Protagonists of Art 370 were themselves its biggest abusers: Dr Jitendra Singh

Jammu, Oct 30: Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh today said that the protagonists of Article 370 were themselves its biggest abusers.

In this connection, he also referred to many laws and constitutional amendments, which were aimed at public welfare were not extended to J&K, taking the pretext of Article 370 by the then rulers. At the same time, those constitutional amendments, which they found could serve their political ends, were introduced in J&K despite Article 370.

According to a press note, he was delivering “Brigadier Rajinder Singh Memorial Public Lecture” on “Accession of J&K’ organised by the Department of Defence and Strategic Studies headed by its Director Dr Virender Koundal in the University of Jammu.

Dr Singh said that the partition of India was gravest blunder in the recent history of world and a self-styled plan of a few ambitious individuals who allowed themselves to be played in the hands of a divisive design of the British rulers.

He added that the partition was vociferously opposed not only by Mahatma Gandhi but also across the sections of masses including many a Muslim intellectuals who constituted Progressive Writers’ Association. In the aftermath, more than a million people lost their lives and manifold more were rendered homeless in a bloody exchange of populations between India and the newly carved out Pakistan, he said.

Dr Jitendra Singh said the two- nation theory which was given as an argument in support of partition also proved to be misguided as evident from the separation of the then East Pakistan to form Bangladesh.

The union minister said, if only the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had allowed his Home Minister to handle Jammu and Kashmir in the same manner as Sardar was handling the other princely States of India, the history of Indian subcontinent would have been different and PoJK would have been a part of India.

One of the Nehruvian blunders, said the Minister, was to declare unilateral ceasefire precisely when the Indian Army was about to retrieve back the areas of J&K captured by Pakistan which are now part of PoJK.

 The Minister said that Pandit Nehru, despite opposition from Gandhi and others, tacitly allowed Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s demand for partition to succeed.