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"Sheer Impertinence." In his marathon reply to Noon, stonewalling Krishna Menon tediously led the Security Council through a nine-year maze of military reports, diplomatic exchanges, ministerial conferences, press clippings and gossip. To demonstrate the justice of India's position, he ranged from the status of Texas after the Civil War to Australian constitutional law. Out of it all emerged one clear point: India had no intention of permitting a plebiscite in Kashmir.
At the end of the first five hours of this. Security Council President Carlos Romulo wearily tried to shut Menon off, but the indefatigable Indian insisted that it would take him the better part of another session to finish his case. So far, Menon had kept his hair-trigger temper under control; but the following morning, when he discovered that the U.S. and four other powers were already circulating a resolution which began, "Having heard statements from representatives of the governments of India and Pakistan ..." Menon's control broke. In a fit of irritation he implied that Britain's Sir Pierson Dixon was anti-Indian, later accused Pakistan's Noon of "sheer impertinence," and snapped arrogantly: "We have suffered in the past in this discussion by trusting to the good sense of everybody all around."
Menon's pettishness did nothing to help India's case. "People here," said a Canadian delegate, "are not so much pro-Pakistan or pro-India as they are anti-Menon. Every time he opens his mouth, people want to vote against him." In the roll call that followed Menon's speech, this desire was freely indulged. By a vote of 10-0 (with Russia abstaining), the Security Council for the fifth time called for a plebiscite in Kashmir, and challenged the right of Kashmir's puppet assembly to unite the state with India. Indians were disappointed by Russia's abstention, after Khrushchev had noisily proclaimed India's right to Kashmir—but after all. Russia is currently trying to win Moslem friends in the Middle East.
"I Am Pained." Consoling as the moral victory was to the Pakistanis, it was not likely to have much practical effect. In New Delhi, Prime Minister Nehru, informed of the U.N.'s vote as he saw Red China's Chou En-lai off at the airport, announced: "I am deeply pained by this . . . But may I point out that the Kashmir Constituent Assembly has finished its work, dissolves itself tonight and disappears . . . The position remains as it is now." A few hours later, in the Kashmiri capital of Jammu. Puppet Premier Bakhshi Ghulam Mohammed formally proclaimed adoption of the constitution joining Kashmir to India—and in the process, gave the clearest statement yet of Jawa harlal Nehru's attitude toward the U.N.: "We are not bound by resolutions which are against our country and our interest."
*In precisely the opposite circumstances, the Moslem ruler o-f predominantly Hindu Hydera bad was opposed to joining ladia. The Indian army simply moved in and grabbed the place, has held it ever since.