Giving dialogue a chance is critical for taking Pakistan and India out of a bilateral cold war time-warp.
Resuming dialogue is always weighed down by anxiety over the outcome. But India and Pakistan need not worry. Nobody realistically expects too much out of tentative renewals. They hold little promise of anything except an exchange of chai and samosas. Yet these renewals are bright arcs in the treacherous sky that hangs over the nuclear neighbours. The mere return to dialogue signals a recognition by both parties that a ritual has its uses. It breaks the ice, presages hope, promises substance, and sets the stage for road maps and change.
For those who want to teach the other state a lesson or negotiate a more nationalist identity by spurning dialogue, there is comfort in the sulphur of emotion. They are yet to understand that national security, or its pursuit, through non-coercive diplomacy is a ruthless business. It bets on the long term and looks at maximising optimal outcomes. If a military solution is the best option, then all resources such as anger, ballistic missiles, artillery and the best planners need to be marshalled on the table. If a military outcome is not in the best interest of either side, then it is chai, samosas and gritted charm.
At a recent track-two dialogue between experienced interlocutors of Indo-Pakistan strategic nodes in Bangkok, one thing was clear: despite the Indian Premier League issue that sent alarm bells ringing across Pakistan when its cricketers were excluded from the bids, civil society in India still seeks to do business with Pakistan. This was a very important signal for those of us who have invested in cross-border meetings and relationships as a way of broadening the peace constituency. The backlash against the Shiv Sena that the Shah Rukh Khan episode generated also demonstrated that support for peace in South Asia is not just a wishy-washy Leftist dream.
Sustainable peace is a not a prelude to concessions by either state. But it should signal the willingness for flexibility on key issues. New Delhi will serve the region better if it shelves the threat of suspending dialogue every time there is a terrorist strike. The good news is that templates exist for many of the smaller conflicts in the Indo-Pakistan terrain. It is Kashmir and terrorism that loom large on the road map, while the conflict in Afghanistan also provokes responses that muddy the pool. Water in South Asia is a contentious issue and, if left unresolved, could spark conflict between riparian states of the Indus Water system. Where do we stand on all of the above?
On terrorism, Pakistan is facing a blitz. It is a capacity deficit, not a commitment lag. The question that needs addressing is a vexing one for New Delhi. How much power does it want to concede to terrorists? Democratic governments may be weak everywhere, perhaps more so in Pakistan, but they hedge their futures against war. They seek opportunities for peace and trade, not because they are nice but because they are accountable for losses. War with India is really not an option when more people die in Pakistan from acts of terror than in war-torn Iraq or, for that matter, anywhere in the world. New Delhi should, therefore, grasp the magnitude of the war roiling Pakistan before it makes dialogue hostage to the terror that rips through the region. This is not to say composite dialogue is some metric for success. Far from it.
In fact, in the last lap, it looked like an instrument that would lose all shine if not shot in the arm with some political will. After the fourth round of composite dialogue sorted out the fine print on many well-worn CBMs, the inertia of leaden intentions dragged movement at its usual pace. Then Mumbai, or 26/11, happened. Suddenly, the state became hostage to terrorists and their goals. The dialogue screeched to a halt, and the power of setting the agenda landed in the terrorists’ laps. This is what has to change for all countries of the region to combat terrorism together. We must seek to marginalise those who promote the terrorist cause.
The identity of most terrorists seeking to rob Pakistan’s citizens of their peace may not be trans-national at a glance but the sophisticated military resources and funds that drive them do not originate in Pakistan. In the last two years alone, over 5,000 people have lost their lives to terrorism. Our children are afraid of going to school and our hospitals are bomb-sites. This is a war Pakistan expects its neighbours to help it with and, try as it may, Islamabad cannot possibly provide a guarantee against bombs in India if it cannot guarantee such a thing in its Military’s General Headquarters.
On this count, dialogue should lead to the construction of joint mechanisms for intelligence-sharing, best practices and optimal outcomes. Intelligence is the first line of defence in terrorist terrain, and we need to bolster our states with a formal architecture for interaction between India and Pakistan. Terrorism cannot be tackled alone, and while both states have skeletons in their unofficial closets, these and other mutual embarrassments should be discussed across the table, not on the airwaves, making our media combatants in a virtual war. Interrupting dialogue will only reify hardened positions, not create room for cooling off.
Second, structured talks on Kashmir will have to resurface, even if they inch forward. If New Delhi refuses to include Kashmir at a later stage on the formal table, the dialogue will lose momentum and political traction in Pakistan. Peace-making governments will increasingly become hostage to shrill nationalist voices and the project of Pax South Asia will again flounder on the rocks of gratuitous intransigence. Talks on Kashmir will also profit from a back channel, as well as the quiet inclusion of Kashmiri opinion in any dialogue for it to remain credible. Representation from Kashmir on both sides of the border is essential if the process is not to be seen as an exercise at appropriating real estate.
