Talk:Instrument of Accession

Moving the article to a more precise name
The title "Instrument of Accession" is a general term that applies in a number of settings, while this article is about one specific instrument. I suggest renaming this article to something like "Instrument of Accession (British Princely States)" and then creating either a more general article or a disambiguation page that can point to different instances of instruments of accession. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.118.173.37 (talk) 16:01, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I take the point that the title is not specific, but “British Princely States” would be incorrect, as the states were not British. Moonraker (talk) 23:57, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

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Treaties
The Treaty of Lahore (9 March 1846) and the Treaty of Amritsar (16 March 1846) lapsed under Article 7 of the |Indian Independence Act 1947. The Act was passed by the British Parliament on July 18, 1947 to assent to the creation of the independent states of India and Pakistan. The aforementioned Article 7 provides that, with the lapse of His Majesty’s suzerainty over the Indian states, all treaties, agreements, obligations, grants, usages and sufferance’s will lapse.

The 7 year old Maharaja Duleep Singh Bahadur (Sikh) was under the control of the East India company when he sign The Treaty of Lahore on 9 March 1846 which gave Jammu and Kashmir and its people to the East India Company.

Under the British legal system and international law a treaty signed by the 7 year old Maharaja Duleep Singh Bahadur and under duress is not valid. (The International Court of Justice has stated that there "can be little doubt, as is implied in the Charter of the United Nations and recognized in Article 52 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, that under contemporary international law an agreement concluded under the threat or use of force is void.)

Maharaja gulab Singh (a Hindu and the relative of Harri Singh) originally worked for the Sikh Empire. But then betrayed the Sikh empire by siding with the East India Company in the First Anglo-Sikh War. His name is mentioned in the treaty of Lahore too. He collected Taxes for the East India Company and the money was then given by him to the East India Company.

The removal of Article 370 of the Indian constitution further invalidated The Instrument of Accession.

Alistair Lamb also disputed the validity of the Instrument of Accession in his paper |'The Myth of Indian Claim to JAMMU & KASHMIR –– A REAPPRAISAL'

Where he writes "While the  date,  and  perhaps  even  the  fact,  of  the accession to India of the State of Jammu  &  Kashmir in  late  October  1947  can  be  questioned,  there  is  no  dispute  at  that time   any   such   accession   was   presented   to   the   world at large   as   conditional   and provisional. It  was  not  communicated  to  Pakistan  at  the outset  of  the  overt  Indian  intervention  in  the  State  of Jammu  &  Kashmir,  nor  was  it presented  in  facsimile  to  the  United  Nations  in  early  1948  as  part  of  the  initial  Indian reference  to  the  Security  Council.  The  1948  White  Paper  in  which  the  Government  of India set out its formal case in respect to the State of Jammu & Kashmir, does not contain the  Instrument  of  Accession  as  claimed  to  have  been  signed  by  the  Maharajah: instead, it reproduces  an  unsigned  form  of  Accession  such  as,  it  is  implied,  the  Maharajah  might have  signed. To  date   no   satisfactory   original   of   this   Instrument   as   signed   by  the Maharajah has  been  produced: though  a  highly  suspect  version,  complete  with  the false date  26 October 1947,  has  been  circulated  by  the  Indian  side  since  the  1960s. On the present evidence  it  is  by  no means clear  that  the  Maharaja  ever  did  sign an Instrument of Accession."

Indian troops actually began overtly to intervene in the State’s affairs on the morning of 27 October 1947

