In the Fifties, Sixties and even the seventies it was treason to talk about anything that could be construed or interpreted as against the interest or security of the Indian Nation. No one ever talked about any negotiated settlement of the Kashmir issue. Words across the border between India and Pakistan were sharper and meant to kill!
Things have changed radically in later years. Today no one talks about military intervention to settle issues, thanks to the changed equation after the nuclear tests conducted by both the countries. But the rhetoric among the politicians in both the countries have changed only very little. In fact no one believes that there would be any solution at all!
In the free market atmosphere the postures and speeches of political and religious leaders have changed too. There is no bar on the language one uses. There are no barriers or boundaries between nations (is it too good to be true?) in this beautiful free world. Whatever be faults of our democratic system the world today acknowledges that Democracy is firmly rooted in the Indian soil. We have our problems but we have our Democracy too, for keeps!
I would like to quote a few lines from the book “THE WORLD IS FLAT” by Thomas Friedman which appeared in the book reviews in the Times of India of 6th Aug ’06.

The largest Muslim country in the world is Indonesia. And the second largest is not Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt or Pakistan. It is India. With some 150 million Muslims, India has more Muslims than Pakistan. But here is an interesting statistic from 9/11: There are no Indian Muslims that we know of in Al Qaeda and there are no Indian Muslims in America’s Guantanamo Bay post-9/11 prison camp. And no Indian Muslims have been found fighting alongside the jihadists in Iraq. Why is that? Why do we not read about Indian Muslims, who are in a minority in a vast Hindu-dominated land, blaming America for all their problems and wanting to fly airplanes into the Taj Mahal or the British Embassy? Lord knows, Indian Muslims have their grievances about access to capital and political representation. And interreligious violence has occasionally flared up in India, with disastrous consequences. I am certain that out of 150 million Muslims in India, a few will one day find their way to Al Qaeda—if it can happen with some American Muslims, it can happen with Indian Muslims. But this is not the norm. Why?
The answer is context—and in particular the secular, free-market, democratic context of India, heavily influenced by a tradition of non-violence and Hindu tolerance. M J Akbar, the Muslim editor of The Asian Age, a national Indian-English language daily primarily funded by non-Muslim Indians, put it to me this way: “I'll give you a quiz question: which is the only large Muslim community to enjoy sustained democracy for the last 50 years? The Muslims of India. I am not going to exaggerate Muslim good fortune in India. There are tensions, economic discrimination and provocations, like the destruction of the mosque at Ayodhya (by Hindu nationalists in 1992). But the fact is, the Indian Constitution is secular and provides a real opportunity for economic advancement of any community that can offer talent. That’s why a growing Muslim middle-class here is moving up and generally doesn’t manifest the strands of deep anger you find in many non-democratic Muslim states.”
While a Muslim woman sits on India’s Supreme Court, no Muslim woman is allowed even to drive a car in Saudi Arabia. Indian Muslims, including women, have been governors of many Indian states and the wealthiest man in India today, high on the Forbes list of global billionaires, is an Indian Muslim: Azim Premji, the chairman of Wipro, one of India’s most important technology companies. I was in India shortly after the United States invaded Afghanistan in late 2001, when Indian television carried a debate between the country’s leading female movie star and parliamentarian—Shabana Azmi, a Muslim woman—and the imam of New Delhi’s biggest mosque. The imam had called on Indian Muslims to go to Afghanistan and join the jihad against America, and Azmi ripped into him, live on Indian TV, basically telling the cleric to go take a hike. She told him to go to Kandahar and join the Taliban and leave the rest of India’s Muslims alone. How did she get away with that? Easy. As a Muslim woman she lived in a context that empowered and protected her to speak her mind—even to a leading cleric.