by: Vinod Sharma
Are The Two Nsas Scripting The New India-Pakistan Lexicon Of Peace?
They’re talking but not through the media — which they’ve used only to let their actions speak. It’s a relatively new experiment in Indo-Pak relations bedevilled historically by vituperative slugs. Gentle nudges seem to be working for now. The etymology of the new lexicon could be in the growing chemistry — and suggestions of trust — between the two national security advisers.
Their off-camera engagements have yielded results — including a terror alert last week to New Delhi from Islamabad. The optimism stems as much from other signals: Pakistan lodging an FIR on the Pathankot attack; its foreign minister saying a phone number the attackers used was traced to Jaish-e-Mohammed’s Bahavalpur base; the information that JeM chief Masood Azhar is in custody.
Against this backdrop has come a bigger straw in the wind— the hanging on February 29 of Mumtaz Qadri, a police commando who pumped bullets into West Punjab governor Salman Taseer for seeking reforms in the country’s blasphemy laws. Politically, the execution is a big deal for the Sharif brothers — Nawaz and Shahbaz — given its religious-political implications in their home province.
Qadri was deified after the 2011 killing by a rabid assortment of Mullahs and advocates. They feted and garlanded him for taking out the very person he was assigned to safeguard.
The hanging and the intelligence alert NSA Ajit Doval received from Pakistani counterpart Naseer Janjua on possible cross-border attacks during Mahashivratri, could be read as a gingerly shift to containing, if not immediately confronting, anti-India groups based in the country’s eastern enclaves in Punjab. A Pakistani official distinguished the push in the east from the army’s Zarb-e-Azb operation on the Af-Pak border in the west. “The task in Punjab isn’t easy as it cannot be performed militarily,” he reasoned.
In southern Punjab where groups such as JeM have formidable clout, the answer lies in intelligence-based police operations made credible by parallel India-Pak dialogue on ‘resolvable’ issues. “Masood Azhar and Hafiz Saeed touch a chord with people on Kashmir. We have to have a counter-narrative. They’d dwindle into history if we give Kashmiris an environment of comfort,” the official said.
For the present, the civilian regime’s actions in tandem with the army are subtle, not frontal. For instance, PEMRA (the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority) got LeT headman Saeed’s support for and threat of more Pathankot-type cross-border strikes blacked out in the local media. It reportedly has gag orders in place against groups revelling in anti-India rhetoric.
An aide of Nawaz Sharif explained the effort was “to narrow the field of play for terrorist organisations” through legal restrictions. They can’t be allowed a free run of the place with over 5,000 lives lost and 1.80 lakh Pakistani troops engaged in counter-terror operations, he said.
And like many others I met — journalists, diplomats, politicos, think-tankers — the PM’s aide advocated early resumption of FS-level talks. Recalling what he termed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “assurance” to Sharif in Lahore (before the Pathankot attack) to not let anything “disturb” the dialogue process, he cautioned: “trust deficit will increase if dialogue is postponed further. Such positions aren’t sustainable”.
Imtiaz Gul of the Islamabad-based Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) underscored the need for an outcome-oriented dialogue to “disincentivise (sic) the theory of victimisation” in Kashmir the militants exploited for popular traction. He didn’t go into details. What’s well known is that Pakistan’s security forces aren’t untouched by the exponential rise of the religious middle-class in the Islamic Republic.
Even the army cannot but pay heed to internal feedback on its anti-terror campaign, said a Lahore-based commentator. The officers promoted to higher ranks now come from the deeply religious middle-class. From Islamabad’s standpoint, that makes advances on the political front with New Delhi ‘imperative’ to balance out action against anti-India jihadists.
So what’s doable in the immediate future? Cognizant though of our army’s position against withdrawing from strategic heights it occupies in Siachen, Pakistani experts consider the glacial confrontation ‘resolvable’ — what with a blueprint inherited from 1989 and revisited in Track-2 military to military engagements. “The psychological factor of an understanding on Siachen will be huge,” said former Pakistan high commissioner to India Aziz Ahmed Khan. But for that to happen the two sides have to develop an equally huge reservoir of trust!
