Whipping India to talk ‘Aman’
By: Mentioned at the Bottom
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It is natural to expect that those across the border who profess to be bitten by the ‘Aman ki Aasha’ (hope for peace) bug will climb down from their traditional high seat of bellicosity to build a conciliatory capacity when talking about India. It is a simple rule in life as well as diplomacy that when two embittered parties meet to end mutual hostilities they do not talk in shrill tones. Instead the two parties try to create the impression that they are ready to forget bitterness of the past and are eager to start a new chapter based on understanding and respect. While it may be dismissed as a partisan, prejudiced and incomplete view, the perorations of some ‘eminent’ Pakistanis that have appeared in the Indian media as part of the on-going ‘Aman ki Asha’ exercise have tended to create the impression that India has to be shamed into accepting ‘Aman’ as the only ‘Asha’ for taming the overflowing anger in the neighbourhood—the necessary precursor to building peace. The media in Pakistan continues to be chary of taking note of the Indian point of view on ‘core issues’—it has ignored the Indian rejoinder on the Pakistani accusations on the sharing of river waters. But it can otherwise claim to have opened up its columns to a variety of Indians, ranging from the well known ‘jhappi-pappi’ advocates to sundry ‘candlewallahs’ and feisty ‘liberals’ who routinely find fault with everything that India does or says, especially about Pakistan. Most Indians would probably not bother much about what these self-professed ‘peaceniks’ tell the Pakistani audiences even though the latter see them as nothing but odd exceptions to the general rule in India which produces nothing but peddlers of ‘muscular nationalism’, a bye-product of ‘India shining’—or is it about the Indian ‘hegemony’. The Indian media too has opened up its columns to the Pakistanis who will perhaps be ‘modest’ enough to claim that unlike their Indian counterparts they believe in ‘peace’. These Pakistanis also believe that, again unlike Indians, they are capable of a fair introspection of the problems they face in their country even if they know that they are all creations of India. For example, the label ‘Terror Central’ is nothing but a part of the dirty work of the contumelious Indians who exaggerate facts about the size of the Pakistani army of men ready for ‘holy harakiri’. Every Pakistani whose by-line appears in the Indian media likes to hector India about all the opportunities that have been missed by not talking to Pakistan, a country that has proved to be more than a match for the guiles of the crafty Americans. The ‘inflexible’ Indians do not seem to realise how their progress has been retarded by not handing over the Kashmir valley to peace-loving and progressive Pakistan, who, of course, have steadfastly refused for over 60 years to give up their ‘Kashmir-first’ stance. Now, by depriving Pakistan of its ‘share’ in the Himalayan Rivers, India has sealed its reputation as an ‘intransigent’ neighbour. And a ‘meddlesome’ neighbour too: look how India is engineering all the acts of terrorism in Pakistan. These reminders form constant theme of the volume of advice that is gratuitously flung at ‘inflexible’ India almost on a daily basis in the august columns of Pakistani newspapers and TV chat shows. The ‘enlightened’ and ‘moderate’ Pakistanis do admit that their country could benefit from better water management. But that does not alter their view of India as it takes up ‘hundreds’ of project on the flow of the river waters in Kashmir. That international arbitration has found nothing wrong in Indian projects only strengthens the Pakistani suspicion of worldwide prejudice against the land of the pure. The well-meaning Pakistanis cannot hold back their fury when India refuses to accept that both countries are affected by the same brand of terror. ‘Thousands’ of Mumbai are enacted in Pakistan everyday; so why does India crib over an attack here and there and that too after intervals! It is worse to use that as an excuse to suspend talks with the country that is universally known to preach tolerance! Particularly touching has been the effort of a Pakistani author who won some international award. He has taken upon himself to convince his readers that stories of unrest in Pakistan are highly exaggerated and false because he is able to attend swinging exclusive parties in plush and secluded corners of Karachi and Lahore. A former journalist, ambassador and also a former minister in Pakistan who is clearly a prominent member of the Pakistani establishment, rued in an article that appeared in Indian as well as Pakistani newspapers the other day that Indians have ‘no interest’; in taking note of the large number of Pakistanis being killed in terrorist attacks. The voices of moderation in India are getting ‘sparser’ along with the emergence of a ‘strident Indian television culture of consumer-led discourse.’ Worse, India has a ‘new reactionary middle class’ that exhorts governments to talk ‘tough’ with Pakistan. No need to emphasis here that in Pakistan it is just the other way: plenty of voices of reasonableness, timid TV debates that extol the ‘enemy’ and the emergence of a class that loves India except that right now it is preoccupied with certain holy matters like the jehad. This ‘fair’ Pakistani was magnanimous enough to concede in the article that technically India could ‘remain on the right side of the Indus Water Treaty’ if it builds dams on the Jhelum and Chenab. But it cannot store water. Why, because the timing for the storage has to be decided by Pakistan! Like all ‘moderate’ Pakistanis, this Pakistani too absolves the state of any part in the Mumbai terror attacks, blaming them on ‘non-state actors’ and then bluntly states that certain questions remain unanswered in view of observations made by the widow of the slain police official of Mumbai, Hemant Karkare. His inference is that the Mumbai attacks were planned by Indian agencies! The purport of the article written by the ‘eminent’ Pakistani was, it can be presumed, to encourage India and Pakistan move from ‘distrust’ to a ‘settlement mode’, from ‘confidence-building formats’ to ‘conflict-resolution templates.’ But most Indian readers would probably miss the lofty point. They might even have the temerity to conclude that articles like that are contributing nothing to building ‘Aman ki Asha’. (Syndicate Features)
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