Whose Kashmir is it anyway??

What will the world remember 17th Nov 2008 for?
Yuvi's century? Citigroup crash? anything else?

What happened on 17th Nov deserves a new chapter in the book on history of a political dispute which a billion have rued over for 61 years now. It was on this day that the first phase of Legislative Assemble Elections were held in Kashmir. If it hasn't hit you yet, look at these figures

Voter turnout for Elections

	2002	2008
Bandipura	44	57
Gurez	76	74
Sonawari	42	46
Mendhar	78	73
Poonch	74	73
Surankot	70	68

Does that ring bells??
Bandipura is a region where temperature falls below 0 in this season and yet the turnout was as much as 57%, way more than what it was in 2002 when the valley was silenced with tensions of a nuclear war.

Separatists have always maintained that people of Kashmir should be allowed to decide which country they want to belong. And if that was not enough they called for a boycott of these Elections week ago. Repeating the same story of 1947 when both countries had agreed that the rulers of princely states would be given the right to opt for either Pakistan or India. In 1947, Kashmir's population was 77 per cent Muslim and it shared a boundary with Pakistan. Hence, it was anticipated that the Maharaja would accede to Pakistan, when the British paramountcy ended on 14-15 August. When he hesitated to do this, Pakistan launched a guerilla onslaught meant to frighten its ruler into submission. Instead the Maharaja appealed to Mountbatten for assistance, and the Governor-General agreed on the condition that the ruler accede to India. Once the Maharaja signed the Instrument of Accession, which included a clause added by Mountbatten asking that the wishes of the Kashmiri people be taken into account, Indian soldiers entered Kashmir and drove the Pakistani-sponsored irregulars from all but a small section of the state, giving seperatists and Pakistanis a point that people of Kashmir were not given any chance to exercise their option to chose between India and Pakistan.

I hope it does ring Bells now.
Had the people of Kashmir not wanted to be with India, would they turnout in these numbers to exercise this constitutional right provided by the Secular State of India?

I can't resist mentioning the idea of BJP which they used in 2004 general elections although they lost then, they said
"Kashmir has always belonged to India and will continue to be Indian".
It is only today that it has been sealed by people of Kashmir themselves.