Opinion Waiting for Pindi

When India seethed with anger as the outrage against Mumbai played out for nearly three days on television screens,Delhi found it had no credible option for military retribution. The least Delhi could do in the wake of 26/11 was to suspend the diplomatic dialogue with Pakistan. But India was aware then that non-engagement with Pakistan was not sustainable beyond a short period. Delhi also knew that neither the international empathy that flowed in India’s favour nor the pressures on Pakistan to act against the terror infrastructure on its soil would last very long.

At the same time,India also recognised that the Mumbai attacks had shattered the framework for the peace process that was agreed to in January 2004 by Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Pervez Musharraf.

That framework had three elements. Pakistan would prevent its territory from being used for violence against India,Delhi would negotiate purposefully on the question of Jammu and Kashmir,and both sides would put in place a broad range of confidence-building measures (CBMs).

If Musharraf did bring down the levels of cross-border violence,Prime Minister Manmohan Singh authorised a back channel to negotiate a Kashmir settlement. According to Pakistani sources,there was much progress on the subject. Both sides also instituted a range of CBMs,promoted trade and facilitated people-to-people exchanges during 2004-07.

If Musharraf began to lose political ground from early 2007,the attacks on the Indian embassy in Kabul (July 2008) and on Mumbai (November 2008) raised questions about the commitment of the Pakistan army to the peace process under its new chief,General Ashfaq Kayani.

After he returned to power in May 2009,Manmohan Singh sought to re-engage Pakistan,this time with the civilian leadership — President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani. At Sharm el-Sheikh in July 2009,and in Thimphu in April 2010,Manmohan Singh sought to revive the peace process on the old terms — Pakistan will stop support for terrorism in return for India’s readiness to resolve all outstanding disputes. For India,progress on the Mumbai trial would be the defining benchmark.

In July 2010,External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna offered to move away from a “sequential” process — justice for Mumbai victims first and a full dialogue later — to a more “simultaneous” one. India,Krishna suggested,would begin some parts of the dialogue as Pakistan moved to fulfil its promises on the Mumbai attack.

But the Pakistan army apparently would seem to have none of it. It wanted an unconditional resumption of the dialogue. Islamabad also wanted the first round of the full dialogue to take place before Pakistan’s foreign minister made a return visit to India. The agreed understanding between the Indian and Pakistani foreign secretaries announced last week in Thimphu suggests that Delhi has given up its preconditions and accepted those of Pakistan.

The BJP and the hawks in the foreign policy community are bound to be outraged by these changes.

Krishna,on the other hand,has underlined that India’s decision to resume dialogue with Pakistan was deliberate. He did not elaborate on the factors that went into the government’s consideration,but some of those are not difficult to imagine.

One,Pakistan’s civilian government is in no position to do justice to the Mumbai victims,let alone wind down the terror machine on its soil. The elected leaders in Islamabad have no control over Pakistan’s national security policy. That is the exclusive domain of the Pakistan army’s GHQ in Rawalpindi. Delhi,then,is unwise in shunning contact with Pakistan’s civilians by demanding what they can’t deliver.

Two,the situation could be different,however,if General Kayani is ready to directly deal with India. On the face of it,there is nothing to suggest Kayani’s attitudes towards Delhi have changed. There is no public hint at all that he might rein in the LeT if India agrees to complete the negotiation on Kashmir. But it is certainly worth Delhi’s while to explore a possible opening towards Kayani. Without discreet,high-level political contacts between Delhi and Kayani that can help “pre-cook” the outcomes in the formal dialogue,the renewed peace process will go nowhere.

Three,the most important reason for talking with Pakistan is not that it might produce reasonable returns in the short term. In fact,the new dialogue might not even survive the first major terror attack after Mumbai. Delhi must engage all sections of Pakistan because its deepening internal crisis,an escalating conflict on its western borders,and the sharpening contradictions with the United States and the international community over Afghanistan could have lasting effects on India’s national security.

There will be many dangers and a few fleeting moments of opportunity that Pakistan will present us in the coming year. To forestall the former and seize the latter,India needs a comprehensive and unsentimental engagement with Pakistan.

raja.mohan@expressindia.com