When the Prophet, along with his Companions, wanted to enter Makkah to perform the Umrah or the ‘minor pilgrimage’, he was wrongfully stopped by the leaders of the town at a place called Hudaybiya. This created a situation of conflict between the Muslims and the Makkan polytheists. The Prophet resolved this conflict by withdrawing his right to enter the town. In response, the Makkans gave him the guarantee that they would cease their war against him so that peace could prevail between the two parties.
In the immediate wake of the Treaty of Hudaybiya, a chapter of the Quran (48) was revealed, in which it was declared that this treaty had been a ‘clear victory’. From this Quranic declaration one can deduce an important principle—that a dispute is always resolved through the method of ‘give and take’. The Prophet and his Companions accepted the demand of their opponents to relinquish their right to enter Makkah. In return, the Makkan opponents agreed to cease their war against the followers of Islam, thus giving the latter the opportunity of carrying on with their work peacefully.
This point can be expressed in a different way: that in this world only those people can succeed who are ready to step back, if need be, without feeling that they have been defeated. Only those who are willing to give to others are capable of obtaining anything. Only those who are brave enough to make way for others can engage in successful action.
This principle is the key to peacefully resolving all sorts of conflicts, even those at the international level. Consider the Kashmir conflict, for instance, in the light of this principle. The policies of the leaders of Pakistan with regard to the resolution of this conflict have proven to be completely unsuccessful. The only reason for this is that they have failed to adopt this above- mentioned Quranic principle. They are ignorant of the law of nature.
In 1947, the Kashmir issue was plain and simple. At that time, it was possible for the Pakistani leadership to relinquish their claim to Hyderabad, and, consequently, get the whole of Kashmir. But owing to their lack of foresight, these leaders did nothing of the sort, because of which the Kashmir issue became a deadly conflict between India and Pakistan.
After the 1971 Bangladesh war, some 93,000 Pakistani soldiers fell into India’s hands. At that time, India could have returned these men to Pakistan and ensured a permanent resolution of the Kashmir conflict. But, once again, the leadership of both countries failed, and despite this invaluable opportunity, the Kashmir conflict continued to remain unresolved.
Towards the end of 2001, the leaders of India and Pakistan met at Agra to discuss the Kashmir question. On this occasion, I put forward a proposal—that both parties should accept the status quo in Kashmir and thereby end the conflict. That is to say, that part of Kashmir that is under Pakistani occupation would become part of Pakistan, while the part that is under India’s administration would be recognised as an integral part of India. But on this occasion, too, the leaders of the two countries failed to enter into any agreement, and so the conflict remains as it was before.
I then made another suggestion—of adopting what I called a ‘delinking policy’. That is to say, the question of Kashmir’s political status should be delinked from other important human concerns in the context of relations between India and Pakistan. The Kashmir question should then be sought to be resolved entirely through peaceful dialogue. As regards other, non-political issues, relations between the two countries should be fully normalised. For instance, with regard to trade, education, travel, tourism, cultural relations and other such matters, India and Pakistan should establish fully normal and friendly relations— the same sort of relations as exist, for instance, between India and Nepal or between the different European countries. The advantage of this solution would be that the Kashmir question would not stand in the way of progress on other fronts as far as India-Pakistan relations were concerned, as is the case at present.
The biggest blunder of the Pakistani leadership with regard to Kashmir is that they are still living in the past. They want to extract the price of their mistakes from the other party. Completely ignoring an unchangeable principle of nature, they want to build an imaginary world of their own. However, this is completely impossible in the real world.
Pakistan’s completely unrealistic approach to the Kashmir question has greatly damaged Pakistan itself. If it continues with this unrealistic approach, its final consequence could be an enormously destructive war between Pakistan and India. If, God forbid, such a war breaks out, it would prove deadly for both countries. However, because India is a large country, it will be able to bear it. But Pakistan, in comparison, is a much smaller country. Today, it refuses to accept India’s control over Kashmir. But in the event of such a devastating war, Pakistan would itself have to accept coming under the control of numerous countries to recover and remain alive with their assistance. And as far as Kashmir is concerned, its political map will have remained completely unaltered.
