'Brothers across the LoC' won't pay

Here's the latest gripe from the Kashmiris -

"We were eagerly waiting for the beginning of cross LoC
trade, even dispatched thousands of apple boxes to PoK in the start. But, so far
growers have not received a single penny in lieu of the apples," President Fruit
Mandi Sopore, Bashir Beig said.

Your 'brothers across the LoC' won't pay? You don't say! So much for your 'brotherhood'. Bashir Beig further says -

"After three months, we don't know what happened to apples
in PoK,"

Take a guess Beig. I can suggest one, your 'brothers' ate them all without bothering too much to pay for them. How's that for a reality check? So when the dough proved tough to come by from the Pakistanis our Kashmiri friends grew wiser and stopped sending them apples. Left with empty pockets, they have suddenly realised how much better, indeed profitable it is to do business in our country. Not only do the 'evil' Indians make for a good market, they also pay enough so our Kashmiri friends can make up for their losses -

There is other reason that compelled
growers not to dispatch their apples to PoK as the growers were offered
lucrative rates by the Delhi based traders. "Soon after the cross LoC trade
started, the rates of apples have gone up," said Beig, adding that this year all
the losses got compensated by good rates.

So, the Indians don't seem as 'oppressive' any more eh Beig? Looks like the money paid for your apples made up for all your grudges. But not quite, Beig adds -

"The trade is useless unless Government starts a permanent communication link
between two parts of Kashmir," he said.

Well, that still does not guarantee payments from across the LoC, what do you do about that? Besides why would any one want to do trade with someone who won't pay, much less pay enough. The Indians are already covering for your losses.

Javid Ahmad, another Kashmiri says -

"I don't know what happened to my apples in PoK. Government
has to do more to sustain this trade, otherwise in coming months no trade will
take place via Kaman bridge. “

So while it is the Pakistanis that don't pay, yet somehow, it is the Indian Government that is not doing enough. Whatever happened to the 'Autonomy' demand.

The Kashmiri 'grievances' never end, do they? It is time we called the separatist's bluff. The recent elections in the valley exposed the lack of ground support for the 'Azadi' leaders. They make far too much noise, completely out of proportion to their 'support base'. So do their seditious supporters in the media.

Karan Thapar the un-intellectual

Mr. Arun Jaitley was the recent guest on Mr. Karan Thapar’s ‘Devil’s Advocate’. This particular debate is a good example of how self styled ‘secular’ journalists fare when faced with a worthy opponent.

Mr. Thapar brought out the issue of economic blockade of Kashmir –

Figures released by the Jammu and Kashmir horticultural department, which is a
part of the official government, prove that between the first of August and the
17th of August this year, only 890 trucks bearing fruit came from Srinagar to
the Banihal pass where as last year during the same dates, the figure was
2,148—a fall of nearly sixty per cent.

Mr. Jaitley countered this claim as a mere propaganda by the separatists in the valley with no real basis to it –

Let’s be very clear. If there is a bandh and a curfew in Jammu for 50 days, if
you have a curfew in the Valley for 30 days plus, business is bound to go
down.

To support his claim he quoted this –

We asked the Army and the district administration as to what is the position.
They gave us the daily figures. This was not the apple season.
They said, we
have nothing lying in the stocks and today we have 90 trucks waiting at the
sabzi mandis, and there is nothing to be loaded on it. It was a false
propaganda.

Mr. Thapar had similar questions of shortage of medicines in the valley which were countered effectively by Mr. Jaitley by referring to clarifications by the relevant officials and the army who denied charges of economic blockade and attributed the fall in traffic and business to the bandh and curfew in the state –

The Army’s position is that there is no blockade; the
government’s position is that there is no blockade and the Sanghash Samiti told
us that there never was a blockade and there won’t be a blockade.

But that did not satisfy Mr. Thapar, he kept repeating that there in fact was a bandh in the valley and that the BJP was exacerbating the situation. Apparently Mr. Thapar seems to hold the separatist’s claims in high regard and not believe the state officials or the army or even the union government that denied any economic blockade in the valley. Not surprising when you cite your sources as ‘The Indian Express’ or ‘The Times of India’ who themselves cite only the separatists and have total disregard for any official that denied such claims.

