High-level advisers allotted by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh are recommending autonomy for Kashmir, where militants have fought for 20 years against rule from New Delhi
December 26, 2009
High-level advisers allotted by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh are recommending autonomy for Kashmir, where militants have fought for 20 years against rule from New Delhi.
Under its attainment to India in 1947 upon the country’s liberty from Britain, Muslim-majority Kashmir was approved independent powers over all sectors exclusive of communications, defense and foreign affairs.
These powers have been gnarled over the years. But the advisory group, headed by former Supreme Court judge Saghir Ahmad, recommended that the prime minister look at an assortment of formulations ‘to restore the autonomy to the extent possible’.
The Kashmir legislative assembly in 2000 passed a resolution favoring full restoration of the state’s autonomy. But India’s then Hindu-nationalist government rejected the resolution passed unanimously by the assembly.
Autonomy is the main stipulate of the ruling National Conference, the state’s biggest pro-India political party, which had moved the resolution in 2000.
The government has not reacted to the report so far.
‘We will react only after going through the report. It is a long report,’ said Ali Mohammed Sagar, Kashmir’s law and parliamentary minister.
Singh had appointed the working group in May 2006 to try to find a permanent solution to the unrest in the scenic Himalayan region, which is split between India and Pakistan.
Most of the militant groups fighting New Delhi’s rule want the region to become part of Pakistan. A few support its independence.
India has been dangling the pledge of greater autonomy to Kashmir’s for many years but the idea has been discarded by the separatists
Posted by Angelia Kates · Filed Under World news
