MB Naqvi

The writer is a well-known journalist and freelance columnist

mbnaqvi@cyber.net.pk

Indian and Pakistani heads of government went to New York (and Washington), addressed the UN General Assembly, spoke about their concerns about terrorism, had bilateral discussions with the US President George W Bush and other American officials and should now be back. These two heads traversed on parallel lines without any intersection. The Indian Prime Minister A B Vajpayee even observed diplomatic purdah from President Musharraf by not attending the UN Secretary General's lunch for fear of having to sit in proximity to Musharraf. What have the two gained for their respective peoples?

Pakistan's gains are simple to count. These were mainly financial aid, rescheduling of debt servicing and various American promises to be helpful in getting more funds and understanding from the multilateral agencies and other donors. Pakistan President must have been very pleased with the kind of reception he received in America in contrast with what was his experience until this year's September 11. Pakistan has reaffirmed its commitment to go on acting the faithful ally in the fight against Terrorism. Among the non-tangible gains are words of fulsome praise for the President and his courage with the American promise that they would not again walk away after the war, unlike the 1989 experience. How substantial is the credit side of the ledger and whether there is any debit side to it would remain a subject for discussion.

Insofar as India is concerned, it is clear the BJP leaders have not swallowed the American decision of recruiting Pakistan's cooperation in the war against Afghanistan. They do display signs of feeling jilted and insulted after their astonishing offer of unreserved cooperation for American military operations against Afghanistan. They have been irked and that seems to verge on chagrin. What did they really aim at requires investigation. It is understandable if they had Kashmir in mind and would have liked the Americans to lean on Pakistan to stop its cross-border terrorism. That is how they see their national interest. The Americans have not refused to accept Indian cooperation but have deferred it until after they have done with Taliban, Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. The logic of American priorities should have been understandable to the Indians. America's perceived need for Pakistan's cooperation for fighting in Afghanistan is geography's imperative. Why this Indian attitude that looks like petulance?

Aid for Pakistan is ingenious due to the overall US attitude being un-trustful of it. Their bilateral relationship remains wary and halting. There is no identity of purposes despite all talk of identity of views. The shadow of the Indo-Pakistan cold war hangs heavy and has resulted in the US President not countenancing Pakistan's wish - whether or not Musharraf brought it up - to let the earmarked F-16 aircrafts restored to Pakistan. American concerns about nuclear proliferation question, the Kashmir Jihad and democracy remain. These concerns are not being pressed for the time being. No one should forget that they are still there. Pakistan's desire for America playing a role in the Kashmir dispute with India has always had willing listeners in Washington. Indeed the US has been anxious to play the mediator. But it is stymied by the total Indian refusal of third party intervention in Kashmir. American readiness to mediate is hard to count as a gain for Pakistan. Americans have been desirous of playing a role on their own. Should India relent and permit a larger American role, no matter what it is called, it will not necessarily be a boon for Pakistan - unless Islamabad is only interested in getting off the hook.

Taking India's obsessive interest in Kashmir as the datum line it is possible to see its sudden and unconditional cooperation, not to mention the earlier astonishing and unreserved support for NMD, as being calculated to buy American goodwill for India's Kashmir stance of all trouble being due to cross-border terrorism - and to isolate Pakistan more even more. If so, the calculation seems to have gone awry. Americans show no sign of giving up their desire for playing the mediator's role, now preferring to call it facilitator's role. On the contrary, it is possible to see the other side of the coin as Americans having made India tacitly accept its 'facilitation' in Kashmir by its persistent assertions and India's unconditional cooperation offers nonetheless. Anyway, the way the Americans are going their own way and disregarding Indian, Pakistani and others' sensitivities, it is clear that the Indians and Pakistanis are now reconciled to unprecedentedly larger role in South Asia while their own wishes can safely be disregarded. Both have been diminished to an unprecedented level.

The suspicion that India saw an opportunity in the American reaction to September 11 attacks for itself has been strengthened by Indian reaction to the American decision to recruit Pakistan's help in its campaign in Afghanistan. Why cavil at Pakistan becoming the conduit and staging post for any operation in Afghanistan, if you agree with the overall purpose? Could it be that the BJP leadership was immature enough to expect the Americans to eat out of their hands and align themselves with the Indians in fighting cross-border terrorism in Kashmir simultaneously with the war against Taliban? Should that dream have come true, India would have gained many collateral benefits: Pakistan would be on the enemy states list and the strategy for war would be suggested by M/s Vajpayee and Advani. It is astonishing that politicians of Vajpayee's and Advani's experience would suggest a course of action to a superpower that will pull India's chestnuts out of the fire - the chestnut being so big as Pakistan itself, itself a nuclear power - that can offer so much more to the Americans.

