News Nine | Congress-BJP exchange barbs over Nehru's Kashmir Policy

Nov 17,2022

The Story Fifty-eight years after his passing away, India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru continues to remain one of the most popular and yet debated figures in contemporary Indian politics. 

The Script Every time any debate or controversy crops up on questions of India's problems of development, or its border disputes with its neighbours in today's polarised environment, Nehru's name becomes central to the discussion

BJP trying to dismantle Nehru's legacy?

It is no secret that India's ruling dispensation, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has time and again dragged Nehru's name into controversies, criticising and routinely mocking him. A few months ago, the BJP observed Partition Horrors Remembrance Day and released a video narrating its version of events that led to the partition of India where visuals of Pandit Nehru and Pakistan founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah appeared all through.

Adding to BJP's tirade against the country's first PM, in a recent opinion piece, Union law minister Kiren Rijiju listed 'Nehruvian blunders of Kashmir', questioning Nehru's intentions concerning Kashmir. "Nehru was aware even in June 1947 that all that Hari Singh wanted was to join the Indian dominion. Nehru stated as much in his note to Mountbatten (the last viceroy of India)," Rijiju wrote in his opinion piece in News 18.

When he was called out by the Congress party, Rijiju took to Twitter and tweeted, "Nehru rejected Maharaja Hari Singh's plea to accede to India not just once but thrice." Lending credence to Rijiju, his Cabinet colleague Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri said, "Why was the (Kashmir) issue taken to international or multinational fora? My information has been that then Maharaja Hari Singh was happy to sign the instrument of accession. That's what I have read as a student of history." Responding to reporters during his Srinagar visit on November 14, Puri added that it was because of the mistake made by Nehru that Pakistan was able to foment trouble in Jammu and Kashmir. "I think it is a monumental blunder. So I agree with my dear friend and colleague Kiren Rijiju entirely," Puri told reporters during his two-day visit to J&K.

Congress calls out BJP's malicious intent The Congress party was quick to retort and accused the BJP of upending settled narratives just to fit its outlook and downgrade the contributions of Nehru to Indian history and society. Accusing the Modi ministers of abusing Nehru "every day", Congress general secretary KC Venugopal said at the Nehru Memorial lecture event, "I think Modiji created a portfolio, a department for abusing national leaders. Ministers are given that responsibility. Every day their duty is to abuse national leaders like Gandhi ji, Pandit ji, Indira ji and Rajiv ji." Congress leader Karan Singh, son of Maharaja Hari Singh, and whose once-close ties with the party have come under strain in recent years, wrote an opinion column in Hindustan Times recently, clarifying his father's role in the events which unfolded leading to the accession of J&K into India.

Opinion that matters Reacting to the two opinion articles, AICC spokesman Jairam Ramesh criticised Karan Singh for not standing up for Nehru. Ramesh tweeted, "There is not a single scholarly and serious work on J&K that portrays Maharaja Hari Singh in good light. Even the authoritative work by VP Menon doesn't make Hari Singh a wronged man. It is hence natural that his son Karan Singh defends him today. What I find surprising though is that Karan Singh has sidestepped Rijiju's hit job on Nehru. This is the same Nehru without whose support Karan Singh wouldn't have achieved much, as he acknowledges in his 2006 book with 216 letters exchanged between them during 1948-64." Another sharp reaction came from Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera who said that BJP leaders are students of "WhatsApp nursery" and need to revisit their history classes. In an article on the website Kashmir Life, which was also tweeted by Jairam Ramesh, Dr Jahanzeb A Sirwal, national media coordinator of the Indian Youth Congress, termed Nehru as a far-sighted leader with exquisite political acumen and statesmanship. "It was his untiring efforts and personal zeal which saved Jammu and Kashmir from slipping away into the hands of Pakistan. Decades after his death, some BJP ministers would question his role in his absence... Congress and its leaders including Pandit Nehru have a history as a witness in their defence and their role cannot be diminished by a party which has time and again hurt the unity and integrity of our country," Sirwal wrote.