Escalating incidents of aggression on the western frontier make it imperative that we separate the wheat from the chaff of political rhetoric before we err into the abyss of diplomacy with a neighbour whose unprovoked hostility is once again being glossed over by the Congress-dominated UPA Government. Islamabad is speaking to New Delhi with a velvet tongue and an iron fist. We must not permit a lame duck government to heap scorn upon our dead heroes by surreptitiously resorting to another ‘Sharm el-Shaikh’.
Note that despite the friendly noises emanating from Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif during his election campaign, the most memorable act of the new regime was the allocation of Rs 61.35 million to the Jamaat ud Dawa (JuD) by the Punjab Provincial Government in June 2013, ostensibly for social work at its Markaz-e-Taiba centre at Muridkey.
The province is governed by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz. The JuD is the parent body of the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba, whose chief, Hafez Saeed, is believed to have masterminded the November 2008 terror attack on Mumbai. Pakistan defended the allocation saying that the JuD was not proscribed by the UN Security Council, and that it had appointed an administrator to run the Markaz-e-Taiba, thought Pakistani media said JuD was effectively in control of the place.
This startling event should have set the paradigm for New Delhi’s assessment of the kind of set up Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif would be made to preside over by the powers that control the State and institutions in Pakistan. It does not take a rocket scientist to recall that Nawaz Sharif was reigning in Islamabad when the Kargil misadventure took place, either without his knowledge, or with his reluctant consent. His attempt to stand up against a formidable section of the Army resulted in his exile to Saudi Arabia. To expect such a man to deliver peace and goodwill is an exercise in self-delusion.
The latest outrage saw five Indian jawans (four of them from the 21 Bihar Regiment) ambushed and killed in Poonch sector on August 6. Yet Defence Minister AK Anthony spoke of terrorists in Pakistani military uniforms, thus continuing the UPA’s policy of toeing the Western line of soft-peddling Pakistani terror attacks at the cost of the national interest. How can any terrorist organisation operate from Pakistani territory without the backing of the Army and the ISI? Even if there was no involvement of the Pakistan army in the Poonch incident, New Delhi knows it is incorrect to speak of non-State actors when we are suffering State-sponsored terror.
There seems an obvious link with the American attempt to exit from Afghanistan with dignity, by discouraging Taliban attacks on its retreating soldiers. An obvious strategy is to divert the jihadis to another frontier by providing alternate ‘soft targets’ in India. It is well known that Washington is keen to talk to and clinch a deal the Taliban, which is causing discomfort in New Delhi. According the intelligence sources, Lakshar-e-Tayyeba is already operating in Kabul with logistic support from the Haqqani network, which is close to Pakistani intelligence. The attack on the Indian consulate in Jalalabad on August 3 is being seen in the light of this collaboration.
This is why one takes with a pinch of salt the claim that India initiated the ‘dirty war’ preceding the Poonch ambush by allegedly kidnapping four “innocent herb collectors” (Zafran Ghulam Sarwar, Wajid Akbar, Mohammad Wajid Akbar and Mohammad Faisal) in the Neelam valley on July 28, by crossing the Line of Control. This is supposed to be the reason for Pakistan’s ambush of August 6, much as the supposed beheading of Pakistani jawans by India (in Kargil and other places) was supposed to explain the beheading of an Indian jawan and murder of another in the Mendhar sector in January 2013.
Interestingly, both claims on behalf of Pakistan originated in India, and not in Pakistan. The same source claimed that after the disappearance of the herb gathers, another five men (possibly guides for the jihadis trying to cross over) were shot dead by Indian troops in the same area, 500 metres on the Indian side of the LoC. The men are unidentified and the bodies have not been recovered.
It is pertinent that increasing ceasefire violations by Pakistan in Jammu and Kashmir seem to accompany the escalated rhetoric from Chief Minister Omar Abdullah for a political solution to the so-called problem of J&K and withdrawal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. The election of a new government in Pakistan has seen increased attempts by jihadis to infiltrate into India; hence increased vigilance by the Army and increased skirmishes on the border.
In this context, Defence Minister Antony cut a sorry figure when he ascribed the attack to “terrorists along with persons dressed in Pakistan Army uniform”, even as the Army spokesman said that 20 heavily armed terrorists launched the attack in concert with “soldiers from Pak Army”. Sadly, the Army was probably pressured to revise its statement to conform to that of the Minister.
And the unseemly haste with which Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid ignored Islamabad’s insulting claim of ignorance of the attack and said the two neighbours should not treat each other as “untouchables”, betrays the UPA’s anxiety to resume the stalled dialogue, without any commensurate advantage to India. New Delhi has already agreed for a meeting between Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and Nawaz Sharif at New York in September, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting, as well as for talks on the Tulbul navigation project / Wullar Barrage and Sir Creek issues.
It would be in the fitness of things to leave all dialogue to the next Government.
Niticentral.com, 7 August 2013