The question of who has gained how much should be discussed with some objectivity and from various angles. The commonest angle being used in Pakistan is what did the country gain out of the whole affair? Well, Pakistan has gained the status of an ally with the US and those who call it a gain should be happy, although it seems uncommonly like a satellite's. Pakistan military may be happy because it can get its officers trained in America, obtain spares, components and other necessities from the US. The other gain is, as noted, $1 billion plus aid for a few more years. That is about all. There does not seem to be any prospect of substantial longer-term gains from the US connection, only goodwill for so long as the master-client relationship lasts. Insofar as promises of not walking away again after the victory in Afghanistan, it is a tale to the Marines. When the time comes, the Americans would review the situation and do what is urgent and expedient then. Can they remain faithful to an old flame?

Insofar as Indians are concerned, they have certainly gained long-term friendship of the US, although even that relationship would not be between equals. The Indians have by their actions - motivated largely by spite for Pakistan - become seekers of favours. The operative part of their desires amounts, at its maximum, to be recognised as a regional influential. Recognition of American supremacy over the whole Asia is implicit in it. India's would be a somewhat higher level of satellitehood, something like being a butler among other menials. Talking about India in this context largely because the relationship between India and Pakistan is ineffably close, even if not cordial. Enmity does not pre-empt closeness. Besides, South Asia remains a perfect region made by nature itself. The potentialities inherent in the region cannot be ignored for the sake of - yes, even the Americans. The governments of India and Pakistan cannot be allowed to ignore the fact that their main business is to promote the interest of their people. Their relationship with foreign powers comes later; it is a secondary matter. The primary interest of the people in both India and Pakistan is obtaining a job, to be able to buy foodstuffs, clothes and a shelter. They require governments that cater to them first of all.

For Pakistanis, there is a special democratic deficit in this visit. While President Bush's earlier commitment to stabilise the Musharraf presidency had merely made Pakistanis apprehensive, there is now a none too inscrutable reality to be faced: President Musharraf has told New York journalists that while he will honour his pledge to hold polls for national and provincial assemblies by October 11, 2002, he is sure to remain the President for as long into the future as he could see. It sounds like a threat rather than a promise to rejoice in.

Governments in South Asia are primarily fighting over foreign policy issues. The Indians are fond of saying that Pakistanis are obsessed with Kashmir. It is largely true. But can it be denied that Indians are obsessed with Pakistan - and quite malevolently too. Who does not know that the ruling party in India has been recently weighing the pros and cons of mounting an invasion nominally of Azad Kashmir, though the objective could only be larger. The two governments of New Delhi and Islamabad are quite similar in outlook and political rhetoric. The BJP wallahs have always flourished on anti-Muslim policies and actions; anti-Pakistan propaganda helps them electorally. The military and other conservative regimes in Pakistan have also flourished on anti-India (connotation being anti-Hindu) rhetoric and Kashmir. The two are happy enough to be enemies so long as there is no shooting; both would flourish politically in their respective countries by demonising each other. But the politics in India is remarkably anti-people. The grinding or near grinding poverty of some 60 to 65 percent Indians is being ignored while maximum resources are pumped into war preparations, research for war and war industries. The Pakistanis do the likewise. This half a century old pattern needs to be broken.

Let's imagine for a moment that the governments in Delhi and Islamabad have buried the hatchet and have returned to peaceful pursuits. What would their first priority be? It would be to manage various glitches in the India-Pakistan relationship and their first priority would be to fight poverty and economic backwardness. They would automatically opt for regional cooperation and free and preferential trade. They would go in for integrated regional planning and execution through regional institutions and instruments. The resources that nature has endowed the region would be developed and exploited from the point of view of growing more wealth without forgetting a more equitable distribution.

Should the standards of living begin to rise in the region, the various nationalistic, communal or caste polarisations will become less explosive and would gradually erode. This is an area where one and a half billion souls, perhaps more, live and have many ethnicities - within each nation state. The point to be remembered is that while mass poverty lasts and most of the mobilisable resources are spent on war-like purposes the various polarisations would continue to grow and become harder still to tackle in each country.

It is from this viewpoint that the India-Pakistan relationship should be viewed. A new purposeful politics has to be introduced which would be more people friendly and would assign higher priority to economic development than war preparations. Insofar as Kashmir is concerned, it is hard to conceive any immediate solution that would satisfy all the three parties: India, Pakistan and Kashmiris themselves. The best that can, and should, be done is to isolate it, contain the violent part of it by mutual agreement and postpone a solution to better times by putting the problem in a new political framework that is democratic and people friendly. Meantime the two countries should normalise their relationship and embark on a course of people-to-people friendship with maximum economic and trade cooperation. This regionalism should not ignore the need for a more equitable distribution of incomes. What they have so far done, particularly in this visit to America by the two heads of the governments, is to glory in being satellites of America and have lowered their own statures. Both countries have lost substantially as a result of this visit. They can only regain self-respect by turning their attention to their own region and by developing it.