The order says that the budget will be presented to the assembly and passed by it. However, what is significant is that it will be prepared by bureaucrats.

Similarly all members of the public service commission, the auditor general or the election commissioner will be either the direct or indirect appointees of the Pakistan government. Similarly all the key functionaries of the administration like the chief secretary, the finance secretary and the inspector general of police will be Pakistani bureaucrats deputed from outside. It is significant that the region has no representation in either the Pakistani parliament or the council of ministers, which will have the final say in the future set-up of the region.

It is thus quite clear that all the real executive, legislative and judicial powers will vest with outsiders or their appointees, whereas the Assembly or the Council of minister will in reality be toothless tigers.

The fact that the terminologies like the governor and the chief minister have been used, rather than the 'President' and 'Prime Minister', which are used for the heads of so-called 'Azad Kashmir', indicates a more sinister design to the whole exercise.

These cosmetic changes are intended to give an impression of autonomy, whereas the real attempt is to separate this strategic region, which has been an inalienable part of the state of Jammu and Kashmir since 1866, from the other part of Pakistani Kashmir to eventually gobble it. Right from 1947, Pakistan has systematically worked towards this end.

Immediately after occupation, it separated the State of Chitral, a vassal of the Maharaja of Kashmir, from the region and incorporated it in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP). In 1975, it abrogated the State Subject Rule, which had been set up to prevent outsiders from acquiring land or settling down in the region. After the abrogation, there has been a constant influx of Sunni Pakhtoons in this predominantly Shia region and the demographic profile has changed significantly.

The local leaders from the region as well as from other parts of Pakistan-administered Kashmir have severely denounced the order. According to Abdul Hamid Khan, chairman of the Balwaristan National Front, the order will further consolidate Pakistan's hold on the region. According to Manzoor Hussain Parwana, the chairman of the Gilgit-Baltistan United Movement, it is a ploy to perpetuate Pakistan's rule in the region. The Karakoram National Movement and the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) have also criticised the move.

In the past Indian response to the developments in the region has been quite muted. It is time India took up strongly the grievances of the inhabitants of this region, who are legally Indian citizens.

(10.09.09-The author, an editor of the book 'Pakistan Occupied Kashmir: The Untold Story' is a senior researcher at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA). He can be contacted at alokbansal_nda@yahoo.co.in)