"Aman ki Asha" is real but official India-Pakistan talks are always a farce
Monday, 24 August 2015|
Hardik Bhawsar
The official talks between India and Pakistan are the most boring soap opera in south Asia.
They are so repetitive, unintelligent and extremely predictable and have been going on for generations without an end in sight. The characters haven’t changed, but the actors who play them have; and the plot, the twists and the points where the story and melodrama repeat themselves have remained the same.
Real soap operas don’t die because producers have tasted success; the Indo-Pak talks don’t die because they have become a farcical necessity in meaningless diplomacy.
So, when the talks failed for the nth time last week, it made no impact. Some times they work and sometimes they fail, but India and Pakistan remain as hostile and opportunistic as ever. Pakistani hawks such as the late Hamid Gul (former ISI chief who nurtured Afghani Islamists at the instance of the CIA to take on the Soviets and later tied up with anti-Indians such as Hafiz Sayeed), India and Pakistan could only be enemies. For Indian politicians and strategic analysts, Pakistan government is a farce because it’s the army that runs the country.
Curious enough, still they talk peace.
Every time India and Pakistan prepare to talk, it would be preceded by sharp bites by people such as Hamid Gul (who by the way died recently), cross-border insurgency in Kashmir, and some anti-India rally in Pakistan where people such as Sayeed spew venom. The same orchestrated animosity is maintained during and after the talks as well. And predictably, the conversations fail and both sides start preparing for another round.
Many of us lived through three greatest farces in bilateral relations between Pakistan and India that made diplomacy a no brainer - the Shimla summit during Indira Gandhi’s period and Agra and Lahore summits during AB Vajpayee’s tenure. The characters who represented Pakistan changed - Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Parvez Musharaff and Nawaz Shariff.
Of these three, the Shimla event was the most promising because it followed a lot of acrimony and put on paper an agreement and framework that promised to improve the relations between the two countries. The famous Shimla Agreement began like this: “The Government of India and the Government of Pakistan are resolved that the two countries put an end to the conflict and confrontation that have hitherto marred their relations and work for the promotion of a friendly and harmonious relationship and the establishment of durable peace in the subcontinent so that both countries may henceforth devote their resources and energies to the pressing task of advancing the welfare of their people.”
And what did it say on Jammu and Kashmir?
“The line of control resulting from the ceasefire of December 17, 1971, shall be respected by both sides without prejudice to the recognized position of either side. Neither side shall seek to alter it unilaterally, irrespective of mutual differences and legal interpretations. Both sides further undertake to refrain from the threat or the use of force in violation of this line.”
India can certainly claim that it stuck to the Shimla agreement in letter and spirit, but Pakistan never did because as every Indian knows its single most important and influential institution is not its Parliament, but the military. It’s the only institution that most of the Pakistani elites are proud of because every other institution in the country has failed. And every time the government gets to talk to India, the military knows that it’s a farce.
And India knows it too because after Shimla, it was party to two more such farces - one in Agra and then in Lahore, both celebrated by Indian media as historical breakthroughs.
The Agra summit was a classic example of the comic drama that Indo-Pak talks drift into. The then President Musharaff spent three days in India, had great photo ops in Delhi, Rajasthan and Agra, but failed to agree with any of the texts that were prepared for the summit. He went back with no paper.
It didn’t matter because all that had to be said had been said in Shimla and had been duly violated. Then came the nuclear tests, a lot of chest-thumbing nationalism from either side and threats of aggression. Another round of talks and a summit were the predictable outcome, this time in Lahore.
Vajpayee took a bus ride and spent time in Pakistan. Compared to a “failed” Agra summit, Lahore at least produced a declaration which said the same things Bhutto and Indira Gandhi said in Lahore - that both the countries were “convinced that durable peace and development of harmonious relations and friendly cooperation will serve the vital interests of the peoples of the two countries, enabling them to devote their energies for a better future”. The only new element was the nuclear angle because both the countries had detonated nuclear devices. The summit statement said that both recognised “that the nuclear dimension of the security environment of the two countries adds to their responsibility for avoidance of conflict between the two countries.”
Committed to peace and stability since Shimla, the countries had graduated to nuclear peace - with both threatening each other with nuclear warheads. And the talks and hand-shakes between the heads of states on foreign locations continued even as Pakistan kept raising the heckles at every possible forum while its army and intelligence kept sending terrorists to India. Whenever India complained, Pakistan said “Baluchistan” accusing India of fostering insurgency from Afghanistan. Whenever India said it had dossiers with evidence, Pakistan also brandished the same number of dossiers. Whenever India asked for Dawood Ibrahim, Pakistan claimed innocence asked for Baluchi leaders. The story in fact is too long.
For an average Indian who has lived through Shimla, Agra and Lahore, three wars and countless bilateral peace talks preceded and followed by war cries and violence, the most commonsensical question is this: Can’t you just stop this farce? Why the heck should India talk to Pakistan when all the latter wants is to keep the hostility simmering? Why should India waste its time, when the farce has been going on for far too long?
India should certainly stop this official farce and leave the bilateral relationship to the people of both the countries. At the people-to-people level, Pakistan and India are great friends. At the official level, they cannot be because there are too many factors that infuriate Indians - terror attacks, people such as Sayeed and insurgency in Kashmir - and the reality that democracy in Pakistan exists only at the pleasure of the country’s army.
