In 1951, Dr. Karan Singh—who had succeeded Hari Singh in the largely  ceremonial  post  of  Sadr-e-Riyasat  (similar  to  the  post  of Governor in other states of the Indian Union)—issued a proclamation directing  the  formation  of  a  Constituent Assembly  for  the  state of  J&K,  whose  pressing  duty  was  to  be  the  drafting  of  a  new constitution for the state, and settling once and for all the unclear status of the Valley vis-à-vis India, Pakistan or full independence.

Sheikh Abdullah, for his part, was against joining with Pakistan, but nor  was  his  support  for  joining  India  unequivocal.  He,  like  Hari Singh, harboured ambitions for independence, and sought to use the state’s strategic importance, being located as it was at the junction of India, Pakistan, China and the Soviet Union in Central Asia, to leverage  as  much  power  as  he  could  by  playing  the  great  powers off against one another.

But  returning  to  the  early  1950s,  the  total  number  of representatives in the new Constituent Assembly was fixed at one hundred. Forty-three of these would come from Kashmir, thirty from Jammu, twenty-five from the occupied territories (taken by Pakistan), and just two from the frontier constituencies of Ladakh and Kargil and  Baltistan. The  first  meeting  of  the  new  assembly  was  held  in Srinagar  on  October  31,  1951. Addressing  the  delegates,  Sheikh Abdullah urged them to apply themselves diligently to the task of framing a constitution to safeguard the state’s autonomy while also allowing for the conclusion of its formal accession to the Union.

Bakula Rinpoche could not understand Kashmiri, Urdu, Hindi or English. As he looked around him, he could see the vast majority of delegates were Kashmiri. Naturally they would have the interests of the Valley uppermost in their minds.

The  issues  facing  other  parts  of  the  state,  in  particular  the Buddhist-majority  regions  of  Ladakh  including  Zanskar,  were pressing and complex in nature, due to the particular environmental, religious,  educational  and  cultural  circumstances  in  those  areas.

These areas should be dealt with according to their own needs and not considered mere extensions of Kashmir.

“A note dated July 23, 1952 on “Kashmir Government’s Sinister Designs  on  Ladakh”  forwarded  to  Dr.  Kailash  Nath  Katju,  States Minister,  Govt.  of  India,  New  Delhi,  in  which  Bakula  Rinpoche expressed his most vehement language yet:

“It is clear as crystal from all this that unless India inter- venes immediately, Ladakh will be lost to it one way or the other. Let India grasp this fact clearly: the existence of the Buddhist  community  in  Ladakh  is  the  only  factor  which guarantees to it the possession of this important frontier. We shall prefer to be wiped out of existence, but we shall not permit  ourselves  to  be  hurled  into  the  blazing  hell  of Pakistan.  We  prize  our  Buddhist  culture  above our  very  lives.  Therefore,  the  thought  of  the  advent  of Communism into our land is a dreadful nightmare for us.

But  if  India  casts  us  to  the  wolves  we  shall,  as  we  have repeatedly declared, prefer being restored to our home Tibet even  under  Communist  regime  than  to  being  tied  to  the chariot-wheels of Pakistan. Our culture, our ideals can live and  thrive  only  under  the  direct  sunshine  of  India’s protection  and  not  under  its  shadowy  long-distance guardianship exercised through the non-conducting medium of a virtually independent Islamic Kashmir. Our demand of internal  autonomy  is  being  thrown  overboard.  Shri Gopalaswamy Ayyanger had reassured me during my recent interview with him at Jammu, that India would depute an administrator  to  the  District.  But  the  Prime  Minister  of Kashmir  has  informed  me  that  he  has  not  agreed  to  this proposal and that India has not agreed to the direct merger of the District with itself. This is most unfortunate for us and gravely harmful to the interests of India itself. The need of the hour is the appointment of an administrator by the Government  of  India.  …To  save  the  Frontier,  India  must save the Buddhists of Ladakh and to save the Buddhists of Ladakh  it  must  take  over  administrative  control  of  the District without the loss of a moment.”

In Feb. 1954, the Constituent Assembly ratified J&K’s accession to India, by a unanimous vote. The new constitution drafted by the assembly  then  came  into  force  three  years  later  on  Jan.  26,  1957, proclaiming categorically that the J&K is and shall be an integral part  of  the  Union  of  India.  The  constitution  also  institutionalized what  had  been  the  temporary  safeguards  of  regional  autonomy stipulated in the famous Article 370 of the Indian Constitution.

In 1952, Dr. Karan Singh, Sadr-i-Riyasat of the state and the son of the erstwhile Dogra ruler Hari Singh, when the former visited Leh for three days along with his wife Maharani Yasho Rajya Lakshmi. This was the royal couple’s first visit to Ladakh and they received a warm welcome from the people. Although Ladakh had been a part of the princely state of J&K for over a century, no member of the royal dynasty of Gulab Singh had ever actually visited Leh. The visit was particularly significant as it coincided with the historic opening of  the  Srinagar-Leh  highway,  which  they  inaugurated  at  Kargil.

While  in  Ladakh  the  royal  couple  also  visited  Bakula  Rinpoche’s Samkar  Gonpa.  Dr.  Karan  Singh  was  deeply  affected  by  the  visit and  henceforth  he  was  always  very  supportive  of  Ladakh, recognizing  its  vulnerability  and  the  concerns  of  its  people.

Reminiscing about the visit in his autobiography, he wrote:

“Even more so than in Jammu, the Ladakhis were feeling uneasy  and  insecure  under  the  Sheikh’s  administration.

Forming as they did a distinct cultural entity, they felt that their  position  in  the  new  dispensation  with  only  two members  in  the  State  Assembly  (on  the  basis  of population)  was  extremely  precarious  and  made  them totally subordinate to the Kashmiris.”