Alex Perry of Time breaks the story of the offer that the Indian Prime Minister is going to place before the Pakistani Dictator Musharraf for solving the Kashmir Problem.

There, a senior Indian official tells TIME, Singh will make an offer to help defuse South Asia’s most dangerous flash point, Kashmir. India, says the official, will offer to “adjust” the Line of Control, the de facto border dividing Kashmir, “by a matter of miles” eastward. Indian analysts confirm that the offer has been under discussion, in India and with Pakistan’s leadership, for months

There was a proposal from the Indian side to convert the Line of Control to an international border as a solution to the Kashmir problem ? But this was turned down by Musharraf with the question, “Then why did we fight so many wars ?”.
Let’s look at each of these wars in detail. In 1948 even though the Maharajah of Kashmir had a standstill agreement with Pakistan, there was infiltration by several thousand Pashtun tribesmen from the Hazara district of NWFP. Since the NWFP were tribal areas were beyond the control of the Pakistani Government, the Pakistani Prime Minister claimed that they had nothing to do with it.
After the war with China which India lost in 1962, the Pakistanis started training Kashmiri youth in military camps to fight as guerillas. In 1965, several thousand armed men crossed the Line Of Control who were mainly professional Pakistani soldiers and non-Kashmiris. They expected support from the Muslims in the valley, but it did not happen and the war was stopped by United Nations.
In 1999 it was the Pakistanis who crossed the Line of Control again. The army did not even inform the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. The Prime Minister had to go to Washington and agree to withdraw the troops after he started losing the war.
Each time it was the Pakistanis who violated the Line of Control and got humiliated by the Indian Army. So when Musharraf asks why did we fight so many wars, the answer is, we did not start the wars, you did, and we cannot be held hostage to your mistakes.

On August 15, 1947, when India became Independent, the Maharajah of Kashmir had signed a standstill agreement with the government of Pakistan, which is a precursor to accession. The Pakistanis also took over charge of Jammu and Kashmir’s post and telegraph system, food supplies and essential commodities. In September armed groups from Pakistan came from west Punjab and started looting and raping the the Muslims in Kashmir valley, the same people whom they had come to liberate. It was the Indian army which came in and chased these people back into Pakistan.
One of the major grievances against the Hindu Maharajah was that he did not care much about his Muslim subjects. Reports from the early 1900s talk about Muslims living in medieval conditions of poverty and oppression. Muslims were forced to work for the Pandit elites who were also the landlords and also they were not permitted to become officers in the state’s military. On 13 July, 1950, Sheikh Abdullah, the Prime Minister of Jammu and Kashmir introduced sweeping land reforms 700,000 landless peasants, mostly Muslims became landowners in a sweeping land reform act. (Many Malayalis incorrectly claim that it was the communists in Kerala who did land reforms first in India).
After Independence all Governments have pampered the state with special powers and lavish financial assistance.

Habibullah’s report laments that Kashmir’s ‘economy is growing more and more slowly’ and that ‘the state’s infrastructure is crumbling.’ Since he is, as always, referring here only to the J&K state of India, the reality must be pointed out that, in 2003, the reputed India Today magazine gave J&K the ninth overall rank among the then 17 big states of India, the classification being based on eight factors of macro-economic performance. Another reality is that, according to a report by G Venkatramani in The Hindu of October 8, 2004, India’s J&K has only 3.48 percent of its population falling below the poverty line and its consumption of foodgrains is higher than the norm of 420 g per capita per day set by the Indian Council of Medical Research. What’s more, the research foundation of the internationally renowned economist, M S Swaminathan, has drawn up a 15-point action plan that will achieve a poverty-free J&K by 2007. Clearly, the government of India’s massive financial assistance for over a decade and the presence of a large number of security forces with families have helped create a large market and a generally benign economic ambience in the state — without any foreign aid of significance. [Why should US have a role in J&K?]

If all these do not keep the people in the valley happy, then why are we putting so much effort ?
[References: Kashmir : Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace, Pakistan: Eye of the Storm]

India has decided to extend its support for the Palestinian cause and to make that clear the Minister of State for External Affairs is personally traveling to meet Yasser Arafat. Will he ask Arafat to reign in his suicide bombers ? No. Will the junior minister visit Israel in this trip ? No.
This trip is to convince the Arab world that India is not really cozying up to Israel. The Minister will convey to the Arabs that the previous Govt. made of “Hindu Fundamentalists” may have gone overboard, but No, Sir, we are here at your feet.
Considering the fact that it was Israel who helped many times when India was under attack, it is only fair that the Junior Minister’s visit to Palestine be followed later by a visit by the Indian Prime Minister to Israel. As it was Congress which established formal relations with Israel in the first place, it would right for Manmohan Singh to be the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Israel.