In My View

Catch me if you can!

Pakistan is playing the familiar game. But what else could it do under the circumstances. After 9/11, it had made a 180-degree turn and had disavowed its long standing association with the Taliban regime of Afghanistan. It had then let the US and allies use military bases in Pakistan for launching their ‘regime changing’ expeditions across the country’s western frontiers.

But as later experiences have revealed the Pakistan state avoided an existential crisis of it’s own by a diabolical ploy. Knowing well that important and significant sections of its own people were in close dalliance with the Taliban, Islamabad and Rawalpindi had winked and nodded when Mullah Omar and his close lieutenants had crossed over with their tails between their legs from Afghanistan. The latter had found refuge in the Pushtoon dominated north western parts of Pakistan where they now continue to reside and dream of returning to Kabul. Even key al Qaeda leaders had melded in that crowd and had sought sanctuary there.

Even now when the Pakistan army and air force lead military actions in those parts of the country, they do it with great ‘sensitivity’ about the level of harm they should cause to these ‘guests.’ A perennial complaint of Islamabad’s US allies is about this undue reticence in hitting targets by Pakistan’s marksmen. The new US president-elect, Barack Obama hopes to correct the situation when he is in the saddle post-January 20.

But Pakistan is not similarly beholden to India in the way it is to the West. Islamabad does not have to kow-tow with angry Indian fulminations about taking action against all those who use its territory to wage war against New Delhi. The only real pressure that India can exert is moral. And morality is a highly discounted commodity these days in the bazaars of Lahore or Karachi.

However, amidst this rather bleak prognosis another element has got added recently. That is reflected in the commentaries of Pakistan’s intellectuals in the pages of its newspapers. They say that India does not pose an existential threat to Pakistan any longer. Presumably, any such threat, in their minds has been effectively countered by the nuclear weapons the country now possesses. But the real and present danger to the country now resides with the glassy-eyed jihadis, high on Wahabi Islam.

These groups have increased their state-less autonomy to such a high degree that Pakistan’s ruling elite now see them as threats to its own survival. No longer are they viewed like ‘guns on hire’ who could be directed against India – like in Kashmir – if only to cause death to the Indian nation by a thousand cuts.

There is also a growing appreciation in Pakistan that India is no longer in its league. India’s emergence as a power to reckon with has made these people recognise that whatever happens to India now causes a global impact. They are now thus seeking a modus vivendi to engage with India in a context, which does not seem too supine.

One model that is being talked about, now, in their country is the ‘regional’ approach. Apparently, this is the current favourite in the US among its fast dwindling corridors of power. In that light, the statement of the newly elected victor, Awami League’s Sheikh Hasina Wajed, in Bangladesh’s polls becomes important. That she has spoken about a South Asian regional task force on terrorism does not seem to be the product of her own imagination alone.

For India, that idea should sound promising especially considering that it emerged from Bangladesh, the other problem child of the sub-continent. There is always greater accountability if a mechanism is developed outside of the bilateral matrix, with multiple actors being involved in the exercise.

If that Hasina Wajed proposal reaches fruition, it would remove much of the cover under which Pakistan plays the game mentioned above. For, then evidence or proof of a situation would not lie in the realm of one or two, but would be examined by all the others of the region. And that would underline the acceptability of that ‘evidence.’

India should not nitpick too much when the proposal comes to the SAARC table about whether China should become a party to the ‘joint task force.’ Whatever New Delhi might imagine, the reality is that both Islamabad and Dhaka sees China as a hedge against a perceived Indian hegemony.

On the contrary, New Delhi might actually discover an ally in Beijing on issues of terrorism, especially since the latter seems so weary of challenging the global status quo at least for the next two decades. In fact, if Beijing were to become a party to the mechanism it would raise the level of the discourse from being strictly regional to global. That would guarantee a kind of attention, which would preclude any obfuscation by any other individual country or even, group.

In other words, what Mumbai mayhem had kicked off might prove to be seminal in the history of the troubled South Asian region, far outflanking any diversionary ploy that Pakistan could dream about under the circumstances. At the end, the memories of the people who lost their lives in the city during those last days of November, 2008 would be better served if something systemic changes in the sub-continent in the longer run.

Pinaki Bhattacharya, currently located in Kolkata, is a Special Correspondent with the Mathrubhumi, Kerala. He writes on Strategic Security issues. He can be contacted at pinaki63@dataone.in