As Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee lands in
Islamabad Saturday, there is plenty of speculation on what the
24-hour visit will generate. Actually, the stories may not be many.
Mukherjee comes to deliver the invitation for the SAARC summit to be
held in New Delhi in April this year. He will call on President
Pervez Musharraf, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and his counterpart
Khurshid Kasuri.
There is some expectation that the four agreements - on reducing
risk of nuclear accidents or unauthorized use of nuclear weapons,
revised visa regime, speedy repatriation of inadvertent
border-crossers and quarterly flag meetings between sector
commanders at the Line of Control - finalized during the November
2006 foreign secretary-level talks may be signed.
As a stand alone event Mukherjee's visit is not significant, but as
part of a paradigm shift in Pakistan-India relations it is.
Coincidently it also comes within a week of Indian Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh's offer to Pakistan for a friendship treaty. Manmohan
Singh's offer defines possibly the ultimate outcome of the present
peace process. But of immediate significance are the inputs required
for such an output - confidence building, normalization and most
importantly conflict resolution.
Significantly, media excitement about every Pakistan-India encounter
notwithstanding, this bilateral relationship is off the sensational
roller coaster. Having tried all thinkable means - moral-immoral,
legal-illegal, military-non-military and political-non-political -
the two countries are at the dialogue table. And that too for three
solid years!
Manmohan Singh froze the dialogue after the Mumbai serial train
bombings. He made a political choice. The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP)
emerging response strategy, using the still electorally popular man
Narendra Modi who was linked to the 2002 genocide in Gujarat, would
have raked up deadly communalism.
Fury against Indira Gandhi's tragic assassination had over 2,000
Sikhs killed overnight. Also Pakistan's alleged involvement in the
Mumbai blasts of the early 1990s made it vulnerable to culpability.
Manmohan Singh did not take the risk. However dialogue was resumed
shortly after.
Another important area for cooperation - intelligence sharing - was
also identified. During the January 2006 breakthrough meeting in
Islamabad, the Indian National Security Advisor of the BJP
government, Brajesh Mishra, had also held a meeting with Pakistan's
ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) chief General Ehsan ul Haq.
Steering away from distrust and violence, this historically complex
relationship is not an easy task. The lingering suspicion and the
violent parting of ways in 1947 which left millions dead and
generated the biggest population swap of about 10 million, precludes
a sudden turn around. Yet on a cautiously optimistic note, where the
two countries stand at present is a far cry from the relationship
defining assertions by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Zulfiqar Ali
Bhutto.
After Pakistan's failed Operation Gibraltar against India,
Pakistan's Foreign Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in September 1965
had said: "Pakistan would wage a war of a 1,000 years, a war of
defence."
After having midwifed the birth of Bangladesh then Indian prime
minister Indira Gandhi triumphantly yelled: "We have avenged 1,000
years of history." When she made these remarks on Dec 18, 1971,
Pakistan was only 24 years old. She was referring to the
1,000-year-old minority Muslim rule over majority Hindu India.
There is now a desire to turn away from the warring zones - the
three wars (1948, 1965 and 1971), two mini-wars (1965 Rann of Kutch
and 1999 Kargil), 1987 Operation Brasstacks, in 1990 the first
nuclear crisis leading to the Gates Mission and the two near wars in
January and June 2002. And then the Lahore and Agra summits, which
amounted to 'Summits to Nowhere'.
The momentum generated from 2004 Musharraf-Vajpayee led breakthrough
has been sustained. Continuous engagement on the core unresolved
issue of the political future of the Kashmiris, the expanding scope
of possible resolution formulas acceptable to the Kashmiris, to
Pakistan and to India has kept the momentum going. As is the
realization that other bilateral problems needs need to be resolved.
With the breakthrough on Sir Creek, there is expectation of progress
on Siachen too.
They are now on a steady track of normalization. They are inching
away from the path of bilateral confrontation. Over a 100 annual
Pakistan-India official meetings take place covering border security
matters to visa issues, to trade issues and on core issues like
Kashmir and security too.
Brief interludes similar to the post-Mumbai one will happen. The
half-century-old distrust and policy moves that have caused animus
will also not disappear overnight. Reopening of old connecting modes
is underway - almost irreversibly. Airways, motorways, sea-routes
and the rail tracks are becoming functional. Progress has also been
made on cross-border trade. Concrete steps towards resolution of
conflicts guarantees increased trade between these natural trading
partners.
Peoples' links keep multiplying as they naturally will. History,
culture, religion, economic and even blood ties in many cases
provide the perpetual impetus for cross-border travel. And the world
of media, perpetually following the fascinating journey of
reconnection, tells the narrative simply, analytically and
critically. It keenly observes the changing design and tempo of this
Pakistan-India tapestry as it moves from tentative engagement to
more confident linking - whether its artists, friends, students,
faith tourists, sportspeople and businesspeople.
Politicians, as opposed to governments, are a mixed bag. In
Pakistan, the main opposition party Pakistan People's Party (PPP)
remains supportive of the present government's India policy. By
contrast the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) led by former prime
minister Nawaz Sharif, who first opted to re-orient Pakistan's
policy towards India and was undercut by the establishment, is
hugely critical of it.
Might he have still been in power there is no doubt he would have
traveled much quicker on the path to normalization. His party's
position today is merely political. It seeks more sticks with which
to beat the Musharraf government. No more.
In India it's worse. The grand men of the BJP opposition, in effect
the architects of Manmohan Singh's current Pakistan policy, are also
the grand critics of the very same policy! They play politics too
nakedly. They want to know of the secret deals that the prime
minister has struck or is going to strike on Kashmir and have
criticized intelligence sharing.
The Congress party is following the trail the BJP initiated. Now
like bloodhounds they seek to draw political blood from the Congress
leadership taking that trail!
Ultimately it will be the non-bureaucratic forces and visionary
politicians on both sides that will keep this relationship from
returning to the confrontational path.
(Nasim Zehra, national security strategist and columnist, is
currently a Fellow at the Harvard University Asia Center. She can be
reached at
nasimzehra@gmail.com)
(c) Boloji.com :
1999–2008 : All
Rights Reserved Boloji.com is owned and managed by Boloji Media Inc Privacy Policy |
Disclaimer
No part of this Internet site may
be reproduced without prior written permission of the copyright holder.