Now, agreed that he was playing the devil’s advocate, but Mr. Thapar was not being responsible in quoting such luminaries (sic) as Mobin Shah, the president of the Kashmir Chamber of Commerce (who incidentally is a part of the Hurriat), the information secretary of the Lashkar-e-Taiyyaba (really? The LeT Mr. Thapar?). And if indeed he was serious about debating the issue, he would not have restricted it to supporting the separatist’s claims, but would have talked about what really is at the core. But that may be uncomfortable for Mr. Thapar and the others, when they seek to legitimise the separatists. Hearts that bleed for the Jihadists and separatists do not care about it. Mr. Jaitley got it exactly right when he said –

As far as Jammu is concerned, it is crying due to
discrimination and this is a strong ground of discrimination and you want to
shut a popular debate out on this discrimination?

But when you suffer from myopia all you can see is the evil ‘communal forces’ (which comprises of only the BJP and the sangh parivar and no Muslim, Jihadi group) and you have to bring them down. Mr. Thapar gets it completely wrong when he said –

It is not a popular debate. It is that BJP deliberately
exploiting a political situation to gain electoral benefits.

Un-intellectuals and their seperatist instincts

The not-very-intelligent "intellectuals" tribe, conveniently patronized by our mainstream media because their views coincide, is growing by the day. Khushwant Singh joins Swaminathan Aiyar, Vir Sanghvi and Suzanne Arundhati Roy in demanding freedom for Kashmir. One cannot help but wonder who are these people batting for? While being Indian nationals, their views are heavily slanted away from our national interest.

Kashmir did accede to India and is very much an integral part of it. That being the case, none of these un-intellectuals write any opinion on the need for scrapping article 370 and integrating Kashmir completely into India. Not a word on the ethnic cleansing of the Kashmiri pandits from the valley so Muslim majority could be established. Such dhimmi apologists, give more traction to separatists. Besides, this could encourage more such separatist voices in the country. Such un-intellectuals could be running a propoganda to facilitate India's breakup, a la USSR.

A free Kashmir is another potential hub for terrorism. India is already faced with two such. China is another neighbor that keeps us on our toes. The un-intellectuals have no thoughts on that. But, 'secularism' demands propagating a false sense of victim hood among the Muslim community in India.

Distancing Kashmir from India and allowing it to grow closer to Pakistan is not in India's national interest. It will also be betraying the Kashmiri pandits who, even in the face of violent Islamic onslaught, have been the guardians of our culture and heritage in the valley. It is their home.

Islamic intolerance

The islamists are driven by only one aim, to establish their supremacy over the world. Islam is their only consideration and the ulema their only guide. Anyone who has ever argued with Isamists will realise how futile is it to rationalize with them. Any attempt to reason, question or bring about a change is strongly quelled by the ulema. According to them, anyone who is a non-muslim, anyone who does not believe in their prophet and the Quran is a kafir and that everything that such a person does is kufr. Everything else (the law of the land, the majority religions in the land etc.) means little to them. Indeed any change or innvoation in their interpretation of Islam is kufr. The Islamic apologists fail to realize that thay are only being used by the Islamists and they will never be considered on par with the Muslims. Arun Shourie's book, "The World of Fatwas or The Shariah in Action" tries to understand the Muslim rationale. It is a wonderful book and gives us an idea on how the Muslim mind works.

With this in mind, it is hardly surprising that the Muslim leaders behave the way they do and the thoughts they harbor. However, what is more astonishing is that our leaders (Mulayan, Laloo, Manmohan et. al.) are completely blinded by their concern for the Muslim vote. Completely ignoring their obligations, duties towards the nation. They seem to think, their only duty is to cater to the Muslims.

The Muslim population in India is substantial enough to have a voice (a very strong one). It is now well over 10 %. In fact it is now 13.4%. As their numbers increased over the years so has their intolerance. Our leaders bend all the way backwards to pander to them, listen to their every demand and even go the extent of putting them ahead of everyone else and the nation.

Recently a 1,200 sq. ft. piece of land in Kolkata, which happens to be a mosque where barely 30 people offer prayers, cost the government thousands of crores. The tax payers money has no consideration but the voice and sentiments of the Muslims does.

On the other hand, when the government in Jammu and Kashmir donates land to a Hindu shrine, the Muslims in the state go on a rampage. They allege that this would promote Hinduism and Hindu settlement in the area. The protests went even further with Anti-India slogans. "Down with India," and "We want freedom!" were the chants. And when you call such people anti-Indians or ask them to prove their loyalty, you are snubbed and called racist. That's secularism!