The India celebrated its republic day on 26th January and Kashmiris observed it as black day

India observes Republic Day on 26 January annually to mark the adoption of its constitution in 1950 as a way of projecting itself as the largest democracy in the world based on justice, liberty, equality and fraternity. This story of constitutional nationalism is reinforced by military parades, cultural pageantry, as well as diplomatic pageantry in New Delhi. However, this day means a lot of another thing to a significant to the people of Indian occupied Kashmir.  It is noted as a Black Day, a symbol of being dispossessed and not being able to live up to promises and even the denial of political rights on a systematic basis. This opposition of celebration and mourning brings out a moral and political hypocrisy in the core of the Indian state-relationship with Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir. This article takes the critical and unapologetically Kashmiri view that the Indian Republic Day is constitutional legitimacy to India and constitutional betrayal to Kashmir where the principles embodied in the Constitution have been selectively enforced, suspended or nullified.

The causes of this dissonance are the fact that the Kashmir dispute remains to be unresolved since 1947. The accession of Jammu and Kashmir to India was conditional and disputed with clear promises given by the Indian leaders such as the prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru that the people of the region should decide their political future via a plebiscite under the supervision of the United Nations. These were not several fall-out diplomatic promises but binding international undertakings, as were shown in various UN Security Council resolutions of 1948-1957. Even the Indian Constitution recognized the exceptional status of Kashmir under Article 370 that the association between the state and the Union was provisional and could be revoked at the will of the people. The celebrations of Republic Day echo in a part of the world where the promise of self-determination that was the backbone of it was put on hold and never taken back. Kashmiris saw Indian constitution not as a social contract between the ruled and the rulers but as the tool of coercive state power. Whereas India celebrates 26 January as the victory of constitutional democracy, the political history of Kashmir since 1950 was marked by the loss of autonomy, interference of democratic procedures, and repetitive periods of oppression. The removal and subsequent arrest of Sheikh Abdullah in the year 1953 which is considered the most popular Kashmiri leader of that era saw the onset of systematic involvement of internal politics of Kashmir. The next decades were characterized by fixed elections, placement into power of compliant regimes and gradual erosion of the Article 370 through presidential decree, all of which were against the letter and spirit of constitutional federalism.

The popular revolt of 1989, which is simply viewed through the Indian discourse as terrorism, should be interpreted in this historical context of political suffocation. It was a popular uprising against decades of disenfranchisement, having been precipitated most obviously by the broadly recognized rigging of the 1987 state elections. The reaction of the Indian state was not self-introspection and political reconciliation, but massive militarization never before seen. The legislation including the armed forces (special powers) act (AFSPA) gave the security forces blanket impunity resulting into widespread records of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, custodial torture, and sexual violence by human rights organizations. The fact that these practices still exist in the constitutional republic would leave some uneasy questions about the universality of Indian democracy.

On 5 August 2019 a turning point has been reached. India achieved a constitutional coup by abrogating unilaterally Article 370 and demoting Jammu and Kashmir to two union territories and thereby eliminating what many Kashmiris perceive as a constitutional coup. This action was taken with the harsh military lockdown, communication blackout and detention of political leaders, activists and civilians in mass. Instead of including Kashmir by the democratic consent, the Indian state proclaimed its direct rule by using extraordinary force. When Republic Day in such a circumstance is celebrated, it seems to be a statement of majoritarian authority rather than a statement of Constitutional values. To Kashmiris, 26 January is therefore not a sign of inclusion but rather one of erasure, or diminution of a politically discrete and controversial territory into an administratively dominated and agency-less territory. The official discourses of Indians tend to ignore the Kashmiri dissent as foreign-funded or anti-nationalistic without factoring in the content of Kashmiri political agendas. This denial in itself serves to highlight the reason why Republic Day is celebrated as a Black Day. Shutdowns, call of protests, and black flags are symbolic resistance towards constitutional colonialism as seen. They are a collective memory of unfulfilled promises, lived experience of occupation and a continued disjuncture between the image of the democratic India and its activities in occupied Jammu and Kashmir  Kashmir.

As a form of criticism, it is not nihilism or anti-democracy; rather it is an anti-selective, anti-exclusionary, and anti-coercive version of constitutionalism that is being opposed on 26 January as a Black Day in Kashmir. To Kashmiris Indian Republic Day is the personification of a political order that is founded on denial and not consent, coercion and not negotiation. A constitution which purports to secure the fundamental rights and yet is allowed to suspend them indefinitely in one area becomes immoral. The Republic Day will continue being a status symbol of domination as opposed to democracy in Kashmir until Kashmiri people are acknowledged as political beings with the right to choose their future. This continued celebration of Black Day is therefore a lesson that the constitutional legitimacy cannot be achieved by blaring ceremonies or parades, but by justice, accountability and obedience to the will of the people.

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Ahsan Javed is a research intern at the Kashmir Institute of International Relations (KIIR) and serves as the Member of HEAL Pakistan Organization, a youth-driven effort for humanity, education empowerment, awareness and leadership.