Future of India Pakistan Relationship
August 21, 2014
The relations between India and Pakistan have received a setback with the recent meeting between the Pakistani High Commissioner Abdul Basit and the Hurriyat leaders.
What could be the agenda of their talks at a time when the political situation in Pakistan is fluid? This question assumes significance in the wake of a recent statement made by Indian Defence Minister Arun Jaitley during his visit to the forward posts — “Pakistan and powers within that country do not want Indo-Pak ties to be normal.”Pakistan’s Kashmir Fixation
Whenever there has been political uncertainty in Pakistan, it rakes up the Kashmir issue as a diversionary tactic. The country’s Kashmir obsession is only well known. It has fought and lost wars over Kashmir. Only recently, on the occasion of Pakistan’s Independence Day celebration, Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif reiterated what Pakistan has all along been saying that Kashmir is the “main source of tension” in Indo-Pak relations.
There has always been uneasiness between India-Pakistan relationships because of trust deficit between the two neighbours. The invitation by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the subsequent visit to New Delhi by his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, where the latter heeded the Indian government’s advice to avoid the Hurriyat, was a significant initiative by both the countries to earn the trust of each other. Till then, Pakistan had made it a standard practice of inviting the Hurriyat leadership before any crucial bilateral meetings with India. All visiting Pak premiers met Hurriyat leaders in India and also invited the Hurriyat leaders to Pakistan.
Pakistan: A Nation in Turmoil
But, things have changed dramatically in Pakistan thereafter. Supporters of Imran Khan’s right wing Tehreek-i-Insaf have for the last one week thronged outside the nation’s parliament, calling for Sharif’s resignation as Pakistan plunges in political turmoil yet again. Sharif is on the back foot and the army has intervened asking the government and protest leaders to engage in dialogue to break the impasse.
It is in this context that the defiance of the Pakistan High Commissioner in India, Abdul Basit, should be evaluated. He defended his meetings with Hurriyat leaders on grounds that Kashmiris “are legitimate stakeholders” and that Kashmir is a “bilateral issue”, what if India called off the secretary-level talks with Pakistan in protest!
Why Hurriyat Tops Pakistan Agenda?
It is important that the Basit-Hurriyat leaders meeting took place on the eve of the foreign secretary-level meet between the two countries. One may recall, such a dialogue process was to resume after a big gap as the talks were suspended since January last year when Pakistani troops had beheaded an Indian soldier and killed another along the border. Yet, Basit went on to meet the Hurriyat leaders for two days ignoring a warning by the Indian government that this sort of indulgence to separatists was unacceptable to her.
But why is Pakistan so much obsessed with the Hurriyat that it is ready to forsake its ties with India?
We know for sure that the Hurriyat Conference, formed in 1993, does not justify India’s claim over what it terms as the ‘disputed territory’ of Jammu and Kashmir. We know it is averse to engaging India on any dialogue process. Remember its boycott of the 2006 round table conference initiated by the then prime minister Manmohan Singh to resolve the Kashmir issue? More than 30 political parties and active groups had then participated in the conference to discuss the vexed issue in an open manner.
Hurriyat Suits Pak Gameplan
Obviously, and it has been reported time and again, Hurriyat supports the Pakistani claim that Kashmir is the ‘unfinished agenda of Partition’ and needs to be resolved ‘as per the aspirations of the people of Jammu and Kashmir.’
Yet, can we really term Hurriyat as the sole representative of the Kashmiris — a claim that has so far been endorsed explicitly only by Pakistan? Haven’t Pakistan’s successive leaderships deftly exploited Hurriyat’s anti-India bias to its own selfish motives to address their own constituency – both domestic as well international? Isn’t it true that in Hurriyat Conference, it has found more than a willing partner to help internationalise, albeit unsuccessfully, the Kashmir issue?
Yet, can we really term Hurriyat as the sole representative of the Kashmiris — a claim that has so far been endorsed explicitly only by Pakistan? Haven’t Pakistan’s successive leaderships deftly exploited Hurriyat’s anti-India bias to its own selfish motives to address their own constituency – both domestic as well international? Isn’t it true that in Hurriyat Conference, it has found more than a willing partner to help internationalise, albeit unsuccessfully, the Kashmir issue?
What else could be the reason for Pakistan to avoid other Kashmiri parties in the process is anyone’s guess. After all, Kashmir does participate in the democratic process and has an elected government. There are about three dozen parties espousing the cause of the Kashmiri people.
Pakistan’s obsession with the Hurriyat smacks of a deliberate design – to keep propping up the insurgent elements to serve its own cause.
Last but not the least? What mileage can India derive out of cancellation of the talks with Pakistan?
Consider the present Indian government’s new thrust on Kashmir as signified by two visits in as many months to the valley by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The visits interlaced with the development plank of the government, may help the BJP make significant inroads in the state that goes to poll soon. The party has laid stress on bringing back the displaced Kashmiri Pandits back to the Valley.
Overall, a sense of uncertainty and uneasiness has gripped the future of Indo-Pak relations once again.
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