Feb.26 : At the end of the three-hour conversation between the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistan in New Delhi on Thursday, the direction and pace of any dialogue between the two countries remains uncertain. As the government promised earlier, India’s foreign secretary Nirupama Rao sought to retain the focus on particulars in the context of terrorism and issues relating to the 26/11 Mumbai attacks. From the official Indian briefing, it appears that more details were supplied to Pakistan in the form of three more dossiers which Pakistan foreign secretary Salman Bashir — in his lengthy interaction with the media — would later describe as “literature, rather than evidence in the legal sense”. This is as clear an answer as India might expect to get from the Pakistani authorities on issues that concern it the most. It is far from clear if India brought up the fundamental question of the ideology of terrorism directed from Pakistan at India and the nature of terrorism that has come to afflict Pakistan in recent times. In sum, New Delhi needs to clarify whether it sees itself and Islamabad as equal co-victims of terrorism, which could then be tackled through a joint effort, as Mr Bashir repeatedly sought to suggest. People in this country have considerable sympathy for the people of Pakistan who are being burnt in the raging fires of terrorism. But they harbour a nagging worry. While the Pakistan government does what it can to fight those terrorists whose aim is to challenge the Pakistani state, it gives every impression of turning a blind eye to the activities of anti-India terrorists that elements of that very state have nurtured over the years.
Pakistan’s logic is simplicity itself: that the subcontinent is a nuclearised neighbourhood; that India is exacerbating tensions by disturbing strategic equations through spending massively to upgrade its weapons systems under the doctrine of preparing to fight a two-front war (neither of which is factually valid); that India is nitpicking when it concentrates its energies on discussing single incidents such as 26/11 and by focusing attention on individuals such as Hafiz Sayeed of the Jamat-ud-Dawa (the ideological nursery of the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba); and that it is only an Indian decision to engage Pakistan across the board politically that can help both countries overcome the menace of terrorism. Mr.Bashir also made the point that it has effective cooperative mechanisms against terrorism with the United States, many European countries and others, but alas not with India because India is pussyfooting. The untenability of Pakistan’s case on terrorism that hits India from jihadist camps in Pakistan and Occupied Kashmir cannot be made out without effectively referring to the history and ideological basis of this particular brand of jihadi hyperactivity. In the age of round-the-clock cable television, the exercise must be publicly convincing. The Indian system has not so far summoned the alacrity to do so.
Although Islamabad is yet to meet Indian concerns, Pakistan’s foreign secretary on Thursday sought to make a strong case for long-term engagement with India and an early return to the disrupted “composite dialogue” framework, in the process showering praise on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s “vision” that could bring peace and prosperity if that vision were acted on. The Indian side gives the impression of leaving things hanging. Its interaction with the media suggested that as of now there could not be a return to comprehensive dialogue but the conversation at the foreign secretaries’ level could continue, given the appropriate atmosphere. On a possible meeting between the Prime Ministers of the two countries during the Saarc summit due in April as well, New Delhi’s responses speak of a dilemma. The top leadership here needs to get its political act right.