Border Security Force (BSF) soldiers patrol the border at theIndia-Pakistan International Border Post
AS one should have expected, the terrorist attack in Mumbai on Nov 26 caused the government and people of India not only anguish but intense anger.
The anger was directed at Pakistan because of the suspicion that the perpetrators had been linked to certain militant organisations such as the Lashkar-i-Taiba and Jamaatud Dawa based in this country.
Construing the attack as an act of war, Indian officials (prime minister, defence minister, foreign minister) initially spoke of retaliation and strikes. They asserted also that if the attackers were ‘non-state actors’, it was still Pakistan’s responsibility to locate and interrogate their sponsors, procure evidence of their guilt, prosecute them and award them the penalties they merit. It would also have to eradicate all terrorist organisations operating within its borders.
The government and media in Pakistan matched India’s tough talk with some of their own. Resounding declarations of the resolve to fight back followed. The National Assembly passed a unanimous resolution to the same effect. Preparation for war appeared to be under way. Military personnel on leave were called back, and it was said that troops would move from the tribal areas to the eastern border with India.
The Pakistani response caused Indian officials to have second thoughts. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared that war with Pakistan would be out of the question, and that it was not being contemplated.
Pakistan had banned Lashkar-i-Taiba several years ago, and it has now banned Jamaatud Dawa and detained a large number of its activists. India would prefer that some of these detained individuals to be turned over to its authorities for prosecution, but this option is not acceptable to Pakistan.
Plans for their trial in Pakistan’s own courts have not as yet surfaced. As a result India’s dissatisfaction with Pakistan’s response to its grievance remains unabated and so does the tension between the two countries.
Further action against those who have been detained is fraught with complications. The arrests were made under the Maintenance of Public Order Act which is one of the preventive detention laws in force in the country. Detention under any of these laws does not mean that the person arrested is necessarily presumed to be guilty of a crime.
The history of Pakistan is replete with instances of reputable and well-respected politicians, opposed to the government of the day, being placed in preventive detention.
The act of prosecuting the Jamaatud Dawa militants will signify that the government believes they have been undertaking, or otherwise aiding, terrorist acts. It will also imply acceptance of the Indian allegation that elements based in Pakistan are involved in terrorism in India.
It should be noted also that the government’s prosecution of these persons will invite severe criticism within the country. It will be said that the government has knuckled under India’s pressure.
Pakistan had been asking India to provide hard evidence against the persons it suspects and has now said that India has done so although the likelihood of it being circumstantial evidence (intercepts of telephone conversations and confessions of a man, now accepted by Islamabad as being a Pakistani national and who has been in the custody of Indian police for weeks) may not bear scrutiny in a court of law.
India cannot come up with ‘hard’ evidence such as eyewitness reports if the suspects hatched their conspiracies and made their preparations while sitting somewhere in Pakistan.
It expects Pakistani investigators to procure the needed evidence through their interrogations, possibly including resort to torture. This they may or may not be able to do. The tension between the two countries may then remain.
Can we expect that relations between them will some day become cordial and mutually cooperative, and may we ask what such relations are like? First, it means that while the two governments may not see eye to eye on all issues, there is no conflict of vital interests between them.
Next, cordial relations entail freer movement of persons, merchandise and capital between them, meaning that Indians may set up stores on the Mall and Anarkali in Lahore and factories in Sheikhupura and Gujranwala, and Pakistanis may be free to do the same in places of their choosing in India.
We may then ask if the dominant forces in Pakistan and India — politicians, the military, higher bureaucracy, captains of business and industry, great landowners — desire such an outcome.
Indian businessmen and industrialists may welcome the opportunity to expand their ventures to Pakistan. The Indian bureaucracy may not feel strongly on the subject. There are no great landlords in India. It is likely that the ruling politicians and generals have little interest in improving relations with Pakistan; they stand to gain more if they can present Pakistan as an irritant or even as a threat to their national security. They may conceivably favour amity with Pakistan if it can be had without having to make concessions to Pakistan on Kashmir.
Politicians in Pakistan know that they cannot take Kashmir away from India by force of arms, and that India will not hand it over to them on a silver platter. Yet, they are not willing to let go of the issue. That being the case, there is no real prospect of any significant improvement in government-to-government relations. The landed aristocrats and the higher bureaucracy are not likely to be affected by any shifts in India-Pakistan relations.
The Pakistani military establishment will probably doubt the wisdom of the enterprise of improving relations with India. If not only peace but amity and goodwill reign between them, the military’s primacy in the Pakistani scheme of things will decline.
Freer trade and investments do not suit Pakistani businessmen and manufacturers because their products will then not compete well with those of India. One may argue that the continuation of a moderate degree of tension between the two countries works to the advantage of the Pakistani generals and barons of commerce and industry.
It may be said that ‘people’ on both sides — tourists, shoppers, pilgrims — do have a stake in the easing of relations between their two countries. But it so happens that the ‘people’ are not the ones who make high policy in either country. Moreover, public opinion can be very fickle, and propagandists can easily change popular passion from mutual affection to hatred and conflict.
