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8 April 2016

Why we must keep talking to Pakistan

April 7, 2016 

HE COURSE: “In the India-Pakistan relationship, always on a knife-edge, we should appear to take two steps whenever Pakistan takes a step forward…” Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Nawaz Sharif in Lahore.

Special Arrangement

Playing games has become a part of the Pakistani psyche, but India must stay engaged with the civilian and military establishments to help democracy strike deeper roots in the country.

Pakistan may not be, as we sometimes perceive, an army with a country but still remains a country with the army in control. As a Pakistani friend acknowledged, the army has been the final arbiter and guardian of the country since its inception. It truly believes, because of its India-centric obsession, that like the suicide bombers it has nurtured, it is doing what it is doing in Pakistan’s interest. The Pakistani military establishment is firmly entrenched and calls the shots on diplomacy which it equates with national security, a concept too dangerously contrived for our comfort. The generals are resentful of diplomacy behind closed doors and behind their back. At the same time Pakistan prides itself on its professional army, deeply conscious of its image. A possible explanation of why Pervez Musharraf had to go when he had to go is because he had become a politician and yet the army could not countenance his going to jail and bailed him out when he got into trouble with the current government.

Politicians in Pakistan do themselves no favours by their conduct; reckoned weak, corrupt, opportunistic, cashing in on every political opportunity. The reason politicians have appeared wishy-washy in Pakistan is that they have all been creations of the army, its proxies or fallback options. Even Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, it is said, called General Ayub Khan “Daddy”. And Mian Sahab [Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif], as Imran Khan often reminds us, was General Zia-ul-Haq’s creation. The Prime Minister in Pakistan only theoretically retains the veto on key matters including the appointment of the army chief. His fate rather often depends on how he balances the big guns with carrots to match their sticks, from which emerges the school of thought in Pakistan that politicians were nincompoops and the army alone was capable of running the country.

Country of contrivances

In this context the retirement of the current Pakistan Army chief due in November is already a matter of excitement and speculation in the country: will he, won’t he get an extension? General Raheel Sharif, it is said, is a gentleman soldier and would like to retire when due. But there is also said to be a coterie of corps commanders around him, running the military, some of them also due to retire about the same time as the chief, more ambitious than him, aspiring for extensions. So the theory goes that if others get an extension, General Sharif may not be averse to one himself. The Pakistan Army chief is not just any chief and General Sharif has endeared himself in the public perception by taking on terrorists threatening the very identity of Pakistan. His photographs have been on display on trucks and three-wheelers across the length and breadth of the country. He is said to be the most popular chief since Field Marshal Ayub Khan. So, if no one else, the people of Pakistan may demand an extension for General Sharif.

Anything and everything can be contrived in Pakistan. Playing games has become a part of the Pakistani psyche. As a senior Pakistani journalist said while interacting with social activists and journalists in Chandigarh on April 1, it was no coincidence that Pakistan got hold of an alleged Indian spy around the same time cross-border investigations into the Pathankot attack began. And how would one explain the events in Lahore [a suicide bombing targeting Christians that killed at least 75 people] and Islamabad [riots erupting outside Parliament House] almost simultaneously in the last week of March that prevented Prime Minister Sharif from visiting Washington and meeting his friend, Prime Minister Modi? It may not be another Inter-Services Intelligence operation, as some people suggest, but Lahore has certainly compromised Mian Sahab and made him appear more vulnerable than in the recent past. Not just the army but the mullahs as well are again flexing their muscles. As Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman said in Multan recently, “The religious parties may have few votes but it doesn’t mean they can’t topple the government; they will not allow society to become secular.” Mufti Muhammed Naeem of the notorious Jamia Benoria madrasa of Karachi, the nursery of most Islamist killers, has also been fulminating against Punjab. And Punjab is all that Prime Minister Sharif has. Hence his reluctance to allow the army free rein in his fiefdom. Earlier, when the army cleaned up Karachi and wanted to press on against the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), the Prime Minister resisted because he could not survive in Parliament without the MQM. Such are his political vulnerabilities.

Staying invested in Pakistan

In the past what happened in Pakistan could be conveniently ignored. But with his visit to Lahoreand the change in India’s Pakistan policy, Prime Minister Modi has invested political capital in Pakistan’s democracy and more particularly his friendship with his Pakistani counterpart. On March 27 when Lahore was bombed, Mr. Modi had called Mr. Sharif within an hour to convey his grief and condolences. In Pakistan, too, Mr. Modi’s Lahore visit was regarded as a Christmas gift from India and businessmen in Punjab [province] were said to be ecstatic at the prospect of better trade ties between the two countries. Civil society in Pakistan favours peace with India, knowing that democracy there is in a sense dependent on the India-Pakistan détente. All the more reason for us to be magnanimous and market ourselves better in Pakistan to prop up democracy there. Mr. Modi understands better than anyone else that democracy in Pakistan could be closely linked to Mr. Sharif’s own fate.

At the same time, on the business end, nothing can happen without the army in Pakistan. And therefore the need to reach out to it. On the positive side, the respective National Security Advisers (NSAs) already appeared to have worked out a reasonable relationship based on more than just their mutual love for a ‘smoke’. What has made it easier of course is the appointment of a general well disposed to Mr. Sharif as the new Pakistan NSA. As the story goes, the army preferred [Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations] Maleeha Lodhi rather than General Naseer Khan Janjua as the NSA. Our own NSA, Ajit Doval, is no mean operator and an old hand at the game. That the intelligence chiefs should meet is a given. It is, however, equally important for the two army chiefs to meet, perhaps as quietly as the NSAs. The visit by the Pakistani Joint Investigation Team to probe into the Pathankot attack is also a positive development.

In the India-Pakistan relationship, always on a knife-edge, we should appear to take two steps whenever Pakistan takes a step forward rather than giving the impression that when Pakistan takes a step forward, we take two steps back. As Pakistani strategic analyst Dr. Ayesha Siddiqa says, if you travel from Wagah to Attari you realise how seamless the transition between the two countries is, and we need to build on that. From our side, reverting the relationship to the Hindu-Muslim paradigm is counterproductive and only endorses Pakistan’s original justification for the creation of a separate country.

Pakistan still maintains that Kashmir is its core issue but Kashmiris have understood what that core has been. There is a strong sentiment in Pakistan that it had unnecessarily mortgaged itself to Kashmir. From our point of view, Kashmir could be much easier dealt directly with Srinagar than via Islamabad. Smart power trumps all other power.

A.S. Dulat is former chief of the Research and Analysis Wing. He is the author of Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years.

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