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| India-Pakistan |
| Unreal to hope from Pakistan |
| 2008-12-27 |
| By Swapan Dasgupta There is an astonishing sense of déjà vu that confronts any half-detached observer of the post-26/11 mood in India. After the attack on Parliament seven years ago, Atal Bihari Vajpayee spoke menacingly of an aar paar ki ladai and ordered full military mobilisation. This time too India has swung between decrying war-talk and keeping “all options open”. The romantic candles of sadbhavna have been snuffed out by the torches of assertive nationalism. One of the main casualties of this national anger is the belief that Pakistan and India have a common destiny. Bolstered by elaborate people-to-people contacts, cricket matches and cultural exchanges, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh insisted at the NAM summit in September 2006 that India and Pakistan were co-victims of terrorism. Coming within months of the Mumbai train bombings that killed 250 people, this was an exemplary expression of dhimmitude. Days before the Mumbai attack, President Asif Ali Zardari repeated the hackneyed formulation that there was a part of Pakistan that was forever Indian and vice versa. Despite the anger in Indian official circles at the ISI involvement in the bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul, liberal hearts melted instantly. There was a flurry of punditry suggesting that Zardari was India’s newest best bet after Pervez Musharraf. Ever since the West threw its weight behind the peace process, the strategic community in India has been divided between those in search of the “good” Pakistani and those who believed that Pakistan was inherently “bad”. That there was a section in Pakistan disgusted by the drift to extremism and anxious to rekindle Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s vision of a modern, Muslim (but not Islamic) country, wasn’t in doubt. But, were these voices of enlightenment akin to the Good Germans under Hitler? Were they consequential enough to impose correctives on State policy? Or were they the “useful idiots” expediently wheeled out during moments of international exasperation to tell the world that ordinary Pakistanis were innocent of crimes that were invariably the responsibility of someone else? The issue has come to a head in the aftermath of the 26/11 attack. Liberal Pakistanis still insist that they were as shocked and as outraged as Indians at the brutality of the terrorists. They may well be right. Yet, why has Islamabad been so squeamish in admitting that the Mumbai attack was an operation originating in Pakistan? Why has it equated the criminality of ‘non-State players’ with the sovereignty and national honour of Pakistan? Why does it take the spilling of Indian blood to unite Pakistan? While the world was extremely generous in extending a helping hand to a fledgling democracy in Pakistan, it expected the democratic Government to responsive in addressing global security concerns. There was never any suggestion that either President Zardari or the late Benazir Bhutto’s friends who occupy high office in Pakistan were responsible for either the Mumbai attack or the Kabul bombing in September. The finger of suspicion was always pointed at jihadi groups and ISI. The feeling that Pakistan was fast emerging as the new epicentre of global terrorism and threatening the security of countries as diverse as Afghanistan, Britain and India, should have triggered a domestic churning. It should have offended the self-respect of Pakistani elite at least to hear their country described as a “migraine”. Yet, there have been few voices of consequence from within Pakistan willing to tell the political and military establishment that enough is enough and that it is time to flush out the jihadis and the rogues who run them. Those who spent last summer telling the whole world that democratic Pakistan was bursting with exhilarating creativity that would leave India in the shade have abruptly chosen to maintain radio silence. All we have heard is vague talk about making steady, incremental gains in the fight against fanatics. Like the Good German, the Good Pakistani has couched his acquiescence in either silence or sophistry. It is the sophistry that tells the tale of denial. After 26/11, there were many intellectuals from the South Asian diaspora eager to shed tears for a Bombay they imagined had perished in the fires at the Taj. They filled many column inches of iconic liberal publications. Curiously, their remorse was invariably couched with gratuitous references to how badly India treated its Muslim minority, how Babri Masjid and Gujarat have kindled a fierce desire for revenge, and how Kashmir remains the core dispute. Cut out the mandatory allusions to the Sea Lounge at the Taj and the vibrancy of Bollywood, and you are left with the stark judgment: India had it coming. The Good German claimed ignorance of the concentration camps and the Final Solution. The Good Pakistani is better informed. He has seen the devastation of the Marriot Hotel in Islamabad; he has watched the siege of the Lal Masjid; and he has experienced the growing hold of religious bigots on Pakistani society. He knows what the ISI is all about much better than we do. And he is too painfully aware that Pakistan is sleep-walking its way to disaster. Yet, when it comes to India, ordinary decencies have effortlessly yielded to the brusque message for India: You had it coming. Earlier, the Good Pakistani was a social distraction, an embellishment of liberal Hindu self-flagellation and Indian Muslim angst. Today, he has become a red herring and a diversion from the urgent business of confronting the threat frontally. With infinite patience India is still trying to not be beastly to the Good Pakistani. Our Establishment is still hoping Pakistani “civil society” becomes truly civil. It’s likely to be an indefinite wait. In the war on India, the Good Pakistani has invariably sided with a Bad Pakistan. Only the naïve and the foolish should be surprised. |
| Posted by:john frum |