With Pathan tribal fighters backed by Pakistan advancing on his capital Srinagar, Maharaja Hari Singh signed the Instrument of Accession, ceding his princely state to the newly independent India in exchange for military help. India's Governor-General Lord Mountbatten accepted the accession the next day, and Indian troops were airlifted into Srinagar within hours. The move triggered the first Indo-Pakistani war and planted the seeds of a territorial dispute still unresolved more than seventy-five years later.
Hari Singh had tried to stay neutral as British India splintered into two nations that August, hoping to preserve Kashmir's status as an independent kingdom or negotiate special terms with both new states. That hope collapsed in October when thousands of armed tribesmen from Pakistan's North-West Frontier, allegedly with covert support from Pakistan's army, poured into Kashmir, looting towns and advancing toward Srinagar.
Panicked, Hari Singh's government appealed to New Delhi for military assistance. India's leadership, including Prime Minister Nehru, insisted on legal accession first — they wanted Kashmir formally part of India before committing troops. Under pressure and with the invaders closing in, Singh signed the instrument on the night of October 26, and Indian soldiers began landing at Srinagar's airport the following morning, just in time to halt the raiders on the city's outskirts.
Pakistan never recognized the accession as legitimate, arguing it was signed under duress and that Kashmir's Muslim-majority population should have determined its own fate. The resulting war ended in a UN-brokered ceasefire line that essentially still holds today as the Line of Control, and Kashmir remains one of the world's most militarized and contested borders — a dispute born in a single signature amid a collapsing kingdom.
Key people: Hari Singh, Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten