A veil of darkness shrouds Indian political discourse with respect to the State of Jammu and Kashmir. Its genesis can be traced to Jawaharlal Nehru’s decision to extract J&K from Sardar Patel’s mission to integrate the Princely States with the fledgling Dominion of India. Nehru’s subsequent inability to manage the war with Pakistan in the face of the duplicitous manoeuvrings of Louis Mountbatten whom he imprudently appointed as Governor General of India and chairman of the Defence Committee, waffling in the face of the steely British backroom diplomacy at the UN Security Council, and above all, abject surrender to the intractable Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah whom he had unleashed upon the hapless Maharaja Hari Singh and his subjects, have bequeathed a bitter legacy.