Quiet efforts to get India and Pakistan to cooperate in the energy sector have been afoot for a while. The decision to buy excess hydel power generated from the Indus river project has now been given sanction following a formal agreement for sharing natural resources signed by the SAARC members in Maldives.

But while India has been more than inclined to play ball in the energy-sharing sector, the question that arose was, is Pakistan game?

With a proposal for an overland natural gas pipeline having been cleared recently by the core group on security on the Indian side, which includes top-level bureaucrats from the External Affairs, Petroleum, Home and Defence Ministries, a major bureaucratic hurdle has been crossed.

According to experts, this development is an indication that the Indian side has overcome its pathological suspicion that Pakistan will turn off the gas tap if ever a fight breaks out between the two. India's requirements of oil and natural gas are projected to grow exponentially in the coming decades. With the country slated to become one of the four largest consumers of energy in the world, time is fast running out to put in place a feasible plan which will ensure adequate supplies.

Natural gas naturally takes over from oil``IF the 20th century was the century of oil, it is increasingly evident that the 21st century will be the century of natural gas,'' says Petroleum Secretary Vijay Kelkar.

In what could be a precursor of things to come, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh recently decided to set up a confederation for supply of electricity under which, as a first step, India will import power from Pakistan. The deal, brokered by the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, envisages a number of transmission links, with the first located between Lahore and Amritsar.

Kelkar says it is ``not difficult to see India and Pakistan engaging in greater energy trade where India imports natural gas through Pakistan and a part of the electricity can be exported to Pakistan to their grid''. This, according to Kelkar, ``creates confidence building and mutual interdependence''.

India's growing energy needs can best be met with cheap imports of natural gas from the world's largest natural gas resources located in the Gulf and Central Asia. The shortest and most logical option would be to transport it overland through Pakistan. But given the decades of hostilities between India and Pakistan, New Delhi has never considered this a viable option.But clearly, the winds of change are blowing.

The energy sector holds enormous potential for sub-regional cooperation, emphasises Prime Minister I.K. Gujral. ``For the entire region, stretching from Central Asia to South East Asia, natural gas will play an integral role. Countries with surplus natural gas, countries through which it will transit and countries which will be the final consumers have to put their heads together and put it to work for mutual benefit,'' Gujral told The Indian Express.

America, Argentina play pipeline politics

GIVEN the rocky relations between India and Pakistan, New Delhi had opted for a deep seabed pipeline project to transport natural gas from Oman. But the project lost steam when it became evident that the financial costs and technical problems involved in laying pipelines in the deep seas were insurmountable.

Once the undersea pipeline project ran aground, the overland route proposal was resurrected. Though India's participation in such a mega-scheme will have to clear the gamut of Cabinet and Parliament, it has now acquired a certain credibility having been cleared by the core group.

The pipeline politics in the region has become ever more complex with American oil giants wanting a piece of the action. In a bid to cut Iran out of the picture, the US oil corporate, Unocal, is actively pursuing the feasibility of building a natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to Pakistan. Additionally, it is developing marketing outlets for the gas in Pakistan. International oil and gas majors have also been wooing India with proposals to supply natural gas from Pakistan, allaying India's fears of disruptions by suggesting that a multinational enterprise be set up with India, Pakistan having equal stakes.

Another surprise player to have entered the fray is the Argentine oil and gas corporation, Bridas. Directly in competition with Unocal, Bridas wants to construct a multi-billion dollar pipeline to transport Central Asian gas deposits through southwest Afghanistan into Pakistan and India.

After months of hard bargaining, both Unocal and Bridas signed separate agreements with Kabul's Taliban militia though no joint venture has yet been initialled.

For Pakistan, a pipeline running through it, could mean big business. On the one hand it will get assured supplies of natural gas, on the other transit fees from the gas importing countries would keep cash registers in Islamabad ringing. Again, since energy is a perishable commodity which cannot be stored, Pakistan is also compelled to look for buyers.

Will Pakistan match India step for step?

Unlike the Oman seabed pipeline, the overland route from Iran or Turkmenistan to India and beyond, poses no major technical problems as the pipeline would pass through mostly flat desert land into Gujarat and onwards to the Indo-Gangetic plain, according to the noted Pakistani expert, Aurangzeb Z. Khan.

The critical question, however, is whether Pakistan will be able to overcome its innate hostility towards India and get its act together.

So far, Pakistan has soft-pedalled the issue by blaming India's negative stance. But now that the Indian position is turning around, Islamabad will have no excuse. While the prospects for sub-regional cooperation and the benefits that could accrue are enormous, there are too many imponderables, the foremost being the unending conflict in Afghanistan, and the decades-long unfriendliness between India and Pakistan.

But regional analysts see the enormous potential in the natural gas sector as the best chance for normalisation of India-Pakistan relations.

Once energy cooperation between the two countries moves into a smooth trajectory, with a corresponding economic take-off, issues like Kashmir and Siachen will appear to be mere minor irritants, the optimists feel.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.