What is the Logic
Behind This Switch On/off Policy?
By
Kuldip Nayar
I AM ONE of those who wrote and signed a petition in favor of
S.A.R. Geelani’s release. I was happy when the Delhi High
Court did not find his involvement in the Parliament House attack
case.
Numerous human rights activists felt relieved that his innocence
had been proved. I had thought his first remark would be in praise
of the judiciary, however wanting in many ways. He would say that
whenever such verdicts were given, they proved the strength and
independence of India’s judicial system. Instead, he made
a political statement. That he does so 24 hours after his release
indicates that he has given some thought to what he said.
“I
consider the whole of Kashmir a disputed territory. I am for a
peaceful solution to the problem. If the people of Kashmir want
independence, then I am with them,” Geelani said at a press
conference. The case against Geelani was not that he had been
wrongly involved in some agitation on Kashmir. He was taken in
and tried because he was suspect in the attack by the militants
on Parliament House which symbolised the country’s sovereignty.
The militants wanted to kill the representatives of the people.
For Geelani to mix the Kashmir question with the attack is to
politicise a heinous crime.
Whether
the Kashmiris should have an independent country or not is a serious
matter which does not have to be bandied by a person after acquittal.
Geelani is hardly the person to raise the question whose claim
to fame is that the police slapped against him a case which it
could not prove in the court. He has only raised doubts about
his ambitions.
That
the judicial system has become “a tool in the hands of fascists”
to further their agenda is too sweeping a pronouncement. The same
system has let him go free and the same system has reopened the
Best Bakery case in Gujarat. People realise the shortcomings of
system when it is pitted against unscrupulous, power-hungry politicians
and the obliging police. Still they are not willing to throw out
the baby with the bath water. Geelani’s bitterness after
two years of confinement is understandable but not the ploy to
use the court verdict for extraneous considerations.
I
hope that Geelani’s statement does not become grist for
the propaganda mills. A favorable ground for talks between Deputy
Prime Minister L.K. Advani and the Hurriyat is getting prepared.
Although Advani tried to queer the pitch by his statement that
the talks would be confined to decentralisation of power, Maulvi
Abbas, the Hurriyat chief, made light of the observation. When
the state of Jammu and Kashmir joined the Indian Union, it gave
Delhi only three subjects: foreign affairs, defence and communications.
The talks on Kashmir should begin from there.
How I wish that Islamabad had agreed to New Delhi’s proposal
for a bus service between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad. It would
have connected the two portions of Kashmir to enable people to
talk to each other. By asking that UN observers should oversee
the bus service, Pakistan has spoilt an opportunity for the Kashmiris
on both sides to meet and think jointly about the situation they
face. The bus would have provided a contact of sorts. It is apparent
that Pakistan’s agenda is different.
My
impression is that even the overall people-to-people contact of
the Indians and the Pakistanis have got caught between the Scylla
of provocation and Charybdis of arrogance. The military junta
at Islamabad believes that the more it rubs India on the wrong
side, the better it goes go down with the fundamentalists and
the chauvinists whose support it seeks. The BJP-led government
at New Delhi labors under the impression that India has the size
and strength to talk at Pakistan whenever it feels like.
The
governments in both the countries have never allowed a free contact
because they are not sure whether they can handle the fallout.
Pakistan is afraid that its creation may come to be questioned
if its Muslims realise that the Muslims in India are more in number
and articulate their identity openly despite the Hindutva onslaught.
India is scared lest its parochial policy behind the propaganda
of pluralism be exposed or diluted by frequent contacts with the
Pakistanis, meaning thereby the Muslims. The BJP’s allies,
the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Shiv Sena, reflect such thinking
when they oppose any opening with Pakistan.
Still,
I have not been able to make out the logic behind New Delhi’s
switch-on/switch-off policy. Vajpayee makes a statement on April
16 at Srinagar to offer Pakistan talks. Delegations of parliamentarians
and teams of businessmen from both sides try to take Vajpayee’s
initiative further. There is an outpouring of emotions. An effusive
atmosphere of friendship comes to prevail in the two countries.
Then New Delhi goes to sleep. Nothing happens except a measly
bus service between Delhi and Lahore once a week.
Nearly
six months later, New Delhi wakes up — this time to spell
out steps for better contacts. Even then there is no relaxation
in visa rules; visitors will still be confined to one or two cities
with the obligation to call on the nearby police station within
24 hours of their arrival. There is no explanation why New Delhi
allowed the feel-good atmosphere to dissipate between the middle
of April and the third week of October. During the six months
when the two indulge in usual rhetoric, Vajpayee does not respond
to even individual or private effort to sustain the momentum of
his initiative. It is as if the speech at Srinagar was a passing
itch.
My
main worry is about the mindset of the bureaucracy in both the
countries. Take New Delhi. Only a few days ago did its retiring
foreign secretary Kanwal Sibal pour cold water over the conciliatory
efforts. At a Rotary meeting in Punjab, he said that people-to-people
contact was futile and, as usual, scoffed at those who lighted
candles on the night of August 14-15 to celebrate the birth of
the two countries. His tone was contemptuous and his approach
to any rapprochement negative. How do we change the attitude of
such officials because they constitute the implementing machinery?
The
writer is a well known analyst and a former Indian diplomat -
Courtesy Indian Express