On Afghanistan, Pakistan is only one of the smaller elephants in the room. Islamabad’s fear of Indian encirclement will lighten if international strategies to build a nation out of that failing state succeed. Troop surges will likely tip the scales in the short run for the U.S.-NATO forces to negotiate with the Taliban but are unlikely to square the stability and governance circle on its own. International support for a broad-based ethnic mix in Afghanistan will be the only way forward if the region is not to lapse into a lawless buffer zone for extremists to build an infrastructure of dominance and pseudo-Shariah to terrorise the region with. Islamabad’s cavil about Baloch insurgents finding sanctuary in Indian consulates can be resolved if New Delhi provides transparency. Indian protests about Pakistan sponsoring terrorist attacks on its embassy can be rationally resolved through mutual exchange and dialogue.
Four, the widespread anxiety in Pakistan over Indian dams on rivers that deplete the Indus downstream can actually be discussed in a permanent dialogue mechanism that can be established between the two countries, without prejudice to the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT). The IWT has stood the test of time. But in case of violations, it depends ultimately on arbitration, which is not always to the satisfaction of either party, as was the case in Baglihar. Pakistan is dangerously water-stressed and its depleting rivers and reservoirs can benefit only from a joint working commission with India. There is scant awareness in India of Pakistan’s concerns over the potential damming of the Chenab. This is one conflict that can snowball as water is not always a renewable resource in South Asia. Urgent planning is needed by both countries for conservation that is both sustainable and mutually acceptable.
Shifting a state’s strategic calculus in a conflict is always a challenge. Giving dialogue a chance is critical for taking Pakistan and India out of a bilateral cold war time-warp. While the rest of the world forges ahead, meeting in Paris to re-think global nuclear stockpiles, South Asia’s two dinosaurs remain wedded to regimes that are based on mutual opacity, while their conventional arms race remains unfettered by nuclear deterrence. Giving China a role in a separate trilateral commission for nuclear and other talks can help ease that neuralgia.
India’s military focus is still Pakistan, in terms of brigades and hardware. That forces the military in Pakistan to keep the troop strength balanced when all resources are needed on another, dispersed battlefield. Here, history for once, can show the way. In the 1960s, Islamabad withdrew its forces quietly when New Delhi was facing down China in Aksai Chin, as all responsible accounts from Washington will testify. (They should know, as they had asked General Ayub Khan to do that). If one is looking for a game-changer, this will be it. For Pakistan, the potential theatre of conflict will shift where needed, and threat perceptions will slowly start shifting closer to the real ground zero at home. The trust deficit will move down multiple notches and a structured, monitored dialogue can cash in on the space afforded by such a seminal act of courage and statesmanship.
The Indian leadership should strengthen its Prime Minister’s hand to fashion such a grand strategic bargain for South Asia. For, without one, dialogue will go round and round in vilified circles, becoming a low-intensity space for conflict prevention. We need to go beyond crisis management. We need to shift into conflict resolution and business momentum mode. But for all that to happen, we need to give dialogue a chance.
(Sherry Rehman is former Minister of Information and Broadcasting and Member, National Assembly, Pakistan.)
Keywords: India, Pakistan, Indo-Pak talks, Sherry Rehman, former Minister of Information and Broadcasting, CBMs, Kashmir, New Delhi, Islamabad, international relations, Afghanistan, peace talks
Dialogue can be the only way out for India and Pakistan. This is a fact. But back-stabbing with terrorism covertly and demanding dialogue diplomatically never encourages a solution. The widespread support and succour Pakistan gave for terrorists openly (and still giving, unofficially) in the late nineties have come back to haunt it. This is a consequence, and lamenting it is useless.
Nationhood brings with it many responsibilities. And fulfilling them is mandatory for exercising rights that comes with it. If Pakistan is unable to live in calmness, where each moment is a moment of fear and uncertainty, interspersed with routine blasts, it has no one else to blame. The statement, “Islamabad cannot possibly provide a guarantee against bombs in India if it cannot guarantee such a thing in its Military’s General Headquarters” simply lacks spine.
Pakistan would see the dawn of peace, the day it is ready to dismantle ISI and the wide terrorist network that it supervises. Of course, Pakistan is taking measures to counter terrorism. But how much of soul is going into it? Intelligence sharing is out of question, as long as this issue is addressed. We do not want to see the terrorists ultimately referring their blue prints of attack, sourced by the intelligence establishment of India and handed over to Pakistan.