So, let’s do everything else except official talks: Aman Ki Asha, cricket matches, movies, TV-shows and Sufi concerts. At least they radiate real peace and Pakistan army doesn’t feel threatened.
They are so repetitive, unintelligent and extremely predictable and have been going on for generations without an end in sight. The characters haven’t changed, but the actors who play them have; and the plot, the twists and the points where the story and melodrama repeat themselves have remained the same.
Real soap operas don’t die because producers have tasted success; the Indo-Pak talks don’t die because they have become a farcical necessity in meaningless diplomacy.
So, when the talks failed for the nth time last week, it made no impact. Some times they work and sometimes they fail, but India and Pakistan remain as hostile and opportunistic as ever. Pakistani hawks such as the late Hamid Gul (former ISI chief who nurtured Afghani Islamists at the instance of the CIA to take on the Soviets and later tied up with anti-Indians such as Hafiz Sayeed), India and Pakistan could only be enemies. For Indian politicians and strategic analysts, Pakistan government is a farce because it’s the army that runs the country.
Curious enough, still they talk peace.
Every time India and Pakistan prepare to talk, it would be preceded by sharp bites by people such as Hamid Gul (who by the way died recently), cross-border insurgency in Kashmir, and some anti-India rally in Pakistan where people such as Sayeed spew venom. The same orchestrated animosity is maintained during and after the talks as well. And predictably, the conversations fail and both sides start preparing for another round.
Many of us lived through three greatest farces in bilateral relations between Pakistan and India that made diplomacy a no brainer - the Shimla summit during Indira Gandhi’s period and Agra and Lahore summits during AB Vajpayee’s tenure. The characters who represented Pakistan changed - Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Parvez Musharaff and Nawaz Shariff.
Of these three, the Shimla event was the most promising because it followed a lot of acrimony and put on paper an agreement and framework that promised to improve the relations between the two countries. The famous Shimla Agreement began like this: “The Government of India and the Government of Pakistan are resolved that the two countries put an end to the conflict and confrontation that have hitherto marred their relations and work for the promotion of a friendly and harmonious relationship and the establishment of durable peace in the subcontinent so that both countries may henceforth devote their resources and energies to the pressing task of advancing the welfare of their people.”
And what did it say on Jammu and Kashmir?
“The line of control resulting from the ceasefire of December 17, 1971, shall be respected by both sides without prejudice to the recognized position of either side. Neither side shall seek to alter it unilaterally, irrespective of mutual differences and legal interpretations. Both sides further undertake to refrain from the threat or the use of force in violation of this line.”
India can certainly claim that it stuck to the Shimla agreement in letter and spirit, but Pakistan never did because as every Indian knows its single most important and influential institution is not its Parliament, but the military. It’s the only institution that most of the Pakistani elites are proud of because every other institution in the country has failed. And every time the government gets to talk to India, the military knows that it’s a farce.
And India knows it too because after Shimla, it was party to two more such farces - one in Agra and then in Lahore, both celebrated by Indian media as historical breakthroughs.
The Agra summit was a classic example of the comic drama that Indo-Pak talks drift into. The then President Musharaff spent three days in India, had great photo ops in Delhi, Rajasthan and Agra, but failed to agree with any of the texts that were prepared for the summit. He went back with no paper.
It didn’t matter because all that had to be said had been said in Shimla and had been duly violated. Then came the nuclear tests, a lot of chest-thumbing nationalism from either side and threats of aggression. Another round of talks and a summit were the predictable outcome, this time in Lahore.
Vajpayee took a bus ride and spent time in Pakistan. Compared to a “failed” Agra summit, Lahore at least produced a declaration which said the same things Bhutto and Indira Gandhi said in Lahore - that both the countries were “convinced that durable peace and development of harmonious relations and friendly cooperation will serve the vital interests of the peoples of the two countries, enabling them to devote their energies for a better future”. The only new element was the nuclear angle because both the countries had detonated nuclear devices. The summit statement said that both recognised “that the nuclear dimension of the security environment of the two countries adds to their responsibility for avoidance of conflict between the two countries.”
Committed to peace and stability since Shimla, the countries had graduated to nuclear peace - with both threatening each other with nuclear warheads. And the talks and hand-shakes between the heads of states on foreign locations continued even as Pakistan kept raising the heckles at every possible forum while its army and intelligence kept sending terrorists to India. Whenever India complained, Pakistan said “Baluchistan” accusing India of fostering insurgency from Afghanistan. Whenever India said it had dossiers with evidence, Pakistan also brandished the same number of dossiers. Whenever India asked for Dawood Ibrahim, Pakistan claimed innocence asked for Baluchi leaders. The story in fact is too long.
For an average Indian who has lived through Shimla, Agra and Lahore, three wars and countless bilateral peace talks preceded and followed by war cries and violence, the most commonsensical question is this: Can’t you just stop this farce? Why the heck should India talk to Pakistan when all the latter wants is to keep the hostility simmering? Why should India waste its time, when the farce has been going on for far too long?
India should certainly stop this official farce and leave the bilateral relationship to the people of both the countries. At the people-to-people level, Pakistan and India are great friends. At the official level, they cannot be because there are too many factors that infuriate Indians - terror attacks, people such as Sayeed and insurgency in Kashmir - and the reality that democracy in Pakistan exists only at the pleasure of the country’s army.
So, let’s do everything else except official talks: Aman Ki Asha, cricket matches, movies, TV-shows and Sufi concerts. At least they radiate real peace and Pakistan army doesn’t feel threatened.
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