It was not expected that Pakistan would sit tight over Kashmir for long. When it seemed that the Himalayan boundary dispute had been stacked on the back burner, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has stirred a hornet's nest by suggesting new ways to resolve the 50-year-old dispute.

Musharraf has called on India and Pakistan to consider the option of identifying some parts of Kashmir on both sides of the disputed border, demilitarize them and grant them the status of independence or joint control or under United Nations mandate.

Admitting that Pakistan's long-standing demand for a referendum in Kashmir was impractical, Musharraf suggested other options such as autonomy, joint control or U.N. supervision.

So, we need some solution. Identify region, demilitarize, and change status. The whole debate of options will be based on this, Musharraf told Pakistani journalists Monday.

If both sides continue to stick to their stands, the (Kashmir) dispute would persist for 100 years without any solution, he said.

India clearly seemed not impressed with Musharraf's latest talk and asked Islamabad not to hold Kashmir dialogue through the media.

We have heard these comments. We do not believe that Kashmir is a subject on which discussion can be held through the media, India's Foreign Ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna told reporters Tuesday.

Sarna said any suggestions about Kashmir should be discussed within the parameters of the continuing composite dialogue process.

Pakistan's new Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz will be visiting India in the second week of November, during which he will hold bilateral talks with his Indian counterpart, Manmohan Singh.

Officials from both sides have drawn up a schedule for talks on eight subjects, including expert-level meetings on nuclear and conventional confidence-building measures and on commencing the proposed bus link between the divided Kashmir regions.

While New Delhi offered a guarded response, opposition parties in both countries slammed Musharraf.

India's right-wing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party said Musharraf's proposal was totally unacceptable.

BJP leader and India's former foreign minister Jaswant Singh said that map making has to stop in South Asia.

He said for the BJP nothing is acceptable that overrides the will of Parliament. Any suggestion for transfer of sovereignty or transfer of territory is a non-starter. We cannot accept a third party.

In Pakistan, an alliance of six Islamic parties, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, called Musharraf's plan a betrayal of the Kashmir cause.

In the Pakistani-administered part of Kashmir, Prime Minister Sardar Sikandar Hayat said he was disappointed by the president's comments, the BBC reported.

We believe in a plebiscite, the one which was promised to us by both Pakistan and India, he said, referring to a 1948 U.N. Security Council resolution that called for a referendum.

Now, after five decades, they are talking about (the) disintegration of Kashmir into six, seven parts.

In the Indian-controlled Kashmir, a leader of a moderate faction of a group of political parties hailed Musharraf's proposals.

Abdul Gani Bhat said the new formula could usher in lasting peace and an era of prosperity in Kashmir.

Kashmir is the main stumbling block between India and Pakistan. Both claim Kashmir, a third of which is under Pakistani control, while the rest is controlled by India. The two have fought two wars over Kashmir and came close to fighting another war in 2002.

The Indian side of Kashmir, the only Muslim-majority state of otherwise predominantly Hindu India, is home to a 15-year-old separatist Islamic uprising, which India blames on Pakistan.

But much to the comfort of the international community, the two nations started warming to each other earlier this year.