ANALYSIS: Reduce distrust for constructive dialogue —Amit Ranjan

Terrorist groups are growing powerfully and are a big hurdle for the Indo-Pak peace process. They have hijacked almost all conflicting issues between India and Pakistan

After two years of silent war, India and Pakistan are, once again, going to re-engage in dialogue from July 15, 2010. The foreign minister of India is scheduled to visit Islamabad, where he will hold talks on various issues with his Pakistani counterpart. Many people from the subcontinent have high hopes from this bilateral dialogue, but looking into the record of Indo-Pakistan interaction, it seems that this round is also going to meet with a similar fate to earlier rounds. This is not a pessimistic view, rather an empirical one.

Commenting upon the nature of the dialogue, many editorials and columns have been written in various newspapers and magazines in India. The columnists and editors have positively and negatively highlighted the issues likely to be and that must be raised during the bilateral dialogue. The three major issues that have been focused upon by them are: terrorism, water, and Afghanistan. But I dare to differ from the views of all those who give and are giving priority to only these three issues plus the mother of all problems — Kashmir. Priority-wise, for this author, the first thing they must do is to take steps to reduce the amount of distrust persisting between the people of the two countries. Other issues can follow.

The major problem between the two countries is lack of trust. This trust deficit is present at both political as well as at civil society level. So the first step both countries have to take is to reduce the trust deficit, because it is not possible to build trust overnight. To do this, more people-to-people contacts through various exchange programmes by issuing visas to students, journalists, artists, academicians, etc, must take place, without any problems or hassles. Second, the sportspersons from the two countries should be encouraged to play in each other’s countries without hesitation. There must be tournaments at regular intervals, with the host state taking responsibility for security of sportspersons. This practice must continue even if the peace process gets disturbed due to certain unwanted reasons or ill-fated incidents.

Without reducing widely persisting distrust, it is not possible to resolve even a single contentious issue and so there is no use of engaging in a dialogue at regular intervals. Former foreign minister of Pakistan, Khurshid Mehmud Kasuri, wrote in Times of India that, in 2005, both India and Pakistan almost reached a possible solution of the Kashmir issue but the political turmoil in Pakistan derailed it. Mr Kasuri may be correct because he was part of that process, but the question is: can they implement that or any other form of agreement on Kashmir without any public and institutional backlash against the government of the day? The answer is surely ‘no’. This is because the people and institutions are not politically mature to accept any form of compromise on this issue. So, in order to implement any agreement on any contentious issue, the first thing they have to do is politically prepare the people to accept the agreements. This can only be possible by building trust between the people and establishing a peaceful environment in which this trust can flourish.

Terrorism, like a Frankenstein’s monster, is ready to engulf both India and Pakistan. Terrorist groups are growing powerfully and are a big hurdle for the Indo-Pak peace process. They have hijacked almost all conflict issues between India and Pakistan. Earlier they had only one enemy that was India, but now they are in the process of making Pakistan a hell by their continuous attacks on the liberal and democratic space in Pakistan. They derailed the peace process between the two countries twice, in 1999 and then in 2008, by their nefarious acts. Their rise is a serious concern for the two countries because they are not the enemy of any particular country. They are rather enemies of humanity. Both India and Pakistan should not become a pawn in the hands of these groups by abruptly stopping the dialogue process in the middle. The best way to overcome them is to get engaged in dialogue, even when they try their best to disrupt the dialogue process.

On the water issue, the two countries have, once again, drawn their swords against each other. The rising population in India and Pakistan is putting extra pressure on the agricultural and industrial sectors, the largest consumers of water. Due to the amount of distrust present between the two countries, it is not possible to have joint management of water from the River Indus, which had been proposed by David Linthel in the 1950s. If this happens, it will be the best solution to judiciously use the water from the Indus River System. But that is an ideal position. In the present context, the best way to resolve this conflict is to make the people from the catchment area participate in any policy-making process and take decisions according to their interests. This process is in the spirit of the Helsinki provisions and has been effective in resolving various water disputes in many countries.

On the Afghanistan issue, both India and Pakistan have to understand the ill effects of the presence of extra-regional powers in their neighbourhood. Instead of looking to establish their hegemony over Afghanistan, they must show the way to resolve the issue in a democratic way. Both of them are regional powers and so they have a responsibility towards the region. Instead of locking horns over Afghanistan, they must try to establish peace there by defeating the Taliban in all forms.

Finally, the Kashmir issue is the mother of all confrontations and conflicts between India and Pakistan. Every war and war-like situation between the two countries has emerged on the Kashmir issue. Frankly, it is very difficult to resolve this issue unless both sides are ready to make certain compromises. The policy-makers are aware of this fact but they hesitate to go for it because of the risk of a public reaction to any form of compromise made by any side. There are also external as well as internal actors who have their vested interest in making this issue linger because it suits their political and economic interests.

To conclude, fortunately or unfortunately, India and Pakistan are destined to be neighbours, so now they have to decide whether they want to stay peacefully like good neighbours or continue with their conflicts for a few more decades.

Amit Ranjan is a PhD student at the South Asian Studies School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University. He can be reached at amitranjan.jnu@gmail.com