Ever since my book, In Search of a Future was banned on Wednesday, people have been asking what it says. Relatively few know, for it has been suppressed almost from the time it was published in 2007. Yet, many of those who were able to read it have said it opened their eyes about the realities of the Kashmir situation. Leading intellectuals have even called it the best book on Kashmir.
I began work on it, at the invitation of a leading publisher, in 1998. I made up my mind that I would write the truth, and would take as long as it took to discover the truth. I soon realised that I had a lot of unlearning to do. I relied heavily on interviews with a vast array of primary players in the Kashmir story, and so uncovered truths that had not previously been brought to light. The book was finally published nine years after I began work on it.
It was the first book to document how Kashmir’s militancy began, what instructions President Zia-ul Haq gave—to whom, where, and when—and how exfiltration, training, infiltration, and hideouts were arranged, how and what levels of support militants received from people at large, and other aspects of the violence.
The book gave detailed accounts of the ethnic cleansing of Pandits from Kashmir, the siege of Hazratbal shrine, the siege and the fire at Tsrar-e-Sharif, how and when the security grid was established and expanded, and when and what covert talks and moves were undertaken.
Exploded myths
My book cured many established misconceptions about Kashmir, and exploded many myths. For instance, I was amazed to discover in the course of my research that Sheikh Abdullah had been in touch with—and feted—Jinnah as well as Nehru since at least 1944, and actually wished to find a way to win independence between the two new countries, India and Pakistan, in order that he might rule unfettered.
It brought out what happened during the uprising of 1931, when Kashmiri identity was formed in the modern age, and how politics evolved in Jammu and Kashmir during the 1930s and 1940s, up to and beyond the Quit Kashmir Agitation of 1946.
I discovered to my amazement that Abdullah delayed ratifying the New Delhi Agreement in 1952 after Nehru had given him every autonomy (short of total independence) that he could possibly give. That is what led to the friction which finally caused Sheikh Abdullah’s arrest in 1953.
I was amazed to find out that, in the spring of 1990, the then Mirwaiz Farooq had written letters to the president and prime minister of Pakistan asking them who would answer on the Day of Judgment for the blood that was being shed. He was assassinated by a pro-Pakistan terrorist on 21 May that year.
Britain’s destabilising role
I also discovered that the British Raj had destabilised three successive maharajas of Jammu and Kashmir, each time for strategic gains, mainly in Gilgit.
The Raj weaponised accusations of oppression of Kashmiri Muslims by a Hindu maharaja in 1876, soon after their reverses in Afghanistan. In 1877, Maharaja Ranbir Singh gave them their first Gilgit Agent, and the British press fell silent on the oppression of Kashmiri Muslims.
It was the British who made sure that the strategic northern half of the state went to Pakistan in November 1947. Indeed, the British commanders-in-chief of the two countries met in London in March 1948 to divide up the state between the two countries they were meant to serve—putatively giving all of Ladakh and all of Poonch to Pakistan.
Chandrashekhar Dasgupta’s excellent book was published during the time I was researching the subject. He established that, at a Cabinet Committee of Defence meeting in the third week of December 1947, Nehru ordered Army Headquarters to prepare battle plans to invade the districts of Jhelum, Gujrat, and Sialkot in West Punjab.
It was meant to be a compromise with Governor-general Mountbatten, who had been urging a reference to the UN since 2 November. It was decided that the Foreign Office (which was directly under Nehru) would prepare a reference to the UN, while Army Headquarters prepared battle plans. The Foreign Office did. Army Headquarters, headed by British officers, did not.
Terrorist story
In order to bring out the internal workings of the terrorist infrastructure which operated in Kashmir during the 1990s, I recounted the life story of a prominent Kashmiri militant. But I did not glorify him or his choices.
In fact, this part of the book was lauded for bringing out the methods of indoctrination, training, and underground activity, and the various misconceptions about other religious communities which feed into the clash of civilisations agenda in the minds of such figures.
Bringing out every side of his story dispassionately, the book did not glorify either this person or terrorism overall. It is consonant with the Constitution, and the need to understand motivations, methods, and patterns, all of which is essential for any lasting peace-making.
Indeed, what has been striking about the government’s choice of books to ban is that some incisive and academic tomes have been banned. Generally speaking, insurgents have not read these works.
Meanwhile, propaganda material and polemical reports, some of which may actually have motivated a generation of Kashmiri youth to pelt stones and agitate against the state (in 2008, 2010, and 2016), has never been challenged.
