After a meeting of its Core group the Dogra Sadar Sabha held a Press conference at Dogra Sadar Sabha Bhawan J&K on 19th of March, 2017.
The President Dogra Sadar Sabha J&K (DSS) Former Minister Th. Gulchain Singh Charak complimented the New Delhi leadership of their landslide victory in the recently held elections in two States of UP and Uttrakhand and forming Governments in other two, Goa and Manipur after the recently held state Legislative Assembly elections. However, he cautioned that complacency must not be allowed to set in the heat of jubilance and vital national interests not lost track off in the milieu.
Th. Gulchain Singh pointed out with great concern that on the international front Nation’s enemies are not at rest. Pakistan had under its illegal occupation the Gilgit Baltistan area of PoJK covers 72,496 sq km. It was divided in 1970 by Pakistan into two separate administrative divisions: Mirpur-Muzaffarabad (which Pakistan calls “Azad” Kashmir) and the Federally Administered Gilgit-Baltistan. Gilgit-Baltistan which was earlier referred to as the “Northern Areas” in Pakistan. Pakistan illegally ceded the Shaksgam Valley, around 43,180 sq km, to China in a 1963 border agreement. Now she intends to legalize and annex this area as her “5th Province”.
Highlighting the lackluster Indian stand, he pointed out that for long years, India had played down and ignored, its legal claim over Gilgit-Baltistan. As a result, the world assumed that the ‘Kashmir problem’ pertained only to the Kashmir Valley which was under India’s possession; thus, put the onus for compromises on New Delhi.
Charak recalled that after DSS pointed out on 11th September, 2009, that “Pakistan has Passed a Gilgit-Baltistan Empowerment and self Governance order 2009 “on 30 August, 2009. By doing so unilaterally Pakistan had once again violated the status quo of Jammu and Kashmir by imposing its direct authority over Gilgit-Baltistan since the region is not part of Pakistan but an integral part of India. Government of India responded to reports of the presence of Chinese soldiers and workers in the region. On the insistence of DSS meetings were held with the highest authorities in the ministries of foreign affairs at New Delhi during 2009. India re-affirmed that Pakistan had been in illegal occupation of parts of the Indian State of Jammu and Kashmir since 1947. The Chinese were fully aware of India’s concerns about their activities in PoJK. New Delhi’s objections to Pakistan’s plan of holding elections in PoJK’s Gilgit-Baltistan region in 2009 were a mild afterthought and a belated assertion instead of expressing strong objection, in a factually compromised position. Nothing substantial was done and no concrete steps taken.
DSS proposed in 2009 to have a seminar by inviting representative from PoJK, Gilgit-Baltistan and leading members of society from Jammu and Kashmir. This proposal couldn’t see the light of day due to lukewarm reactions by the Central and then State Governments; hence the matter was put in cold storage, with least concern to the suffering population of these areas living like slaves and huge chunk of national real estate.
Our national leadership should pronounce a firmer claim to serve Gilgit-Baltistan and its people better by exposing Pakistan’s illegal occupation, its military and its apparatus of terror networks which have massacred thousands of people in the name of religion and burnet our villages to alter local demography through force. Similarly condemn and protest against Pakistani rulers for illegally transferring thousands of square kilometers of Gilgit-Baltistan’s land to China which originally belongs to Hunza and Shigar districts of India.
The Pakistan’s recent move to declare Giligit-Baltistan as its 5th Province is to further ascertain her position, possession and occupation. The Indian declaration of its being “entirely unacceptable” and other related objections may end in only a war of words. The MEA will have to look for stronger and more effective ways of not only rhetoric but a meaningful approach. “It is sad that the J&K Political leadership of all hues is totally unconcerned and dumb over the issue and has not even condemned the Pakistan’s maneuvers in that integral part of J&K state and our nation” said Charak.
Once again DSS exhorts the national and State leadership to understand the gravity of the situation in light of the strategically located vital area at the crown of the Nation closely influencing India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and China. Once again it is proposed that the leaders from PoJK, Gilgit-Baltistan, J&K and experts from ministry of defence and foreign affairs should assemble in a seminar to work out an effective strategy to scuttle Pakistan’s misadventure and reassert Indian legal ownership of this important land-mass which is integral part of Indian Nation by virtue of accession by Maharaja Hari Singh then ruler of Jammu and Kashmir on 31st Oct, 1947 vide a legal instrument.
The press conference was also attended by Prof. Neel Kanth Sharma – V/President DSS, Sh. P.S Gupta-Gen Secretary, Sh. G.A Khawaja-Add Gen. Secretary, Col Dr Virendra Sahi-Vrc-Incharge Media Cell & Sh. Gambhir Dev Singh Charak- Incharge Youth Wing.
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