The Hindu (Thiruvananthapuram)
Literaryreview
n a new biography, Sheikh Abdullah: The Caged Lion of Kashmir, Chitralekha Zutshi builds a complex portrait of a key figure of India’s modern history. As Kashmir remains a contested question of territory and identity for its people, and India as a whole, Zutshi says there is significant continuity in Delhi’s approach towards the border region. Edited excerpts:
IQuestion:
Sheikh Abdullah was not an intellectual in the manner Nehru was perhaps, but he created the notion of Kashmiri nationalism. Yet, he was unable to steer the course of the force he created. Is that the key argument of your book?
Yes, to an extent. He was the founder and creator of the idea of the Kashmiri nation. By the late 1930s he had come into contact with Nehru and other leaders, and he became very much a part of the Indian National Congress’s vision for the subcontinent, and attracted to it. He wanted Kashmiris to be free from political repression and economic exploitation. Not just for Muslims, but Hindus and Sikhs; all classes, castes and sects. But in creating this idea, he also sowed the seeds for the divisions that have plagued Kashmir ever since, because not everyone agreed with this notion. Between the Valley and Jammu, between Hindus and Muslims, fissures began to appear.
Answer:
Q:Was he trying to please everyone but ended up pleasing none?
In the 1940s, he was trying to have a Kashmiri movement, within the larger Indian nationalist framework. By the early 1950s he had soured on that idea. The people that he wanted to please the most, his primary constituency, always remained Muslims of the Valley. Those were his people, and he wanted his constituency to believe that he was still a devout Muslim, which he was. He wanted to make Nehru and the Congress leadership believe that he was a truly secular individual, which he also was. In the immediate postcolonial India
A:Sheikh Abdullah: The Caged Lion of Kashmir from it. For Nehru, the Delhi Agreement was something that was meant to bring Kashmir closer to India; Abdullah did not want that impression among his supporters.
Q:In 1975, there was another agreement between Abdullah and Indira Gandhi. What happened in the interim?
Nehru kept insisting that Abdullah implement the Delhi Agreement in full, which the latter began to see as a compromise of autonomy. He dragged his feet on its implementation; he refused to meet Nehru and then he was dismissed in August, 1953. The promises he had made to the people remained unrealised and his own regime resorted to political repression, turning on any voice of opposition against his own regime but against India as well. He stifled any antiIndia voices. But his repeated incarceration by the Indian government helped him preserve his legitimacy among Kashmiri nationalists. The agreement between Indira Gandhi and Abdullah largely reiterated the Delhi Agreement and Article 370. There is nothing really new there, his image was tarnished forever in Kashmir with that.
A:Q:Do you think personal ambition got the better of him?
Besides, personal ambitions, his age and health were also factors. His family too put pressure on him to make compromises. Indira Gandhi was all powerful and Pakistan was defeated in the war. All these factors possibly influenced his decision.
A: