To Whom Does Land Belong?

Date: 14th and 15th March 2019

Learning Outcomes:
- Realization of the diplomacy dilemma and more often than not, it is easier said than done
- Students should realize how difficult it is to distribute a resource such as land as it has no
owner
- Students should be able to justify which country claims to have sovereign power over
Kashmir and what proves this claim.
- Students should question whether violence was the last resort option.
Introductory Activity (5 min):
- Give people two different countries (A and B) and ask them to argue about the splitting
of land between the two countries using the rope activity.
o Rope activity: balance a manila paper on a rope/string and be able to distribute all
its resources evenly between countries A and B
o There could be a scenario – eg. Minerals (some should be of more importance
than others, eg. Gold in one part, soil in another), political situation, ethnic
religious backgrounds – string in between the countries
- Let the groups argue over who should take what
- Transition to their seats
Main Lesson Component (10 minutes to prepare and 20 minutes to debate + 5 mins video)
- Identify what they learnt from start-up activity
- Where does this problem arise in the world
- Giving a background about the conflict of India vs Pakistan over Kashmir – how it
started, how it escalated, where it is now
- Talk about the recent event that occurred between India and Pakistan over Kashmir ( the
bombings)
- Provide extracts and come up with a debate about how they should divide the sides
- Let the debate run, stop them halfway (10 minutes in) and make them realize that they
didn’t use the diplomacy approach
- Let them continue but use a diplomatic/arbitrary approach
- After the debate is concluded show them a video about Kashmir conflict (youtube: now
this world)
Conclusion (10 minutes)
- Be able to understand the complexities of the conflict and therefore, understand why the
diplomatic process is easier said than done and understand the pressure applied on the
stakeholders
- What do they realize about the difficulty in solving the problem?
- Are there possible alternatives they know of? (negative and positive)
- Should Kashmir become an independent state? Include regard to the fact that India and
Pakistan would forfeit the possibility of having access to resources in Kashmir.
- What would they have done differently next time?

Resources:
rope/string
Manila
Markers (white board x3)
Pens
Printed materials which will be sent
Hdmi cable
Projector
White board
Speakers