'Kashmir Should Remain Integral Part Of Secular India'

Ahead of the summit meet between Premier A B Vajpayee and Pakistani Presdient PervezMusharraf, influential congressmen and prominent members of the US establishment have said that solution to the Kashmirproblem must be found within the framework of secular India. 

"Vajpayee deserves kudos for ending the deadlock between the two countries," said Congressman Jim McDermott, Co-chairman of the India Caucus,adding the challenge before Vajpayee is to reach a solution under which Kashmir remains anintegral part of secular India.

"Kashmir has to remain an integral part of secular India," he said, speaking at a symposium organised on theplight of Kashmiri Pandits held in Fremont, California. Realising India's rising global stature, he said, "Indiahas potentially a great role to play in the geopolitical solution to the instability in the region stretching from Iranand Afghanistan up to China and including parts of former Soviet Union."

"When you look at that area on the map, you realize how central India really is," Mcdermott said. "Until theKashmir issue is resolved, he said, India will not be able to reach its full potential and take its place asa world leader. Flaying Pakistan for its involvement in Kashmir, in no uncertain terms, Yossef Bodansky, Director of aCongressional Terrorism Task Force, said: "Kashmir has been transformed into an instrument of Pakistan-runstrategy and the evidence of it was the war in Kargil in the summer of 1999. 

"The Kashmiri  Jihad, Pakistanis will tell you, is a war for the liberationof the Muslims of the valley. However, the population of the areas where the bulk ofthe crossing over the border took place was Muslim Shiite and Tibetan Buddhist. What were they going to do there? Kashmir isa classic case of Islamic State sponsorship taking over an indigenous movement," Bodansky said.

The Pakistani involvement in Kashmir is to fulfil the dream of its founder to include Kashmir as a part ofPakistan, he said, adding "I am afraid that for the foreseeable future, unless there is some drastic change, theworld will be meeting again and again discussing the trials and tribulations of Kashmir.

Congratulating the Vajpayee government for extending a hand to Musharraf, McDermot said: "Howeverillegitimate General Musharraf's government may be, it is still the power to be reckoned with. However, appearing sceptical about Musharraf, he said "while his comments are generally positive in the press, thefundamentalists are making it extraordinarily difficult for him to actually carry them out." 

Congressman Mike Honda said "I feel very sad to hear about the plight of a community in India which has beensuffering for so many years at the hands of Islamic zealots".