, bleeding the 
general Indian public, these funds being siphoned off by the 
politicians in collusion with the separatists and terrorists. The 
moment the latter two give up their arms and demands, army and 
security forces need  not be deployed there, with withdrawal of 
fund flow to pockets of politicians.

6. If Kashmiriyat is so precious to be preserved, whatever it is, 
why does the government allow the kashmiris to get out of the 
valley at all, even to foreign countries? How does that help 
preserve the so called kashmiriyat?

7. In any case, in what manner is Bihari or brij or marwari or 
gujarati or Kerala or Tamil or Bengali or Assamese culture any 
less important than the so called great kashmiri culture? If 
Hindu-muslim unity is supposedly the core of kashmiriyat, how were 
kabir and raskhan and akbar in the past, and the millions of 
ordinary folk all over India today, able to live in peace and 
homogeneity, away from the kashmir winds? Have not muslims been 
our presidents and chief justices, with none speaking a word 
against them?

Will kashmiris on the list kindly speak up? I invite nukkadites to 
offer views on this.

MC Gupta

2.


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