India is not an aggressive nation having geographical expansion plans. History proves it. Fears like India “encircling Pakistan” is therefore thoroughly unfounded.
“India’s military focus is still Pakistan”. Well, it is because Pakistan’s military and terrorist focus is India. This logic is simple. No one can forget Kargil.
All the comments above have made strong points about why neither country can trust the other and what should they do before there can be a meaningful dialogue. This is a chicken or egg situation. The article from Sherry Rehman argues, and rightly so, that it is the dialogue which will generate mutual trust and provide enough public support to the two Governments to take the long due steps. Vested interests on both sides will always find some reason to thwart the dialogue, if required by bringing national prestige, historical deceits and elements of mistrust.
On the 17th of this month, sent a note to you which you have not selected to publish. I wanted to comment that the note is not very different in tone or content from many of those that you have published here. I'm neither a trouble making antagonist nor a fanatical patriot. What I said was very matter of factly. I'm Indian. I read most English language newspapers of Pakistan EVERY day. What I said (except the last sentence making the case for ID cards for all Indians) has been the tone, content, and fear expressed in frequent op-ed pieces of Pakistan. Go figure!
I totally agree with M N Panini's comment that dialogue with Pakistan at this stage means that extremists would bully the interlocuters into accepting their agenda or else escalate their violent terrorism. They see it as a win-win situation.
Just think about this- the ISI under Hamid Gul created the Kashmir insurgency and after 22 years of murder,rape and arson they want us to ‘talk’. Isn’t it amazing how they have succeeded in legitimizing a terrorist act? Any further dialogue with Pakistan will be a dangerous precedent.
Pakistan must look into itself and stop advising and finding faults with others.
For once, let us all stop this so called peace initiatives between "elites" of Pakistan and India. Let us not get fooled by this "elite" talk. How many of you people have met the average Pakistanis to know their mindset. Just visit Lahore/Karachi and attend one of their many meetings where thousands throng with full vengeance against India in their minds. Sherry Rehman portrays the picture as if the extremists are a minority. I beg to differ that they are in absolute majority. The Pakistani government is playing a great game where it is bleeding hundreds of thousands of innocent Indians and putting the blame on so called "Non State Actors". We have been talking all along. We have seen that India is going to be bled again and again, no matter what we talk with these Pakistanis. The end result is the same - blood of Indians.
Please keep your peace arguments and candle light vigils to yourself.
No amount of money/words can ease out the pain and suffering of people like the mother, who lost both her children (Ankik and Anindyee Dhar) in Pune blast to the blood thirsty terrorists from across the border.
PM Manmohan Singh must not talk with Pakistan at the cost of the life of innocent Indians. The Indian government is just making statements which clearly shows that it does not have any unambiguous Pakistan policy.
Whether it be the shrill cries of the "Dr" Hamids rallying ignorant Pakistanis to raise their flag on Delhi's Red Fort or the London-Lahore-Defence Colony clutch of smoking sophisticates such as Ms. Rehman, they posit that India is the spoiler. That, but for India and the threat it poses to Pakistan, the Land of the Pure would have achieved its manifest destiny visualized by the philosopher king Mr. Jinnah. But then, never do they - even the elites - admit that the problem are really much more fundamental. And so organic. That nation is close to implosion. Indian machiavellis hiding a Baloch aberrant in their embassies will not impact it any worse even if it really happens. Choking off the water in Indus will not make more productive an economy that is founded on the religious alms of Saudis or the bribes of the USA or the charity of the Bangladesh jute industry .. The Kashmiri bouquet will be never be delivered, of course, but even if it were, it's not going to change the negative dynamics of Pakistan around, it won't stop the perverse tectonics in motion ever since its formation. That is because the very reason and ideology of its founding is faulty. The opportunists (the few business families) who set it up were only equipped (intellectually and administratively) to set it up (well, I'm not giving Montgomery any credit here). It was - and is - beyond these elites' capacity to take it further.
This is not to say that Pakistan has no right to exist as a nation. Or that its people shouldn't have a decent chance to lead a peaceful life. They deserve it as any other. As if the founding itself wasn't shaky, a series of terrible actors in lead roles - Liaquat, Ayub, Yahya, Zia, the Bhuttos, Sharif, Musharraf - set off policies that aided that inevitable implosion. Was there one leader who built any lasting political institution (no, I don't mean buildings), forget setting on building a whole new nation?