It is  now  absolutely  clear  that  the  two  documents  (a) the Instrument of Accession, and  (c)  the  letter  to  Lord  Mountbatten,  could  not  possibly  have  been  signed  by the Maharajah  of Jammu  &  Kashmir on 26 October 1947. The earliest possible time and date for their signature would have to be the afternoon of 27 October 1947. During 26 October 1947 the  Maharajah  of Jammu  &  Kashmir was  travelling  by  road  from  Srinagar  to Jammu. (The Kashmir State Army divisions and the Kashmiri people had already turned on him and he was on the run and had no authority in the state). His new Prime  Minister,  M.C.  Mahajan,  who  was  negotiating  with  the Government of India,  and  the  senior  Indian  official  concerned  in  State  matters,  V.P.  Menon, were still in New  Delhi  where  they  remained  overnight,  and  where  their  presence  was  noted  by many observers. There was  no  communication  of  any  sort  between  New Delhi and the travelling Maharajah. Menon and  Mahajan  set  out  by  air  from  New  Delhi  to  Jammu  at about  10.00 a.m.  on  27  October; and  the  Maharajah  learned  from  them  for  the  first time the result of his Prime Minister’s negotiations in New Delhi in the early afternoon of that day. The key  point,  of  course,  as has already been noted above, is that it is now obvious that  these  documents  could  only  have  been  signed  after  the  overt  Indian  intervention  in the  State  of Jammu  &  Kashmir on 27 October 1947. When the  Indian  troops  arrived  at  Srinagar  air  field,  that State   was   still   independent. Any  agreements   favourable   to   India   signed   after   such intervention  cannot  escape  the  charge  of  having  been  produced  under  duress. (The International Court of Justice has stated that there "can be little doubt, as is implied in the Charter of the United Nations and recognized in Article 52 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, that under contemporary international law an agreement concluded under the threat or use of force is void.)

Additionally Maharaja had no authority to sign the Instrument of Accession because he was on the run. The prevailing international practice on the recognition of state governments is based on the following three factors: first, the government’s actual control of the territory; second, the government’s enjoyment of the support and obedience of the majority of the population; third, the government’s ability to stake the claim that it has a reasonable expectation of staying in power. The situation on the ground demonstrates that the Maharaja was not in control of the state of Jammu and Kashmir and was fleeing for his life and almost all of Kashmir was under the control of the Kashmiri people and the Kashmiri Army that had rebelled against him. His own troops had turned on him. With regard to the Maharaja’s control over the local population, it is clear that he enjoyed no such control or support. The people of Kashmir had been sold by the East India Company and he charged them high taxes thetefore the Kashmir Muslims, Hindus Pandits and Buddhists hated him. Furthermore, the state’s armed forces were in total disarray after most of the men turned against him and he was running for his life. Finally, it is highly doubtful that the Maharaja could claim that his government had a reasonable chance of staying in power without Indian military intervention. This assumption is substantiated by the Maharaja’s letters. Therefore the Maharaja had no authority to sign the treaty, the Instrument of Accession it has no legal standing."

Option of independence for the states
In reply to the question in your edit summary,, you have the reference, and I have the note I took from it. The Patel item you have deleted in this edit read as follows "Vallabhbhai Patel later conceded at a press conference in January 1948, "As you are all aware, on the lapse of Paramountcy every Indian State became a separate independent entity.""

As cited, this is from R. P. Bhargava, The Chamber of Princes (Northern Book Centre, 1991), p. 313, which can be read online on that page link. I see nothing “cherry picked” about it, it is highly to the point of the section, which is about the impact of the 1947 Act on the states. With respect, are you not undermining the neutrality of the article by removing an important part of the truth from this article? Moonraker (talk) 23:48, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * He also says that all the states barring Junagadh and Hyderabad acceded (before the paramounty lapsed). They didn't "become independent". -- Kautilya3 (talk) 00:33, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Groan. Hyderabad of course shows that independence was on offer, . Junagadh shows only that the free choices available to the princes in the Act were not accepted by India. As it happens, in August 1947 other states did choose that path of independence - including Travancore, Jammu and Kashmir, and most of the states which were later the princely states of Pakistan. What happened in the years that followed is not the point here, it is about what options the states were given by the 1947 Act, and it seems clear that you want readers not to be aware of one of them. Moonraker (talk) 05:14, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I would encourage you to go and write a book with your views. But you can't do that on Wikipedia. Here you are obliged to summarise reliable secondary sources as per WP:NPOV and DUE WEIGHT. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 07:11, 29 October 2021 (UTC)