NEW DELHI: In a throwback to the past, it is important to note that on November 1, 1947, at a meeting of Governors General of India and Pakistan at Lahore, Mountbatten offered to resolve the J&K issue by holding a referendum. Rejecting the Mountbatten formula, Muhammad Ali Jinnah remarked that a plebiscite was "redundant and undesirable."
HV Hodson has recorded in his book, The Great Divide, that Jinnah "objected that with Indian troops present and Sheikh Abdullah in power the people would be frightened to vote for Pakistan." Jinnah proposed a simultaneous withdrawal of all forces -- the Indian troops and the invading forces. Here it is interesting to note that when he was asked how anyone could guarantee that the latter would also be withdrawn, Jinnah replied, "If you do this I will call the whole thing off."
In connection with the steps to ascertain the wishes of the people of J&K, Mountbatten was in favour of a plebiscite under the auspices of the United Nations while Jinnah proposed that he and Mountbatten should have plenary power to control and supervise the plebiscite.
Late on Thursday night, UN secretary General Antonio Guterres' spokesperson Stephane Dujarric has said - The Council's Resolution 47 adopted on April 21, 1948, said Pakistan should withdraw its nationals from Kashmir before a plebiscite can be held. Pakistan, however, continues to occupy a significant part of Kashmir making a plebiscite impossible.
Since then, India has said a plebiscite was moot because of Pakistan's continued occupation and because Kashmiris have had their say in state and national elections.
"The Secretary-General also recalls the 1972 Agreement on bilateral relations between India and Pakistan, also known as the Simla Agreement, which states that the final status of Jammu and Kashmir is to be settled by peaceful means, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations" Dujarric said.
While calling for maximum restraint, "the Secretary-General is also concerned over reports of restrictions on the Indian-side of Kashmir, which could exacerbate the human rights situation in the region," he said.
The Charter provisions directly applicable to the India-Pakistan situation require members to settle their disputes by peaceful means and to refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity of any nation.
The Charter also says that UN cannot "intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state. This is a slam dunk against a prospective Pakistani expedition to fish in troubled waters and a win for Indian diplomacy.
As far as UN resolutions go, there are many on Kashmir, including the appointment of a Mediator in Sir Owen Dixon. But east was east and west was west and never the twain shall meet and Kashmir fell between two stools. Pakistan has to realise that the ship has sailed for UN intervention in Kashmir. The UN Commission for India and Pakistan (UNCIP) failed to make any headway. It had even named Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz as the Arbitrator. The pressure at that point in time for arbitration was intense with a catalogue of correspondence flying around.
On August 31, 1949, US President Harry Truman sent a message to Pandit Nehru through US Ambassador in Delhi Loy Henderson. In what was clearly a calibrated and coordinated move, British PM Clement Atlee dashed off a similar sounding letter to Nehru. Nehru, showing great foresight, negated the manoeuvre by replying to Truman with a feisty letter saying that the Truce Terms were unacceptable. He took a very strong line on Kashmir saying that the Government of India could not accept the proposal for arbitration presented by UNCIP until they were "just and well defined.. and the basis and terms were satisfactorily settled, we consider it premature to discuss with the agency to which the arbitration should be entrusted."
Why did Nehru, always a pacifist, take such a strident line and scupper the plan for arbitration? At the very kernel of the tough line was J&K Government junior minister D. P. Dhar's top secret and personal note dated September 2, 1949 for the PM's eyes only after extensive meetings with UNCIP's Dr. Ing Oldrich Chyle. Chyle felt that once an Arbitrator came into being, he would no longer function under the aegis of the UNCIP, but would lord over it and also over India and Pakistan. Moreover, the position of J&K would be naturally eroded and become one of abject pity. The rationale offered convinced Nehru that it was time to stall for Dhar's arguments were cogent:
"The appointment of an Arbitrator would take away the Kashmir issue from the orbit of the UN Assembly and thereby subject the final decisions on it to the vagaries and whims of one individual. In the present set up, however, any award that the Arbitrator may give will not be so much in relation to the realities of the situation but will only reflect the policy of the Anglo-American Bloc."
"That there are solid blocks of divergent opinion and ideologies in the world today and in the event of matters tending to go against India, the voice of dissent, whatever be its character or nature to the Anglo-American opinion would be advantageous."
"The appointment of an Arbitrator would negate the great advantage that India has secured in the UNCIP's proposals by securing recognition of the J&K Government as the only authority competent to appoint a Plebiscite Administrator. This advantage can be at the proper time utilised to feed an attitude of obstinacy which sometimes becomes necessary in international bargaining. The new proposals, if accepted, would efface the limited recognition granted to the J&K Government as a third party whose importance could be employed at the right time."
"Dr. Chyle believed that there were two methods of resisting the new proposals of the Commission. He was aware of the fact that the Commission's latest proposals could no longer be trusted with the same ease by India or Pakistan because of the appearance of the unexpected support that the governments of Great Britain and America had lent to them. He, however, suggested that for the sake of arguments the consideration of the present proposals should be divorced from the combined enthusiasm expressed by Anglo-America in this connection. In other words, one possible method of resistance would suggest the employment of purely legalistic arguments for this rejection."