In the fond hopes of rose petals, we have put our tongues on thrones. When India and Pakistan are celebrating their sixtieth birth year, we have been left to lament over our wretched conditions. We threw our weight behind the Islamic Pakistan in a lingering dispute between India and Pakistan over Kashmir but in return, we found ourselves enslaved by Pakistan. Even the nature did not spare us and mass destruction of property and loss of several thousand citizens ensued in the wake of the earthquake that ravaged us not long ago. Militants who were already flourishing here under the patronage of the Pakistani government got another shot in the arms by winning the public sympathy as the relief money was routed through him. However, disguised were their nefarious designs over our land. Not only the militants, local as well as Pakistanis, relegated the developmental issues to the background, the mercenaries, flocking to this beautiful land from Muslim countries did not lag behind in plundering our land.

We can no longer trust Pakistan. But at the same time, we cannot look towards India where the Muslims are butchered often by the Hindu state. Can we survive as an independent country if the Azad Kashmir and the Indian occupied Kashmir are merged again as ‘Kashmir’ (Kashir) as we would be sandwiched between the two neighbors, perennially hostile to each other and equally hostile to the concept of a new country of Kashmir. Moreover, how can we trust our Kashmiri Muslim brethren who are not expected to have a benevolent attitude towards the non-Kashmiri Muslims who form the bulk of population in Azad Kashmir. Only Allah can show us the way.