Now that a major politician like former Defence Minister Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav has taken the lead to help articulate a fitting national response to the butchery of over a hundred Hindu pilgrims in one blood-drenched night, the Union Government would do well to take the nation into confidence about how it proposes to contain the menace from across the border. There is need to frankly outline the ground reality, and prepare the nation for a calibrated response to a complex situation.
As it happens, the government has not even been able to tell us if it finally plans to bring out the long-suppressed White Paper on Kashmir, much less if it will act upon the growing sentiment in favour of “hot pursuit.” It is high time the government realized that the people have little patience with puerile secrecy, and even less with the attitude that they are not mature enough to be told about the gravity of the situation facing the nation. Families across the land have paid a horrible personal price for the negligence that resulted in Kargil, and sheer somnolence again extracted a fearsome price at Amarnath. With innocent blood having being spilt on a daily basis for so many years now, there is no valid excuse for official silence.
A savvy government would in any case realize that the time for excessive caution is over. The sheer brutality at Amarnath, in which unarmed pilgrims were treacherously gunned down even as an unsuspecting Indian government was preparing for talks with the Hizbul Mujahideen, has shocked the international community out of its complacency vis-à-vis the virulence of jehad-inspired Islam emanating from a piece of territory that is neither a nation nor a state. And the Srinagar blast, which came close on its heels and took the lives of sixteen persons, including The Hindustan Times photographer Pradeep Bhatia, has completely obviated any need for concessions to international sensitivity on the issue of Pakistan.
In any case, discerning observers can already sense a major change in the wind in India’s favour, at both the national and international level. With the absolute collapse of the Soviet Bloc and Soviet-inspired communism, the United States no longer requires the services of Pakistan as a front-line state. It follows from this that Pakistan now has nothing to offer to offset American concerns over drug running, export of terrorism, and jehad-inspired activities, which increasingly threaten American soil and citizens. I believe that it was to indicate this that President Bill Clinton insisted on coming to this country, even though his Indian hosts initially felt that it might be a better idea if his successor made the first visit by an American President in twenty-two years. Clinton’s body language and behaviour in Pakistan reinforces this view. I believe that much of the western world will eventually take its cue from the United States.
At the national level, political parties across the spectrum will be forced to take their cue from the growing revulsion against terrorism. The fact that Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav, an assiduous cultivator of the Muslim vote and a man who once savaged Hindu devotees desirous of reclaiming the birthplace of Lord Rama, should speak up so harshly against Pakistan indicates an extraordinary shift in the continental template. Yadav is too canny a politician to not have factored in the possible loss to his party in terms of Muslim votes, as well as the offsetting of this putative loss by votes from the rest of the Hindu community. If I am right, it would mean that at the grassroots level where politicians operate, the Hindu community has emerged as a sufficiently homogenized and integrated phenomenon to make an exodus of its votes costly to ambitious contenders. Mr. Yadav is nothing if not ambitious. And ambition is no bad thing.
It remains to be seen, of course, how other ‘secular’ parties cope with this realization. Mulayam’s defection would alert them to the fact that even a cent per cent minority vote will fail them if they do not command adequate support from the Hindu community. That vote now comes with a tag called ‘the legitimate concerns of the Hindu community’. Of course, it must be conceded that Mr. Yadav has executed his switch with considerable finesse, choosing both a ‘national’ cause and occasion, and having already established his nationalist credentials by opposing Sonia Gandhi’s backdoor attempts to become Prime Minister. But, on the whole, the significance of his transformation will not be lost on either his political rivals or his constituents.
For the Vajpayee government, however, this would be the ideal opportunity to explore the possibilities of the notion of ‘hot pursuit.’ The idea was originally floated by Home Minister L.K. Advani soon after the party came to power. It was then instantly rubbished by secular commentators who refused to see the issue in nationalist terms, and projected it as an instance of illegitimate Hindu chauvinism. These writers have, however, maintained a discreet silence about Mr. Yadav, though his observations could hardly have made them happy.
Press reports quote unnamed military experts to project the view that hot pursuit is unviable as the Mujahideen camps in Pakistan are extremely well defended; hence the encounters could prove costly. There is also a puerile belief that as the doctrine has not been adopted so far, there is no case to engage in it now. Such opinions rest on an imperfect understanding of the cross-border situation, the international situation, and the stakes for India.
India simply cannot afford to be bled day by day, citizen by citizen, year after year. Hot pursuit is an obvious solution. Yet it is nobody’s case that India has only to chase the militants into their hideouts across the border to put an end to the menace once and for all. Pakistan can set up hideouts in places not susceptible to a border raid. So ‘hot pursuit’ as I understand it, means the political and military preparedness to eventually engage in a wider conflict (read war) with the clear goal of settling the border issue decisively in our favour by recapturing the whole of Pak-occupied Kashmir and inflicting a convincing, humiliating defeat upon a military-ruled Pakistan. This is simply the only way that Pakistan and its people will understand they have no locus standi in Kashmir.
It is, of course, history that India lost a valuable opportunity at Shimla. At the time of the Kargil conflict last year, many citizens felt that India should take advantage of its presence on the heights to cross the line of control and redefine the border. I did not support this view then, to the disappointment of those who only appreciate me for my ‘hawkish’ views. My argument then was that the Prime Minister had crafted a wonderful diplomatic opportunity for this country by convincing the entire world that India was the victim of an unjust aggression, and yet abiding by the international sentiment that he respect the existing line of control. I argued that Pakistan would not long rest without embarking on another misadventure, and India would then be free to do what cannot be done without at least the tacit consent of the international community. I believe that India has now moved into precisely such a happy constellation. Nationally and internationally, the time has come to pick up the gauntlet.
The Pioneer, 15 Aug 2000