The anger was directed at Pakistan because of the suspicion that the perpetrators had been linked to certain militant organisations such as the Lashkar-i-Taiba and Jamaatud Dawa based in this country.
Construing the attack as an act of war, Indian officials (prime minister, defence minister, foreign minister) initially spoke of retaliation and strikes. They asserted also that if the attackers were ‘non-state actors’, it was still Pakistan’s responsibility to locate and interrogate their sponsors, procure evidence of their guilt, prosecute them and award them the penalties they merit. It would also have to eradicate all terrorist organisations operating within its borders.
The government and media in Pakistan matched India’s tough talk with some of their own. Resounding declarations of the resolve to fight back followed. The National Assembly passed a unanimous resolution to the same effect. Preparation for war appeared to be under way. Military personnel on leave were called back, and it was said that troops would move from the tribal areas to the eastern border with India.
The Pakistani response caused Indian officials to have second thoughts. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh declared that war with Pakistan would be out of the question, and that it was not being contemplated.
Pakistan had banned Lashkar-i-Taiba several years ago, and it has now banned Jamaatud Dawa and detained a large number of its activists. India would prefer that some of these detained individuals to be turned over to its authorities for prosecution, but this option is not acceptable to Pakistan.
Plans for their trial in Pakistan’s own courts have not as yet surfaced. As a result India’s dissatisfaction with Pakistan’s response to its grievance remains unabated and so does the tension between the two countries.
Further action against those who have been detained is fraught with complications. The arrests were made under the Maintenance of Public Order Act which is one of the preventive detention laws in force in the country. Detention under any of these laws does not mean that the person arrested is necessarily presumed to be guilty of a crime.
The history of Pakistan is replete with instances of reputable and well-respected politicians, opposed to the government of the day, being placed in preventive detention.
The act of prosecuting the Jamaatud Dawa militants will signify that the government believes they have been undertaking, or otherwise aiding, terrorist acts. It will also imply acceptance of the Indian allegation that elements based in Pakistan are involved in terrorism in India.
It should be noted also that the government’s prosecution of these persons will invite severe criticism within the country. It will be said that the government has knuckled under India’s pressure.
Pakistan had been asking India to provide hard evidence against the persons it suspects and has now said that India has done so although the likelihood of it being circumstantial evidence (intercepts of telephone conversations and confessions of a man, now accepted by Islamabad as being a Pakistani national and who has been in the custody of Indian police for weeks) may not bear scrutiny in a court of law.
India cannot come up with ‘hard’ evidence such as eyewitness reports if the suspects hatched their conspiracies and made their preparations while sitting somewhere in Pakistan.
It expects Pakistani investigators to procure the needed evidence through their interrogations, possibly including resort to torture. This they may or may not be able to do. The tension between the two countries may then remain.
Can we expect that relations between them will some day become cordial and mutually cooperative, and may we ask what such relations are like? First, it means that while the two governments may not see eye to eye on all issues, there is no conflict of vital interests between them.
Next, cordial relations entail freer movement of persons, merchandise and capital between them, meaning that Indians may set up stores on the Mall and Anarkali in Lahore and factories in Sheikhupura and Gujranwala, and Pakistanis may be free to do the same in places of their choosing in India.
We may then ask if the dominant forces in Pakistan and India — politicians, the military, higher bureaucracy, captains of business and industry, great landowners — desire such an outcome.
Indian businessmen and industrialists may welcome the opportunity to expand their ventures to Pakistan. The Indian bureaucracy may not feel strongly on the subject. There are no great landlords in India. It is likely that the ruling politicians and generals have little interest in improving relations with Pakistan; they stand to gain more if they can present Pakistan as an irritant or even as a threat to their national security. They may conceivably favour amity with Pakistan if it can be had without having to make concessions to Pakistan on Kashmir.
Politicians in Pakistan know that they cannot take Kashmir away from India by force of arms, and that India will not hand it over to them on a silver platter. Yet, they are not willing to let go of the issue. That being the case, there is no real prospect of any significant improvement in government-to-government relations. The landed aristocrats and the higher bureaucracy are not likely to be affected by any shifts in India-Pakistan relations.
The Pakistani military establishment will probably doubt the wisdom of the enterprise of improving relations with India. If not only peace but amity and goodwill reign between them, the military’s primacy in the Pakistani scheme of things will decline.
Freer trade and investments do not suit Pakistani businessmen and manufacturers because their products will then not compete well with those of India. One may argue that the continuation of a moderate degree of tension between the two countries works to the advantage of the Pakistani generals and barons of commerce and industry.
It may be said that ‘people’ on both sides — tourists, shoppers, pilgrims — do have a stake in the easing of relations between their two countries. But it so happens that the ‘people’ are not the ones who make high policy in either country. Moreover, public opinion can be very fickle, and propagandists can easily change popular passion from mutual affection to hatred and conflict.
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