New Delhi has done well not to shy away from deciding to hold a
meeting of the Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan followed by a meeting between their Foreign Ministers at the United Nations later this month. It has thus stood by its commitment made by Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh at Sharm el-Sheikh which evoked strong reaction in political circles in New Delhi. New Delhi’s decision will thus take the wind out of the Pakistani sail which was accusing India of going back on its commitment.
However, according to analysts, a message contained in New Delhi’s decision to hold talks is that Pakistan would be barking up the wrong tree if it thought the meeting would be a prelude to a full-fledged comprehensive composite dialogue unless it responds to India’s demand to take concrete and firm action against those responsible for the Mumbai terror attack and arrests Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed. This much was made clear by New Delhi where sources said the talks in New York would solely focus on the issue of terrorism. Ruling out the resumption of composite dialogue, External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna has made it clear that there can be meaningful talks with Pakistan only after it takes concrete action against the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks.
India has so far provided Pakistan six dossiers on the Mumbai terror attacks based mainly on the confessions of Ajmal Kasab, the only surviving attacker in the Mumbai carnage. But Pakistani demand seems unending as each time it is furnished a dossier, even before opening its first page, it asks for more evidence. Dismissing the dossiers handed over by India, it continues to say the information contained in them, especially action against Hafiz Saeed, would not stand up in a court of law. This is seen in New Delhi as a ruse for not taking action Hafiz Saeed who has been set free by a court in Lahore after the Government side saw to it that no evidence was presented against him. As remarked by Krishna, Pakistan is shielding Saeed because it has a vested interest in his control of the LeT terrorist network which Islamabad uses for promoting terrorism against India. The ISI’s links with the LeT in the acts of terrorism against India hardly need elaboration.
The rhetoric from Islamabad in the last couple of weeks has not been encouraging and New Delhi is left with little choice but to say that Pakistan remains a difficult neighbour. Islamabad is demanding the holding of talks without any pre-conditions citing the Sharm-el-Sheikh decision taken at talks between the Prime Ministers of India and Pakistan in Egypt. But an unsaid tacit understanding carried in the decision was that Islamabad would respect and respond to New Delhi’s concerns about the terrorist groups calling shots in Pakistan against India. It now wants India to implement its part of the commitment, while ignoring its own undertaking. India cannot go to the negotiating table under blackmail.
As long as Pakistan continues to support terrorism and turns a blind eye to what is going, on, it cannot expect India to agree to hold bilateral talks. It is ridiculous to accept Pakistan’s argument that Islamabad has no control either over terrorists or over Kashmiri insurgents. To the extent that it has, it must exercise its power. Who, for instance, started shooting at the Siachin Glacier towards the end of April?
Islamabad cannot pretend to be helpless in controlling terrorists. Has Pakistan come to such a stage that it cannot control law and order within its own jurisdiction? There is every possibility that the civilian Government in Islamabad is in favour of arresting Hafiz Saeed, to meet one of the major Indian demands which can lead to the resumption of talks, but the Army and the ISI which have a vested interest in the use of Hafiz Saeed’s terrorist infrastructure to browbeat India, are opposing it . It is, therefore, upto to the people and the Government of Pakistan to rebel against their own Army for bringing them round to seeking normality in relations with India.
Findings from two surveys of public opinion conducted by Gallup Pakistan and the Pew Research Centre’s Global Attitudes Project suggest that there is a strong public desire for better relations with India even among those sections which consider their eastern neighbour a major threat. The Gallup Survey says that only 18 per cent of the respondents consider India the greatest threat. According to the Pew survey, 69 per cent of the respondents do consider India a major threat, but two-thirds believe it is important for both Islamabad and New Delhi to improve their relations. Over a third of those polled believe that having good relations with India is very important. To strengthen these sections, New Delhi needs to reach out and strengthen all those elements who have a stake in better Indo-Pak ties through unilateral gestures that do not demand reciprocity such as specific initiatives for civil society actors as well as others within the business and political community. The people’s pressure will definitely be a key factor in moulding Government opinion in spite of the veto power in the hands of the Pakistan Army which also controls the ISI.
