Ceasefire violations across the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir may have burst across the television screens on January 6 and 8, but in 2012 there had been over 75 such eruptions. Gen. Bikram Singh, the Indian Army Chief, was eventually fielded by the government on January 14, when it realised that the beheaded soldiers widow’s hungerstrike would not allow public ire to dissipate.

From the Army Chief’s explanations emerge some curious facts. Gen. Singh denied that Indian troops undertook any operation on January 6. Who then was the “highly-placed military source” quoted by an English language daily, repeated by international media, that the fracas was an overblown crisis over a grand-mother’s migration to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and unilateral action by the Indian Army? Second, that there were beheadings earlier too which were probably quietly buried by pro-dialoguers in the government. What does the then Chief, Gen. V.K. Singh, the self-appointed tribune of public morality, have to say about that? Could not the recurrence have been avoided had serious protests been mounted at that stage? The Prime Minister’s Office, specifically his national security adviser, needs to answer that.
The talks with Pakistan have resulted in a partially relaxed visa regime, albeit accompanied by the unwholesome pantomime of Rehman Malik, the visiting Pakistani interior minister; and trade liberalisation through the promised Most Favoured Nation (MFN) treatment, which is still a mirage. Warning signals were aplenty that as the geo-strategic environment and Pakistani domestic dynamics evolved their external behaviour would accordingly mutate.
US President Barack Obama’s nomination of Chuck Hagel as defence secretary and John Kerry as secretary of state and the news that US troops evacuation from Afghanistan may be immediate and not staggered, are signalling US desperation to exit. Suddenly Pakistan and US views are converging on dialogue with the Taliban and its role in Afghanistan post withdrawal. Also, as Pakistan government’s tenure ends and an interim government looms, the civilian government’s writ dissipates. Reality is overtaking Indian peaceniks.
These are impacting Pakistani Army’s relationship with the militant hordes, some controlled by it while others, like the Tehrik-e-Taliban (TTP), fighting it. The possibility of the main Taliban joining the Afghan negotiations is impelling a TTP rethink. On December 27 last year, it offered a ceasefire, subject to Pakistan making its laws and Constitution Quran and Sunnah compliant. If the Pakistani Army becomes a “Pure Islamic Army”, the TTP has offered to assist it take revenge from India for the 1971 War. Separately, the pro-Sunni militant groupings are slaughtering Pakistani Shias, with 96 deaths in one Quetta attack alone.
Pakistan’s Army, as Pervez Hoodbhoy, a realist amongst Pakistani columnists, posits, has only three choices in tackling the TTP: to fight, talk or surrender. The first it has reluctantly done under US pressure and consequently become increasingly unpopular domestically. The last is not an option. It is thus left with the option to talk. Hakimullah Mehsud, the TTP supremo, has just announced that they will not disarm before talks. Are we seeing the replay of the post-Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 when the militants, relieved from the Afghan jihad, were directed to Jammu and Kashmir? It would be easier for Pakistan to divert the energies of the jihadis in the tribal areas outwards into India and other neighbours rather than have them remodel Pakistan into an Islamic Caliphate. Escalated ceasefire violations in 2012, often due to attempted infiltration, may have been a prelude to a grand influx. Gen. Singh reassuringly commented that India had factored this into its strategy. Brave words that are likely to be tested sooner than he imagines.
The US, by announcing prematurely a comprehensive withdrawal, may have inadvertently kicked off this realignment of Islamist forces in South Asia. A decade ago, on January 12, 2002, President Pervez Musharraf had promised madrassa reform, de-weaponisation of Pakistan and denial of safe haven to militants. The December 30 killing of 21 abducted levied personnel by the TTP encapsulates the Pakistan Army’s existential dilemma that they are finally both the victim and the perpetrators of terror. The January 8 Ceasefire Line atrocity, which Gen. Singh called premeditated, constituting deliberate mutilation and beheading, was intended to provoke. Pakistani foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar attempted to draw-in the UN Military Observers Group (UNMOGIP), considered redundant by India since the 1972 Shimla Agreement when the 1951 Ceasefire Line became the LoC. Pakistan was perhaps emboldened by being in the UN Security Council now and chairing it in January.
Gen. Singh conceded that two soldiers in a group patrolling a sensitive section of the LoC being abducted by intruders speaks poorly of both tactics and equipment. Repeated violation of ceasefire mostly in two sectors, raises questions whether the anxiety to talk to Pakistan does not blind the Indian leadership to the complex reality that Pakistan presents.
While the general hectored that the Army will retaliate at a time and place of its choosing, when pushed for specifics, he said being a tactical matter it was left to the field formations to decide. The government hopes this will satisfy the public opinion. That it would deter Pakistan is doubtful unless India initiates an inquiry under the 1949 First Geneva Convention, to which India and Pakistan are signatories, for the mutilation being tantamount to a “grave breach”. This does not internationalise Kashmir as government erroneously fears. It invokes accountability and justice, and shames the Pakistan Army into abandoning barbaric tactics.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh often quotes US President Ronald Reagan on trust but verify. Another great US President, Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt, more appropriate to Pakistan, recommended talking softly but carrying a big stick.

The writer is a former secretary in the external affairs ministry