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Pathankot Investigation key to opening door to FS level parleys
The India-Pakistan relationship currently resembles a collage of circumspection and expectation — faint hope coexisting with old doubts.
On the face of it, either side appears in search of consensus within: New Delhi for initiating a comprehensive dialogue pushed back by Pathankot; Islamabad for going after Punjab-based anti-India groups that export terror to derail dialogue. The conflict in this confluence is between Pakistan wanting early resumption of foreign secretary-level talks while India bides time for ‘proof’ of an honest probe to catch the perpetrators of Pathankot.
The Narendra Modi regime is of the view the attack on the IAF base hurt the ambience the Indian Premier built for a full-blown dialogue by visiting Lahore to wish Nawaz Sharif on his birthday. Only a professional probe into the incident — complete with names of individuals and organisations that carried it out — could help get closer to the FS-level talks.
The ongoing engagement between the two countries’ national security advisers on terrorism has undoubtedly paid dividends, including useful intelligence exchange. But foreign secretary Jaishankar’s comment that dealing with terror took precedence over the comprehensive dialogue for now will stand until, at least, the arrival of the Pak probe team. Much would depend on the evidence they bring and the evidence they seek, said an Indian official.
There’s appreciation in Delhi of Pakistani NSA Lt Gen Naseer Janjua’s approach in his talks with India’s Ajit Doval. The tipoff he sent about a terror strike during Maha Shivratri was a refreshing change about which Pakistan’s interior minister Chaudhary Nisar has since briefed Parliament: “Such activities are carried out by non-state actors but we have to take the burden of responsibility.”
The initiative however would have little value unless the Pathankot case is taken to its logical conclusion.
“Pakistan shouldn’t be in denial mode. They should explain to us the compulsions that make them keep or not act against anti-India elements. We can disagree but can also understand their point,” remarked a highly-placed security official. He was responding to a close aide of Sharif who, in an informal interaction with Hindustan Times, called the Pathankot probe an “opportunity to assure each other of our commitment to counter terrorism.”
The Pak PM’s aide was simultaneously emphatic that progress with India on issues of concern to his country would help the Sharif regime build a political consensus – of the kind it has behind the army action on the Af-Pak border – to go after groups active in the eastern flank.
He flagged issues such as Siachen, Sir Creek, Kashmir, trade and terrorism to clarify: “We aren’t insisting on identical pace. But FS-level talks need to be made a normal process…”
The spread of groups like Jaish-e-Mohammad and the Lashkar-e-Taiba in Pakistan’s Punjab province and beyond through a network of mosques, seminaries and even kindergarten schools affords them a socio-religious clout, officials there insist, and it can only be progressively diminished.
What made the challenge even more formidable were their linkages with elements in security-intelligence agencies.
“We have taken a decision in principle to fight all of them. But you must appreciate we cannot go after them at the same time,” the official remarked.
He said Sharif has taken a strategic decision, with the Army on the same page, to improve ties with India. But he wasn’t sure whether the Modi regime has reached that point yet.
For his part, the Indian official said: “Pakistan’s legitimacy is down internationally. It should realise that India can help regain it better than even the US. Four our part, we have to assure them that our growth will not weaken them but will be for them a source of stability and strength. They in return should stop blaming us for their faults and resort to a proxy war…”
In short, things could move forward if Pakistan carries out ‘bona fide’ probe into Pathankot with tangible results.
Once trust develops, all issues that are doable can be taken up—and that includes Siachen. The possibility of Modi and Sharif catching up during the March 31-April 1 Nuclear Summit in Washington is there. They also have a meeting window in the India-Pak T-20 match.
Noting is confirmed. But then surprises are becoming commonplace in our bilateral ties.
Author of the following two articles Vinod Sharma visited Pakistan as a CRSS guest for lectures in February 2016