The Jammu and Kashmir Instrument of Accession is a legal document executed by

Maharaja Maharaja (also spelled Maharajah or Maharaj; ; feminine: Maharani) is a royal title in Indian subcontinent, Indian subcontinent of Sanskrit origin. In modern India and Medieval India, medieval northern India, the title was equivalent to a pri ...

Hari Singh, ruler of the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, on 26 October 1947.

Parties

By executing an

Instrument of Accession The Instrument of Accession was a legal document first introduced by the Government of India Act 1935 and used in 1947 to enable each of the rulers of the princely states under British paramountcy to join one of the new dominions of Dominion ...

under the provisions of the

Indian Independence Act 1947 The Indian Independence Act 1947 ( 10 & 11 Geo. 6. c. 30) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that partitioned British India into the two new independent dominions of India and Pakistan. The Act received Royal Assent on 18 July 194 ...

, Maharaja Hari Singh agreed to accede his state to the

Dominion of India The Dominion of India, officially the Union of India, * * was an independent dominion in the British Commonwealth of Nations existing between 15 August 1947 and 26 January 1950. Until its Indian independence movement, independence, India had be ...

. On 27 October 1947, the then

Governor-General of India The governor-general of India (1833 to 1950, from 1858 to 1947 the viceroy and governor-general of India, commonly shortened to viceroy of India) was the representative of the monarch of the United Kingdom in their capacity as the emperor o ...

Lord Mountbatten Admiral of the Fleet (Royal Navy), Admiral of the Fleet Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma (born Prince Louis of Battenberg; 25 June 1900 – 27 August 1979), commonly known as Lord Mountbatten, was ...

accepted the accession. In a letter sent to Maharaja Hari Singh on the same day, he said, "it is my Government's wish that as soon as law and order have been restored in Jammu and Kashmir and her soil cleared of the invader, the question of the State's accession should be settled by a reference to the people." Pakistan governor-general Mohammad Ali Jinnah stated that the accession was "fraudulent", and that the Maharaja "betrayed" trust by acceding to India at a time when a standstill agreement signed as per his personal request to the Maharaja was still in force. The accession to India is celebrated on

Accession Day An accession day is usually the anniversary of the date on which a monarch or executive takes office. The earliest records of accession celebrations date from the reign of Emperor Kanmu of Japan (), and the custom is now observed in many nations ...

, which is held annually on 26 October.

Text

The text of the Instrument of Accession, excluding the schedule mentioned in its third point, is as follows:Instrument of Accession of Jammu and Kashmir State dated 26 October, 1947
centralexcisehyderabad4.gov.in, accessed 28 October 2021

Schedule

The Schedule referred to in paragraph 3 of the Instrument of Accession reads as follows:Accession of Jammu and Kashmir State to India
unica.it, accessed 19 September 2024

Date

While the Instrument of Accession carries the date of 26 October, some scholars believe that it was actually signed on 27 October. However, the fact that the Governor General accepted the accession on 27 October, the day the Indian troops were airlifted into Kashmir, is generally accepted. An Indian commentator, Prem Shankar Jha, has argued that the accession was actually signed by Hari Singh on 25 October 1947, just before he left Srinagar for Jammu. Before taking any action on the Maharaja's request for help, the Government of India decided to send V. P. Menon, representing it, who flew to Srinagar on 25 October. On realizing the state of emergency, Menon advised the Maharaja to leave immediately for Jammu, for his own safety. He followed this advice and left Srinagar for Jammu that night, while Menon and Prime Minister Mahajan flew to Delhi early the next morning, 26 October. When they reached there, the Indian Government promised Menon and Mahajan military assistance for Jammu and Kashmir, but only after the Instrument of Accession had been signed. Hence, Menon immediately flew back to Jammu with the Instrument. The official version of events is that on his arrival, he contacted the Maharaja, who was asleep after a long journey, but who at once signed the Instrument. Menon then flew back immediately to Delhi with the legal documents on 26 October.

Commentary

In 1950, a

United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy of the United State ...

memorandum prepared by American diplomats George C. McGhee and

John D. Hickerson John Dewey Hickerson (January 26, 1898 – January 18, 1989) was an American diplomat. Biography John D. Hickerson was born at Crawford, Texas, on January 26, 1898. He was educated at the University of Texas at Austin, receiving a Bachelor of A ...

, approved by Secretary of State

Dean Acheson Dean Gooderham Acheson ( ; April 11, 1893October 12, 1971) was an American politician and lawyer. As the 51st United States Secretary of State, U.S. Secretary of State, he set the foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration from 1949 to ...

, stated on the basis of an

Office of Legal Counsel The Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) is an office in the United States Department of Justice that supports the attorney general in their role as legal adviser to the president and all executive branch agencies. It drafts legal opinions of the atto ...

opinion that the Instrument of Accession could not finalize the accession to either dominion. According to this memorandum, the

Attorney General for England and Wales His Majesty's Attorney General for England and Wales is the chief legal adviser to the sovereign and Government in affairs pertaining to England and Wales as well as the highest ranking amongst the law officers of the Crown. The attorney gener ...

and

Foreign Office Foreign may refer to: Government * Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries * Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries ** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government ** Foreign office and foreign minister * United ...

legal advisors felt that the accession was inconsistent with Kashmir's obligations to Pakistan, and for that reason it was "perhaps invalid".

References and notes

;Notes ;Citations ;Bibliography * *

External links

* Venkatesh Nayak
Exclusive: For the First Time, a True Copy of Jammu & Kashmir's Instrument of Accession
The Wire, 26 October 2016.

* ttp://www.lib.berkeley.edu/SSEAL/SouthAsia/kashmir.html Conflict in Kashmir: Selected Internet Resources by the Library University of California, Berkeley, USA;

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

Library Bibliographies and Web-Bibliographies list {{DEFAULTSORT:Instrument Of Accession (Jammu And Kashmir) Legal documents History of the Republic of India Indian documents Politics of the Kashmir conflict 1947 in India 1947 in Indian law Treaties concluded in 1947 Treaties entered into force in 1947 1947 documents Jammu and Kashmir (princely state)