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The Bedis, 'Naya Kashmir' and Stalin's constitution

3/31/2017

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The 1944 'Naya Kashmir' or 'New Kashmir' manifesto - or at least the opening pages which propose a draft constitution for the princely state of Jammu & Kashmir - was based in large part on the constitution Stalin introduced in the Soviet Union in the mid-1930s. B.P.L. Bedi and his English wife Freda Bedi are often credited as the main forces behind the drafting of 'Naya Kashmir' - not least in Sheikh Abdullah's own autobiography. But much of the detail was lifted from the Soviet constitution, which the Bedis' had published in full in the quarterly Contemporary India which they edited in Lahore from 1935 to 1937.

This was explained in a talk that Andrew Whitehead gave this week at the University of Kashmir, with more than a hundred faculty and students present. The talk focussed on 'Freda Bedi in Kashmir' - the Bedis  lived in Srinagar from 1947 to 1952 and had an association with the state, and particularly with Sheikh Abdullah's National Conference, from the late 1930s.  

The talk has been reported on the Outlook website - here's the link:
http://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/sheikh-abdullahs-new-kashmir-manifesto-was-a-cut-and-paste-of-stalins-constituti/298388

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'Partition: the long shadow'

6/14/2015

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A new book edited by Urvashi Butalia contains an article on Kashmir in 1947. The book is Partition: the long shadow, and it includes a piece by Andrew Whitehead about the people's militia set up by the left within the National Conference in response to the invasion by an army of tribesmen from Pakistan. The article, based in part on oral history was first published in an academic journal a few years ago. Partition:the long shadow is published jointly by Zubaan and Penguin Viking - and is also being published by the University of Chicago Press.

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BBC: As Scotland votes, Kashmir's "missing" referendum

9/17/2014

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As Scotland votes in an independence referendum, Andrew Whitehead looks at the failure to hold a referendum in Kashmir first promised in 1947 ... what the historian Yasmin Khan describes as "probably the most important referendum that never happened".

'Several thousand Kashmiris will be voting in a historic and much awaited referendum, this week. That vote will determine whether a region with a distinct identity can successfully secede from a much larger nation. Their ballots will be cast, however, in Glasgow - not in Srinagar or Jammu.'

Here the link to the article.
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