[If The Hindu's readers haven't read Margaret Bourke-White's interview of Mr. Jinnah, please do before your eyes tear up to Ms. Rehman's seeing pleas of reason]. Here's a clutch of people infecting millions of people with an uncontrollable plague and deprivation and they come to the neighbors for a pinch of salt! The implosion is imminent because there is not much there that will hold it together. If we are smart, we'll get EVERY Indian an ID card in a hurry and seal the borders off! That's not being alarmist or paranoid but being well planned. Save this note.
For a dialogue with pakistan to achieve something, there should be a stron pak. govt., a government that is in control of the army and ISI. Alas, history has shown that it is the other way and there lies the conumdrum for India. It is also an oportunity for India to rise to the occassion and negotiate with the superpowers in brokering a deal with Pakistan. if the West could collectively work to break the Taliban stranglehold and then negotiate with it - there is a lesson to be learnt by India. Indian diplomacy must go up by a few notches to achieve anything significant. this can be done. India needs to use its new found status as a world power. India is part of the G20 and it should use its status to force the agenda of sub-continental stabilty. After all this is a region that has traditionally attracted the West's attention and it would help everyone is having stabilised sub-continent rather than a war-ravaged one.
Pakistan is suffering because of its internal problems and it's support for militancy and jihadis in general. I have seen countless articles and requests by Pakistani civil society to start the talks again after 26/11. Now when India offered to talk, their ignorant and popularity seeking ministers were quick to portray as if India had kneeled and offered to talk themselves and as if they actually didn't ask for it. Now what do you make of it?
If a new beginning has to be made in building bridges of friendliness between India and Pakistan, some enabling conditions will have to be created. The verbal belligerence that informs comments on Indo-Pak affairs on our TV news channels and newspaper pages and the often vitriolic pronouncements on these by the spokespersons of political parties are not conducive to achieving peace in the sub- continent. The opinion makers in the country will have to rein in their ultra-patriotic instincts and bring more sobriety and objectivity to what they say. In the government itself, one finds various senior ministers other than the External Affairs Minister freely making public comments on Pakistan’s intentions and actions which is not helpful to improving relations with our neighbour through formal dialogue. The government, on its part, has to work out various problem-solving options, hold confidential parleys with opposition leaders and build a national consensus on these options before sitting down with the leaders of Pakistan for a formal dialogue. Playing to the gallery should be definitely taboo. Only a well-ordered disciplined approach can solve any problem.
Agreed that Pakistan itself is suffering from terrorism, but it has never shown the will to counter it. Even more than one year after Mumbai attacks, it still has done nothing against the perpetrators. The Pakistani Govt. made all the flip-flop statements day-in and day-out. Whom were they trying to fool? It is a known fact that terrorists always had the backing of Pakistan in past , and they still do have it at present. That is why my opinion is that instead of focusing on increasing their military strength to counter India's military , Pakistan should first use this military strength to undermine the very basic foundations of the terrorism inside its own state.
Secondly, coming back to the point that Mr Rahman has made that bilateral talks should continue amidst any possible terror threats and attacks , this can be seen as a rhetoric statement unless and until Pakistan govt shows a pragmatic approach in dismantling the terror camps on its soil. Our past experience tells us that Pakistan govt has failed to do. No doubt, some people were cornered and a they were put through a judicial trial , however it was not more than a gimmick. Therefore, the onus is on Pakistan to ensure that terrorist attacks do not happen if it wants the bilateral talks with India to succeed.
Finely worded article coming forth from a modern mind. Actually, a dialogue--comprehensive and composite--would succeed when the modernists in Pakistan meet the modernists in India. The problem is with extremists who use modern science and technology to go back to their literal translations of Islam and Islamic rule. So if South Asia has to be rid of terror, and if peaceful coexistence and partnership among the nations of the region have to be achieved, first Pakistanis need to introspect on their own institutions and redesign them first. Till then dialogue will only be an euphemism from bullying. Extremists would bully the interlocuters into accepting their agenda or else escalate their violent terrorism.
All these years, having denied that terrorists ever existed on its soil,now Pakistan is in a quandary as to how to put the Genie back in the lamp. No amount of wishful thinking is going to change the fact that Pakistan either wants Kashmir to be an independent buffer nation or as a part of Pakistan. This is unacceptable to India.Adding to this,India's difficulty in negotiating lies in the fact that there are multiple centers of power in Pakisthan, whose modus operandi is not necessarily congruent.These are the government of Pakisthan, the ISI,the Army and the Terrorists.
Wishful thinking ! The common people of Pakistan may want peace with India, but neither the ISI, nor the government wants it.
The Pakistani elite want it because they see the writing on the wall and are looking for a comfortable berth in India. The ordinary people, the craftsmen, the agriculturists etc. will be left to face the music if the U.S. cannot defeat the Taliban.
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