Mariyam Aziz2025-11-282025-11-282021https://escholar.umt.edu.pk/handle/123456789/13472The purpose of the study is to reveal the linguistic strategies that Pakistan’s and India’s prime minister used in their speeches to legitimize their respective positions on Kashmir issue, a major issue between the two countries which sparked the wars of 1947 and 1965, and the Kargil conflict of 1999. To this end, the data was collected from the speeches of Imran Khan (Prime Minister of Pakistan) and Narinder Modhi (Prime Minister of India) which they delivered on different occasions after Article 370 in Kashmir. The data consists of four speeches, out of which two speeches were delivered by Imran Khan and two speeches by Narinder Modhi. The data for the present study was collected from the media. The whole research was framed under the scope of Critical Discourse Analysis (hence thereafter CDA) and the speeches were analyzed in terms of Reyes’ (2011) strategies of legitimization: voice of expertise, a hypothetical future, altruism, emotions, and rationality. The findings of the present study revealed that both the prime ministers used almost the same strategies, that is, rationality, voice of expertise, altruism, emotions, and a hypothetical future to justify their position and to attack their opponent. However the difference lies in the use of different linguistic choices which they used to legitimize their position and to attack their opponent. For instance, Khan and Modhi both used the strategy of hypothetical future to legitimize their respective positions. Imran Khan used the lexical choice “feel” to show his belief that when the curfew was lifted up, there would be a blood bath in Kashmir, whereas Modhi used modal verb “will” which indicates a future possibility for Jammu to be free from terrorism. The findings of the study establish the significance of language as an analytical tool which can help understand the nature of discursive practices underlying certain ideologies. The present study has its importance in understanding the language of legitimization used by anypoliticians to win the support of national as well ii international community. The study is also significant because it aims at critically examining the discourses of those who are not only politicians but also the prime ministers of two states, which also makes it significant to understand the nature of the discursive practices for political influence.enThesis