UPDATE: On 19 September, reports said that exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti has decided to file asylum papers in India.
UPDATE: On 17 September, the Ministry of External Affairs said that no decision has been made on exiled Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti’s Indian citizenship, according to India Today. According to The Times of India, a senior government source has said that India has no intentions at present to give asylum to Bugti.
India wants Baloch leaders to formally apply for political asylum and says that if they are to do so, it would be granted to them within a few weeks, reported News18, which says this information comes from top government sources.
The news channel also spoke with Baloch leader Brahumdagh Bugti, who said he welcomes India’s ‘historic’ move, and that Prime Minister Modi has helped make Balochistan an international issue. He said that getting an Indian passport would be of immense help to Baloch leaders. Geo News had reported that he would be getting Indian citizenship after long negotiations with the Indian authorities. But the Baloch Republican Party had dismissed this report.
If the Indian government is truly planning to grant asylum to Baloch leaders, the magnitude of the move would be akin to giving the Dalai Lama asylum. The latter has been a thorn in the side of Sino-India relations for decades and if Baloch leaders were to take up residence in Indian cities, the Indo-Pak relationship would be in even more trouble than it already is.
A positive development for Pakistan came in the form of the United States’ statement that it respects the nation’s territorial integrity and does not support independence for Balochistan.
However, if India was to start providing political asylum to leaders of the Baloch freedom movement, it would be making an open statement that Pakistan is definitively violating human rights in the region. That would be a declaration that the global community would not be able to easily ignore. Plus, the India-US relationship is deepening as well, and that would put pressure on the latter to acknowledge the step taken by its strategic friend.
Despite the upswing immediately after Prime Minister Modi took office in 2014, Indo-Pak ties have deteriorated over the last year, most significantly in the aftermath of January’s Pathankot terror attack and the ongoing Kashmir violence. Pakistan has been outspoken about Kashmir and has been trying to focus the international spotlight on India and its treatment of Kashmiris. On India’s Independence Day, Modi seemingly hit back by raising the issue of Balochistan and the manner in which the Pakistani state treats Baloch activists and separatists.
While Pakistan dismissed the remarks by saying it was an attempt to take the focus off Kashmir, the remarks had their desired effect. Baloch activists worldwide hailed Modi’s recognition of the issue and just this week, a group of Baloch freedom activists held a protest outside the United Nations headquarters in New York City.
The 71st session of the UN General Assembly is underway. Pakistan and India are expected to raise the issues of Kashmir and Balochistan respectively. India has clearly turned a new leaf in its foreign policy playbook by taking up the issue of Balochistan in such a strong fashion. There are still questions about whether granting the Dalai Lama asylum was a good realpolitik decision in the long term. If India follows the same path with Balochistan, there will be serious repercussions for the Indo-Pak relationship, which India will have to prepare to deal with.
(Sources: Geo News, News18, The Times of India, India Today’s Twitter Account)
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