Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s surprise call to his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif on February 13 once again underscores the unpredictability in the relations between the two countries. When New Delhi had unilaterally called off foreign-secretary level talks in August last year, keen India-Pakistan watchers were taken aback. The new development has also surprised some, although a back-channel route had been opened up a few weeks ago when former National Security Adviser of Pakistan Mahmud Durrani visited Delhi and met, among others, Foreign Secretary Jaishankar and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. Durrani and the Pakistani government denied his visit had any “official authorization”. But the way things have moved swiftly after Modi’s call, it seems that the groundwork had been laid.
The Pakistani prime minister’s adviser on foreign affairs and national security said to me in an interview that there was no back-channel effort behind this development. He referred to US President Barrack Obama’s recent visit to India, saying he played a role in persuading India to re-open the stalled dialogue process. Modi, in his inimitable style, did not make the call Pakistan specific, the way he did in May last year when he invited Nawaz Sharif and all other heads of SAARC countries to his swearing in ceremony. He almost repeated the same tactic this time, talking about a “SAARC yatra” of India’s foreign secretary.
Sartraj Aziz said a lot depended on how the top officials move forward from here. It remains to be seen whether they will jump quickly to the “almost agreed” solutions to issues such as visa and trade. Nawaz Sharif had felt “let down” by India following the visit that he made in spite of concerns by a reluctant army, and had hardened his stance towards India. There was a stark difference in the tone and tenor of the speech he made on Kashmir Solidarity Day on February 5, 2014 and the one he made in Muzaffarbad this year. He revived Pakistan’s Kashmir rhetoric, saying “Kashmir runs in my blood”. He said he belonged to Anantnag and his wife Kulsoom Nawaz Sharif’s parents belonged to Shopian in south Kashmir, and assured the Kashmiris he would not disappoint them.
This change is partly the result of mounting pressure on him from the establishment and an extremist political constituency who had started seeing him as soft towards India. As the dialogue process begins again, so do his challenges. Pakistan Army has traditionally been hawkish on Kashmir except for the period when Gen Pervez Musharraf ruled Pakistan for about seven years. The two countries may move forward on softer issues and there may be incremental progress, but Kashmir will continue to remain a bottleneck. With Narendra Modi in power, New Delhi is unlikely to show any flexibility. For BJP, Kashmir is non-negotiable. And today’s BJP is not the same as the one led by AB Vajpayee, who had developed a passion to iron out differences with Pakistan despite what he called its back-stabbing in Kargil. For the foreign policy managers in the Modi government, Kashmir is a “local issue” as they see the problem through the prism of law and order. That is why they equate the large turnout in the elections as evidence that Kashmiris have reposed their faith in Indian democracy. What they do not realize is that the alienation persists despite the large turnout. Even an elected MLA from Langate, Engineer Rashid, goes to the extent of saying that his heart beats for Pakistan. When even an elected lawmaker cannot reconcile with the Indian system, how can a commoner be expected to do so?
That makes the fragility of the India-Pakistan dialogue more evident. For both the countries, it is about what they offer and what they can take away. Pakistan’s hardening posture could shrink the space further. For the first time in two decades, Pakistan publicly blamed India for supporting terrorism in Pakistan. India “is supporting terrorism in Balochistan and Fata. We have warned them at every level – political leadership, diplomacy, military… even the common man is clear about the dangerous game they are playing,” Maj Gen Asim Bajwa, director general of Inter-Services Public Relations, recently said in a press conference while reacting to escalating tension on the eastern border. “This is an attempt to distract Pakistan because Pakistan is heading towards eliminating terrorism,” he said. With such strong positions on both sides, resumption of dialogue is a positive development. But it will not be easy for either side to move forward and take the relations back to some semblance of normalcy.
This new beginning, though a cautious one, may open new doors.
The Pakistani prime minister’s adviser on foreign affairs and national security said to me in an interview that there was no back-channel effort behind this development. He referred to US President Barrack Obama’s recent visit to India, saying he played a role in persuading India to re-open the stalled dialogue process. Modi, in his inimitable style, did not make the call Pakistan specific, the way he did in May last year when he invited Nawaz Sharif and all other heads of SAARC countries to his swearing in ceremony. He almost repeated the same tactic this time, talking about a “SAARC yatra” of India’s foreign secretary.
For the Modi government, Kashmir is a local law and order problem
Sartraj Aziz said a lot depended on how the top officials move forward from here. It remains to be seen whether they will jump quickly to the “almost agreed” solutions to issues such as visa and trade. Nawaz Sharif had felt “let down” by India following the visit that he made in spite of concerns by a reluctant army, and had hardened his stance towards India. There was a stark difference in the tone and tenor of the speech he made on Kashmir Solidarity Day on February 5, 2014 and the one he made in Muzaffarbad this year. He revived Pakistan’s Kashmir rhetoric, saying “Kashmir runs in my blood”. He said he belonged to Anantnag and his wife Kulsoom Nawaz Sharif’s parents belonged to Shopian in south Kashmir, and assured the Kashmiris he would not disappoint them.
This change is partly the result of mounting pressure on him from the establishment and an extremist political constituency who had started seeing him as soft towards India. As the dialogue process begins again, so do his challenges. Pakistan Army has traditionally been hawkish on Kashmir except for the period when Gen Pervez Musharraf ruled Pakistan for about seven years. The two countries may move forward on softer issues and there may be incremental progress, but Kashmir will continue to remain a bottleneck. With Narendra Modi in power, New Delhi is unlikely to show any flexibility. For BJP, Kashmir is non-negotiable. And today’s BJP is not the same as the one led by AB Vajpayee, who had developed a passion to iron out differences with Pakistan despite what he called its back-stabbing in Kargil. For the foreign policy managers in the Modi government, Kashmir is a “local issue” as they see the problem through the prism of law and order. That is why they equate the large turnout in the elections as evidence that Kashmiris have reposed their faith in Indian democracy. What they do not realize is that the alienation persists despite the large turnout. Even an elected MLA from Langate, Engineer Rashid, goes to the extent of saying that his heart beats for Pakistan. When even an elected lawmaker cannot reconcile with the Indian system, how can a commoner be expected to do so?
That makes the fragility of the India-Pakistan dialogue more evident. For both the countries, it is about what they offer and what they can take away. Pakistan’s hardening posture could shrink the space further. For the first time in two decades, Pakistan publicly blamed India for supporting terrorism in Pakistan. India “is supporting terrorism in Balochistan and Fata. We have warned them at every level – political leadership, diplomacy, military… even the common man is clear about the dangerous game they are playing,” Maj Gen Asim Bajwa, director general of Inter-Services Public Relations, recently said in a press conference while reacting to escalating tension on the eastern border. “This is an attempt to distract Pakistan because Pakistan is heading towards eliminating terrorism,” he said. With such strong positions on both sides, resumption of dialogue is a positive development. But it will not be easy for either side to move forward and take the relations back to some semblance of normalcy.
This new beginning, though a cautious one, may open new doors.