The July 10 (Friday ) meeting between Indian PM Narendra Modi and his Pakistani counterpart Mr. Nawaz Sharif in the Russian city of Ufa on the sidelines of the SCO summit was expected – but the outcome of the meeting has been very unexpected.
The joint statement issued by the two Foreign Secretaries is terse and has six bullets – each of considerable import for the troubled bi-lateral relationship.
PM Sharif reiterated his invitation to PM Modi to visit Pakistan for the SAARC Summit in 2016. PM Modi accepted the invitation.
A careful examination of the joint statement would indicate that India has carried out a holistic review of its current Pakistan policy and after the appropriate diplomatic groundwork was done – Delhi has not only tweaked but reset its Pakistan policy by introducing a prudent degree of flexibility.
India: No Dialogue Till Lakhvi Issue is Resolved
It may be recalled that after the initial meeting in May 2014 when PM Sharif attended the swearing-in ceremony of PM Modi in Delhi, there has been no substantive one-on-one meeting between the two leaders.
Last August, India had called off the Foreign Secretary level talks over the issue of a meeting between the Kashmir separatist leaders and the Pakistani High Commissioner.
Subsequently Delhi reiterated its position that there could be no resumption of the composite dialogue with Pakistan unless Islamabad made tangible progress on the Novemeber 2008 Mumbai terror attack case.
The intervening months have been acrimonious and ordnance has been exchanged between the troops of both countries across the volatile border resulting in casualties on both sides.
Pakistan has made limited progress on the Mumbai terror attack case and the mastermind – Zaikur Rehman Lakhvi – was released on bail in April.
Bi-lateral Tension
Over the last fortnight Pakistan has accused India of fomenting trouble in Baluchistan, indulged in nuclear sabre-rattling and over the last two days, firing by Pakistani para military units has led to the death of an Indian BSF soldier. In short – the bi-lateral was as tense as tense could be.
It is against this backdrop that the Modi-Sharif meeting in Ufa has taken place and it can be inferred that notwithstanding the disappointment over the Lakhvi case, the Modi core team has embarked upon a review and reset of Delhi’s Pakistan policy.
Engagement is back on track and to PM Modi’s credit – he appears to have taken the initiative in reaching out to PM Sharif to end the impasse. Terrorism in all its forms has been condemned in the joint statement and the language is carefully inclusive tro assuage domestic sentiment in both countries.
Pakistani Strategy
Support to non-state entities and related terrorism and is integral to the Pakistani military strategy, and is a deeply embedded structural reality that goes back to October 1947 when the Pakistani military deployed ‘irregulars’ to wrest Kashmir.
Much the same pattern ensued in the Kargil war of May 1999 – when as it happens – Nawaz Sharif was the hapless Prime Minister who claimed that his Army Chief, the adventurous General Musharraf had misled him about the enormity of what had been attempted: the use of covert military force to alter the territorial status quo over Kashmir.
Nawaz Sharif’s Comeback
In the intervening 15 years Sharif has had a tumultuous experience that includes imprisonment and political exile and has made a remarkable come back as Prime Minister of Pakistan.
Perhaps he, more than any other person, knows the degree of control that Rawalpindi (General Headquarters of the Pakistan Army) exercises over the issues that are central to a normative relationship with India – Kashmir, support to terrorism and nuclear weapons.
Rawalpindi in turn has entered into a Faustian bargain with Muridke (HQ of the LeT and its affiliates) that nurtures the radical ideologies that encourage terrorism.
Civilians in Pakistan
In this cynical process, the jihadi chickens have come home to roost in blood-splattered manner from Peshawar to Karachi and Pakistan continues to pay a heavy price.
Squaring this nettlesome circle is a challenge for the civilian dispensation in Islamabad represented by Mr. Nawaz Sharif and is also critical for the normalization of the India-Pakistan bi-lateral relationship.
PM Modi has taken a calculated political risk in reaching out to PM Sharif and the substantive results will be discernible over the next few months.
Whether Modi will succeed with Pakistan or follow in the arid path of his predecessors - Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh - remains moot.
(Commodore Bhaskar is Director, Society for Policy Studies, New Delhi.)
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