Justice Markandey Katju
Today, 14th August is Pakistan’s Independence Day. I wish I could send my greetings on this occasion to the people of Pakistan ( whom I love as I regard them as fellow Indians ) but I regret I cannot since I regard Partition of India in 1947 on the basis of the bogus two-nation theory and creation of Pakistan as a separate Islamic state as a historical British swindle and the greatest tragedy of India in its 5000-year-old history.
I regard India and Pakistan as one nation since we share a common culture and were one since Mughal times. When I meet Pakistanis I feel no different from them, and in foreign countries, Indians and Pakistanis socialize as if Partition had never taken place. We are bound to reunite under a truly secular government, though that will take time, maybe 10-15 years ( see Mission Statement and the 16 articles on indianreunificationassociation.co.in ).
Today the situation is that the economies of both India and Pakistan are tanking. Pakistan is bankrupt and is surviving on the 6 billion dollar IMF bail-out. The Indian economy is in deep recession ( e.g. car sales are steeply down, over 300 car dealerships have closed down, about a lac IT jobs are lost, farmers distress continues unabated, etc ) and unemployment has reached record heights.
To divert attention from this, drastic diversionary measures have been resorted to. Both the Indian and Pakistani Establishments ( in which term I include most of the sold-out jingoistic media in both countries ) have tried to shift the attention of the people to developments in Kashmir, but for how long? One cannot permanently wish away the economic crisis, which will keep reappearing in both countries like Banquo’s ghost.
India and Pakistan are not each other’s enemies. How can they be enemies when they are one country? Our common enemy is poverty, unemployment, ignorance, malnourishment, lack of healthcare, etc. To tackle and abolish these we must reunite under a secular modern-minded government, instead of wasting our scant and precious resources fighting each other.
[Justice Markandey Katju is former Judge, Supreme Court of India and former Chairman, Press Council of India. The views expressed are his own]
