2056hrs:
We wanted to achieve a lot today, on more than 2 fronts:
I was then prompted to make the following entry:
For those of you who cannot read the FB post above, here's the text:
The prisoners in prison must have their say - as the world wants to listen to them
Not to India or Pakistan
Here and there
(Urdu):
Qaidkhaaney me qaidiyo ki hi chalni chahiye...kyou ke dunya un ko sunna chahti hay.
India, Pakistan ko nahi
Aar aur paar
Note:
The photo above is from the inaugural session of 'The People's Assembly' on Sunday the 9th of February
........
Here's a hard hitting open letter to the UK delegation visiting AJK, by a young student of Neelam Valley:
Here's the translation of the letter:
(Note: words in brackets are for clarification or context.)
An Open Letter to the British Parliament
By a 22 year old student of the Neelam Valley
Assalaam u Alaikum (Greetings - Peace be upon you)
We wish to put before you with all due respect that we are undergoing a lot of pain. Our people are being killed on both sides (of Jammu & Kashmir) by Indian and Pakistani firing. In such a scenario of helplessness and distress we are unable to do anything (to change our fate). (Since 1947), we have sacrificed over 600,000 lives as victims of a proxy war between these 2 countries.
It is in my knowledge that you people live in extreme comfort. You have no problem whatsoever. However, who is responsible for the agony that you have imposed and left behind with us? Who is responsible for the loss of these 600,000 lives?
Yes, none else is responsible but yourselves. Namely, Britain and the British parliament.
I want to provide a brief reference here:
If you have forgotten history, I wish to remind you of it. What happened when you were playing the game of dividing the Indian sub-continent and when you tore apart the living communities of the Indian sub-continent on the basis of religious identity?
After the Indian partition the commander(s)-in-chief of both India and Pakistan were British officers. In India, you gave this duty to General Lockhart and in Pakistan you deputed General Messervy. The deputation (of these British officers) was part and parcel of this agreement (Partition plan) that took place between local leaders and the British colonialists. The purpose of this exercise was to ensure that these newly created State structures were strengthened by force and to enable them to maintain control internally.
When the first war between India and Pakistan broke out in 1948 (over Kashmir), these 2 British officers had already mapped out the result of the war through mutual support (and consultation). Hence, the 'Kashmir Issue' was created by none other than Britain itself.
Now, resolving this issue is also the responsibility of Britain. The British parliament along with the Labour Party - which was in power at the time - should seek forgiveness, not just from the people of Jammu & Kashmir but from all the public of the Indian sub-continent.
I am writing this letter in such conditions whereby a delegation of British parliamentarians is present in Kashmir (AJK or Pakistani-occupied territory) and is engaged in meeting such people who are not even sure which century they are living in and what their priorities ought to be.
I think I would like to extend this advice to the British parliament that if, in normal circumstances you are unable to meet the normal (average person), then for God's sake do not conduct photo sessions with the occupying power corridors of Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Muzaffarabad, in the name of Kashmir. Conducting such programmes is akin to further disgracing the martyrs of Kashmir.
We are torn asunder with multiple wounds. We feel that by coming here, you are rubbing further salt into our wounds. The very wounds that you inflicted on us before departing from this region. With deep regret, whenever I watch a debate/discussion on human rights in the British parliament I laugh out loudly in an uncontrollable manner. How can those who've acted most criminally against humanity be the vanguards of humanity?
I wish to provide another reference:
The East India Company's licence to trade in the Indian sub-continent/South Asia was officially sanctioned by the Royal court of the British queen on the 31st of December 1600. The fact is that the East India Company has never left this region. Only the name, faces and modus operandi have changed. Hence, how can something that has never left return once again?
Once the East India Company began dominating this region, the looting via extraction of resources from here reached its peak. To the extent that the East India Company's military force doubled in number that of Britain's own (State) army. Historians (of South Asia) such as John F Richards have given mind-boggling statistics for how much income was generated by the East India Company from the Indian sub-continent.
In 1858, the British State nationalised (brought under State control) the East India Company and later in 1874 dissolved it. However, there was no let up in the looting (of resources) or colonial oppression despite Britain taking on direct control of the Indian sub-continent. Neo colonialists such as Britain riding on the back of an industrial revolution played a front-line role in the looting of colonies that came under their control.
These Western countries gave a perception that this lightning increase in sustenance was a direct virtue of capitalism. It should be understood that this sustenance was developed by utilising the blood of many tens of millions of average people, residing in regions such as the Indian sub-continent.
Utsa Patnaik (An Indian Marxist economist) in a recently published article by Colombia University Press has given an estimate - in today's money terms and in US dollars - that the British colonialists extracted over $45 trillion from the Indian sub-continent.
On a grand level, these heists paved the way for famines - most notably in 1770 and 1943 (in Bengal) - in which many tens of millions of people died a slow and painful death of starvation while the crops produced here were exported elsewhere.
Today, when the world is (rapidly) changing so should you. You have to resolve the issue of Jammu & Kashmir which you yourself created. You must apologise for the human rights violations and mass killings that take place on both sides of the divide (in Jammu & Kashmir).
Irrespective of whether you apologise or not, we are fighting for our right to freedom with great vigour and gusto. I am now certain that our struggle will not go to waste. We will free ourselves from the enforced occupation of India and Pakistan soon. The ornament of slavery that you placed around our necks will soon be taken off and thrown away. As we have nothing more to lose and the whole world to gain.
Wasalaam (Farewell with peace)
Freedom Aspirant
Khawaja Mujtaba Bandey - Pakistani-occupied Kashmir
....End of translation.....
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