Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Thursday morning.

The talks between the two Foreign Secretaries and the Prime Ministers is yet another step that hopes to help resume the peace process, suspended after the attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul last year.

However, India remains adamant about the need for concrete action from Pakistan to address New Delhi’s concerns and the past will not be dumped for history to repeat itself, the sources said. As a result, India is not thinking ahead of itself and has adopted a wait-and-watch attitude, clearly not in a position to take a stand on whether the composite dialogue should resume or not.

In fact, some sections in the establishment feel that the two countries are “far away” from actually taking a firm call on the dialogue. There are no clear markers or milestones set that say if Pakistan takes a particular step, India will reciprocate with something specific. Incidentally, Pakistan is also not insisting on making the composite dialogue the only means of resuming engagement with India although Islamabad sticks to that stand in public.

The Pakistani leadership continues to repose faith in the mechanism of the composite dialogue but it does not also say at the same time that these talks are the only way for the two countries to move forward.

Separately, India feels that Pakistan should not take shelter under legal arguments and the opinion of its Supreme Court about acting against Lashkar founder Hafiz Saeed because the UN resolution for action against his Jamat-ud-Dawa does not call for imprisoning him. For New Delhi, there is no doubt about Saeed’s culpability and Pakistan is obliged to act against him as a “normal, decent, civilized” nation.