Author: Chandan Mitra
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: August 4, 2009
URL: http://www.dailypioneer.com/193516/Backfoot-on-Balochistan.html
Almost every Indian Prime Minister (barring
Charan Singh, Chandra Shekhar and Mr HD Deve Gowda) has been possessed by
a desire to be ranked in the league of world statesmen. It is said the Chinese
aggression of 1962 shattered Jawaharlal Nehru in more ways than one, not the
least being the evaporation of his hope of getting the Nobel Peace Prize.
His daughter was unlikely to have ever entertained such hopes, but her achievement
in dismembering Pakistan to create Bangladesh undoubtedly ranks as India's
greatest military-diplomatic achievement. She did not go down in history as
a great peacenik, but the country still salutes her for the unflinching commitment
with which she pursued the national interest in international matters although
not at home. But most of her successors, including Rajiv Gandhi, have sought
to resolve the Partition's bitter legacy - a hostile neighbour on the west.
They have periodically appeared to make breakthroughs, none of which lasted
beyond a few years.
Perhaps the boldest initiative was taken by
the BJP-led Government when Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee agreed to an impromptu
summit with then Pakistani President, Gen Pervez Musharraf, at Agra in 2001,
shortly after grandly launching the Delhi-Lahore bus service in the company
of Mr Nawaz Sharif. Mr Vajpayee persisted in his efforts, making a historic
trip to Lahore in the concluding months of his tenure, putting the ISI-sponsored
attack on Parliament behind him. He extracted a solemn commitment from Gen
Musharraf not to allow Pakistani territory to be used for terrorist activities
against India, a promise broken before the ink could dry on the statement.
Mr Manmohan Singh went out of his way soon after assuming office, conducted
more bus diplomacy, talked of borders becoming irrelevant and tried in many
other ways to placate the Pakistani Establishment. His efforts were met with
a series of ISI-masterminded terrorist outrages in India, the most dramatic
being the gruesome attacks in Mumbai on November 26, 2008.
It is in this background the alarming wording
of the Indo-Pak joint statement at Sharm el-Sheikh last month needs to be
examined. What has baffled experts and laymen alike is the series of concessions
made to Pakistan without getting anything in return. The two points that have
rightly come under scrutiny are the de-linking of cross-border terrorism from
the normalisation of relations, including resumption of the composite dialogue,
and, second, the stupefying reference to Balochistan implicitly equating India
with Pakistan in promoting terrorism in each other's territory. Arguably,
the statement refers to Balochistan as a matter of concern for Pakistan and
the Government is right in claiming it was a unilateral reference inserted
into the document at Pakistan's insistence without any acknowledgement or
comment by India. However, the Government's subsequent attempts to dilute
the serious implications of that insertion could hardly hide Pakistan's unrestrained
jubilation at having trapped India to concede the unthinkable.
Islamabad has never offered concrete evidence
of India's alleged involvement in efforts to destabilise Pakistan by promoting
separatist movements in that country. However, it has been consistently claimed
in the Pakistani media as well as official statements that Indian intelligence
agencies (read R&AW) have instigated separatist forces particularly in
Sindh and Balochistan - two provinces that continue to chafe under Islamabad's
Punjabi-dominated yoke. Apart from offering periodic lip sympathy to ramshackle
Sindhi groups, this so-called involvement never acquired any serious dimension.
Pakistan's focus thus shifted to Balochistan where it is busy conducting a
brutal campaign of repression against disgruntled indigenous people. This
campaign reached a gory climax two years ago when Islamabad launched a full-scale
military campaign against Baloch leaders resulting in the killing of the region's
most respected tribal leader Khan Mohammad Bugti.
There is no doubt that there exists widespread
disaffection in Balochistan whose residents have consistently opposed the
rampant exploitation of the province's natural resources, especially vast
reserves of gas, without passing on its economic benefits to the local people.
Pakistan has also been steadily militarising the region with Chinese assistance,
acting as a surrogate for Beijing's commercial and military expansionism.
The construction of a gigantic port at Gwadar on the Arabian Sea coast, not
far from the Iranian border, is adequate proof of Pakistan's determination
to eliminate the last vestiges of indigenous resistance.
Faced with sharp criticism at home, the Government
has come up with a series of incredible explanations for the inclusion of
Balochistan in the joint statement - ranging from "bad drafting"
to "mere diplomatic paper of no legal consequence" and the latest
"we have nothing to hide". Not only are these defensive arguments
contradictory, the Government is also guilty of misleading the country on
the implications of the supine surrender at Sharm. Pakistan's hyperactive
diplomatic spin-doctors have over the years successfully put India in the
dock over Kashmir. At various points of time, world opinion has asked India
to agree to a plebiscite, questioned the validity of the State's accession,
urged demilitarisation of Jammu & Kashmir, pilloried India's allegedly
adverse human rights record and put New Delhi into acute discomfort. In other
words, a substantial section of international opinion believes India has a
questionable case on Kashmir, even if it doesn't go the whole way to concur
with Pakistan's claim that India is forcibly occupying most of the erstwhile
princely State, which is why the "will of the Kashmiri people" must
be taken into account in resolving the issue, periodic elections to the State
Assembly notwithstanding.
Following the Balochistan reference, the Pakistani
Establishment has gone into overdrive by planting stories in the media that
a dossier detailing India's 'mischief' has been handed over to the Prime Minister.
Mr Manmohan Singh categorically denied having personally received any such
file, but that still does not eliminate the possibility that Pakistan passed
on a fictitious list of Indian activities in Balochistan through diplomatic
channels. We now have to only wait for selective leak of its contents by Islamabad.
The impact of this transparent skulduggery leaves little to imagination. It
is a matter of time before Pakistan portrays India as a destabilising and
terror-sponsoring state in South Asia in addition to 'forcibly occupying'
Jammu & Kashmir.
The Prime Minister said in Parliament that
the only alternative to dialogue is war. This was a crude attempt to cower
India into acquiescing in the huge political blunder committed at Sharm el-Sheikh.
Nobody opposes dialogue, nor does anybody want war. But the point is what
kind of dialogue. Are we going to spend the next few years strenuously denying
our alleged role in Balochistan while Pakistan jubilantly pursues its agenda
in Kashmir and paints India into a corner before world opinion? Was it mere
"bad drafting" Mr Singh? Did you not read the joint statement before
it was issued? Or did you succumb to pressure, possibly from Washington? Either
way, Mr Manmohan Singh has a lot to explain. No wonder even Ms Sonia Gandhi
is not fully convinced and skipped referring to the Baloch booboo while defending
the Prime Minister's Lok Sabha statement. She can afford to ignore it, but
can the people of India?
