Behind PM Modi’s Balochistan remarks: Re-opening J&K accession to push Pak into Gilgit corner

This official detailed how what he called the “uncoiling of history” by the government has a “strategic” objective.

“When one discusses Jammu & Kashmir,” the official said, “Gilgit and Baltistan are synonymously, indelibly and interchangeably part of that unified princely state of J&K which legally, morally and constitutionally acceded to India on October 26, 1947.”

Therefore, this official said, it was a “surprise” why India hadn’t raised these issues in the past and highlighted Pakistan as “an occupier of Indian territories.”

This reconstruction of J&K history by the government, the official said, is based on archival sources including The Bulletin of The Military Historical Society of UK and ‘The Shadow Of The Great Game — the untold story of India’s partition’, a book by erstwhile prince Narendra Singh Sarila. These conclude, the official said, that the country lost Gilgit-Baltistan to Britain’s “sinister games of chicanery and subterfuge in the subcontinent despite having officially withdrawn”.

According to this reading, the loss of Gilgit-Baltistan is attributed to a coup by British officers. “In its quest to reclaiming Kashmir in 1948-49, it (India) erred in not going beyond Ladakh and capturing Gilgit-Skardu,” the official said.

It’s this “loss” that Pakistan has to be constantly reminded of, the official said.

He claimed there have been protests in the Gilgit-Baltistan area with youth coming out in droves for the release of Baba Jan, a local leader and political activist.

Clearly, with Modi raising the pitch now, the official said, “the proverbial shoe is on the other foot. and it is hurting (Pakistan).”

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Quoting from Sarila’s book, the official said the administrative and defence responsibilities of the northern frontier had been transferred by the Maharaja of Kashmir to the British Government of India under a 60-year lease in 1935. And 15 days before independence, the Gilgit lease was receded by Delhi to the Maharaja of J&K and the area handed over to Ghansara Singh, the state’s Governor from Srinagar.

As soon as Maharaja Hari Singh acceded to India, Sarila recounts, British officers Major William Alexander Brown and Capt. AS Mathieson of Gilgit Scouts got Ghansara Singh imprisoned and informed Peshawar about the accession of Gilgit to Pakistan. This is how the sensitive Gilgit was “swallowed” by Britain acting in concert with Pakistan and India has to underline that in its propaganda war, the official said.