Modi’s visit to Srinagar Saturday brings to mind an event where in September 2006 the British artist Banksy gave special meaning to the phrase “elephant in the room” in a Los Angeles exhibit called Barely Legal. It’s theme was global poverty. As writer Gary Martin says, “By painting the elephant in the same bold pattern as the room’s wallpaper, Banksy emphasized the phrase’s meaning, by both making the elephant even more obvious and by giving those who chose to ignore it (like the woman in the tableau) an opportunity to pretend that it had blended into the wallpaper background.“

Modi’s elephant in the room was depicted in the same way in Srinagar, the Capitol City of Kashmir this past weekend, where we had the same artificial set re-enacted. The attempt to disguise the true problem of Kashmir by locking up the voices and spirit of resistance to Indian oppression did not make it go away nor did it recede into the wallpaper. The dispute over the sovereignty of the land and people of Kashmir cannot be hidden by all the cosmetics that $12 billion can purchase.

Washington, D.C. February 6, 2106. “It is in the interest of world peace that India and Pakistan need to resolve the Kashmir dispute to the satisfaction of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The final and durable settlement of the Kashmir dispute will undoubtedly guarantee peace and stability in the region of South Asia. It will also have a great impact on the international peace and security,” this was stated by Dr. Eija-Riitta Korhola who served as the member of the Foreign Relations Committee of the European Parliament and who was the key-note speaker at the Kashmir Solidarity Day event organized here by friends of Kashmir in Washington, DC metropolitan area and beyond. The event was attended by a large number of people interested in peace and stability in the region of South Asia.

Dr. Korhola added, “Kashmir is not forgotten. We are not going to let it happen. Why? Because as human beings we cannot afford ignoring basic right of self-determination. She emphasized, “The Kashmir problem was in many ways created by one of our members in the EU. When the British left India in 1947, they left without defining the future of Kashmir. Because of this historical background Europe has a special responsibility to make sure that the Kashmiri people will get the right to have the promised referendum to define their own future.”

Baltimore, Maryland. May 31, 2016. “The world powers have voiced not a syllable of reproach to India for its human rights violations in Kashmir. Their tacit message to India’s leaders: your economic attractiveness and hegemony in South Asia exculpate your human rights atrocities in Kashmir. Does that reflect a profile in courage?” this was stated by Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai, Secretary General of World Kashmir Awareness during the 41st Annual Convention of Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA).

Dr. Fai was speaking in the panel, entitled, “Muslims Around The World Series” on the subject of Kashmir. Other speakers included Dr. Nikibur Rahman, son of Motiur Rahman Nizami who was executed in Bangladesh on May 11, 2016 through a trial procedure that international human rights groups, including ‘Amnesty International’ have condemned as deeply flawed. ‘The Arab Spring: 6 Years later’ was presented by Dr. Abdul Mawgoud Dardery, former Member of Parliament of Egypt.

Benjamin Franklin, a signer of the U.S. Declaration of Independence from Britain, and a man responsible for negotiating a treaty between the colonies and France, asked, “When will mankind be convinced and agree to settle their difficulties by arbitration?”

Perhaps the simple answer to that is that it will occur when power is distributed among men in such a way that it cannot be abused by any individual or nation, and that both personal and national sovereignty is once and for all respected.

Benjamin Franklin was a very wise man. He wrote, in respect to the American Revolution, “We have been assured, sir, in the sacred writings, that ‘except the Lord build the house they labor in vain that build it.’ I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel; we shall be divided by our little partial, local interests, our projects will be confounded and we ourselves shall become a reproach and a byword down to future ages. And, what is worse, mankind may hereafter, from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing government by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war, or conquest.”

“The best way to solve any problem is to remove its cause.” Martin Luther King

“Nuclear weapons are the scourge of the earth; to mine for them, manufacture them, deploy them, use them, is a curse against God, the human family, and the earth itself.” Philip Berrigan, American Peace Activist.

The nuclear age has placed in the world’s lap a growing and complex set of threats that create the possibility of an all-out holocaust in some part of the world almost every day. We now have North Korea threatening Seoul, testing intercontinental ballistic missiles and bragging about hydrogen bombs. Few people know that the Korean War has never ended. The Armistice Agreement was just a ceasefire. No formal treaty was ever signed. Then there’s NATO playing war games at Russia’s borders, with generals talking about taking back Crimea. And let’s not forget Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu who has threatened to attack Iran unilaterally if no one else does it. But in South Asia, the mainstream media seems to overlook frequently a continuous and ongoing threat of another kind.

The idea that the dispute over the status of Jammu and Kashmir can be settled only in accordance with the will of the people, which can be ascertained through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite, was the common ground taken by all the three parties to the dispute, viz., the people of Kashmir, Pakistan, and India. It was supported without any dissent by the United Nations Security Council and prominently championed by the United States, Great Britain, France and other democratic states.

It became a matter of controversy only after India realized that she could not win the people’s vote. Due to the cold war, she found a firm ally for her obstructionist position in the Soviet Union. With the end of the cold war, the original perspective should have been recovered.