The Handshake at Kathmandu

Columnist M ZAFAR looks at President Musharraf’s symbolic peace initiative.

Relations between India and Pakistan at times appear to be based more on emotions, competitiveness, jealousy and distrust than on detached realism. The reasons are to be found in the history of the sub-continent where for the last thousand years Hindus and Muslims have lived in regimes of varying degrees of tension but together nevertheless. Muslim whether immigrants or local converts both sought and received privileges of ruling class under Muslim rulers of medieval India.  The locals felt progressively squeezed by steady expansion of Muslim population that threatened not only their religious and cultural practices but also their properties. British rule provided respite from the pressures of influx from outside and expansion from within but could not address the fears of insecurity that lay deep in the recesses of collective memory of the majority community. In 1947 those strains and stresses became the part of inheritance of the two sovereign states that succeeded the British Raj and internal communal strife gained international dimensions. 

The disputes between India and Pakistan are rooted in the anxiety of one community over the possibility of the other gaining decisive ascendancy and dispossessing the diminished of the land of their ancestors. Current stand off between India and Pakistan as indeed does its underlying cause, the dispute over Kashmir fits well into the pattern. Frustrated by the Kashmiri freedom fighters India was keen to give the issue another dimension. Events of 11 September and American resolve to seek out the elements considered responsible for the outrage from their bases in Afghanistan offered a prospect. With superb alacrity and shrewdness India made unconditional offers of use of their troops and bases. Since geographical factors ruled that possibility out without Pakistan’s consent America and her allies declined the offers and denied India a greatly wished for role in Afghanistan War. For a county that considers herself as an emerging great power in the world this slight was hurtful for the added reason that as the operations in Afghanistan progressed America towards Pakistan became pronounced perhaps decisive. 

For the Indians the only way to regain the centre stage and wean the Americans away from Pakistan was to bring international focus back on activities of Kashmiri freedom fighters and overplay their nexus with Pakistan. Their opportunity came with the unfortunate and indefensible attack on Indian parliament occurred on 13th December 2001. Seizing the moment the Prime Minister of India publicly committed India to ‘aar paar ki larai’ (battle to the finish) which amounted to a virtual declaration of war. Within weeks Indians had concentrated about one million men within striking distance of Pakistan. Counter moves by Pakistan brought the opponents within a push button of a conflict that had nuclear dimensions. By moving to brink the Indians were making a strategic point that they, in emulation of the American example, were prepared to take out their frustrations with the Kashmiri freedom fighters on Pakistan at a point and time of their choosing. 

That such an utterly disproportionate reaction was threatened and actualised by India under the stewardship of Mr. Vajpayee showed disturbing trends in the political thinking of the Indian political establishment. Mr. Vajpayee is no ordinary run of the mill political leader. He is a father figure and has extraordinary understanding of the peoples of the sub-continent. His simplicity, patience and humanity instantly strike chords of empathy with the ordinary folks and often it appears that the very soul of India is speaking through him.

His stock with the people of Pakistan was no less high. His journey to Lahore and visit to the Minar-e-Pakistan where he expressed the desire to see Pakistan as a strong and prosperous state, remain memorable events. Soon after Lahore, Kargil erupted but the way he handled it showed that first he had the capacity to see things well past the crisis and secondly maintenance of balance in response was of supreme importance.

It is surprising that the expression ‘Aar paar ki larai’ — fight to the finish — ever escaped his lips. Any one with even a remote understanding of the subcontinent knows that between India and Pakistan there can be no fight to the finish. Finish whom and finish what? The two will continue to live with each other as they have managed for the last millennium.

Balance is in the nature of this land. It is also no coincidence that the leader of the people to whom the threat was addressed happens to have enough courage and sagacity to put formalities aside and walk up to adversary and remind the master of the uniqueness make up of the people of the land of Indus. General Pervez Musharraf’s grand gesture at Kathmandu was no exercise in PR like some of the commentators of New Delhi so insensitively put it. He had expressed the inner desire of ordinary inhabitants of the region in the highest traditions of chivalry.