Content area
Full Text
New Delhi, Aug. 12 -- Since 5 August, when the government revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), the floodgates of righteous rage from the usual suspects from India and the rest of the world have opened. Hardly surprising. This was the jackboot, the blood-soaked end of democracy, a rape of the Constitution, the trampling of fundamental rights of Kashmiris, and so on. These hyperventilating flag-bearers of freedom (or whatever) should calm down and consider one historical fact. Which is this. The "temporary and transitional" provision Article 370 made an exception to the fundamental rights guaranteed to all citizens by the Indian Constitution. These fundamental rights have now been restored. And this is shockingly easy to explain.
A New York Times columnist has wailed that the government has now converted "the people of Kashmir to second-class citizens, if not subjects". Sorry, but the truth is that some of these people-specifically the male Kashmiri Muslim-enjoyed far greater rights than any other Indian citizen; they have now been brought down to equal status. And many other inhabitants of the erstwhile state had fewer rights than normal Indian citizens; they have been granted equality. One would think that anyone who believed in democracy would see that as a good thing.
To explain this, we must...