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(Image credit: PRAKASH SINGH/AFP/Getty Images)

India has been described as an enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in mystery. But Thursday, on the 73rd anniversary of its independence from British rule, it also became a monumental irony: Even as Indians celebrated the overthrow of colonial rule, the Indian army had turned the Himalayan state of Jammu and Kashmir into an open air prison, where seven million residents were being held under curfew and banned from calling, tweeting, publishing — much less protesting.

Their state legislature had been disbanded, their leaders were under house arrest, and the constitutional provisions granting them a measure of autonomy from New Delhi was suspended.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who engineered all this without any forewarning 10 days ago, is claiming that "fully integrating" — read: forcibly annexing — this ravaged state into broader India will turn it into a mecca of prosperity whose herbal products will fi