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In a word, the Taliban are not the cause of the Talibanisation of Pakistani society. They are the result. The madrassas are not the only ones that indoctrinate their wards in extremism; as the excellent studies by the Pakistani historian K.K. Aziz in the early 1990s, and by Islamabad’s Sustainable Development Policy Institute more recently have shown, government schools indoctrinate students no less — from class 2 onwards — in the blessings and glory that accrue from jihad and shahadat.

It is obvious that Musharraf’s ‘emergency’ has had nothing whatsoever to do with the real problems that Pakistan faces. First, he has contributed as much to inflaming them as anyone. Second, if terrorism in the NWFP and FATA are the target, why remove the judges? Why throw human rights activists into jails? Third, look at what he and his ministers began saying the moment Bush and others called him: elections in February 2008, of course I will give up my uniform, ‘emergency’ will be ended within weeks — is it any one’s case that the tribals in NWFP and FATA will be brought to heel in a few weeks?

So, his ‘emergency’ has been just to save himself from the Supreme Court. But equally, for the kinds of reasons enumerated above, removing him is not going to solve the problems in which Pakistan finds itself today. Most certainly not for India.

For Pakistan is today a dictatorship in the grip of the army and ISI because of the neglect of institutions over sixty years. Pakistan is today a Talibanised society as the culmination of a choice it made sixty years ago — of being an Islamic state. Once the dust kicked up by Musharraf settles, whoever is in power in Islamabad will gravitate to the old, accustomed conclusion: there is only one way of coping with the jihadis — deflect them to India...