THE judiciary is free to do what it wants so long as it does not impinge on the army’s sphere of influence. It is widely believed that the manner in which Nawaz Sharif was pushed out of power recently had the tacit consent of the Army, which wanted a more pliable dispensation.
The writing is on the wall that Pakistan is a failed state, regardless of what China, and in a sense the US, may do to prop it up. There are pockets of affluence and a lot of Gulf money has come in over the years, but the state is in real danger of becoming a pariah internationally, being a fountainhead of terror where extremism is being nurtured and protected.
Voices of sanity and progressive outlook do exist among the middle class but there is an undercurrent of hostility to modernism and an increasing intolerance of liberal thinking. The madrasas are still steeped in old thinking and there is state patronage for obscurantism.
The Army still calls the shots on crucial issues especially those having a bearing on relations with India, even as a democratically-elected government plays second fiddle to it, while pretending to be in command. There is talk from time to time of the Army grabbing power through a coup but in recent years the facade of democracy is being maintained.
The judiciary is free to do what it wants so long as it does not impinge on the army’s sphere of influence. It is widely believed that the manner in which Nawaz Sharif was pushed out of power recently had the tacit consent of the Army, which wanted a more pliable dispensation.
The Army indeed is in cahoots with the clergy or the mullahs to subserve its own partisan interests. It has a one-point agenda — to avenge the humiliation of the country when 93,000 of its troops were forced to lay down arms before the Indian Army at the end of the operations that led to the dismemberment of Pakistan and the birth of Bangladesh as a free country.
In all this bickering and obsessive malice, the goal of development is lost sight of as never before. The country is indeed just chugging along at a growth rate that is no one’s envy.
Pakistan has willy-nilly become a nuclear state with help from a recalcitrant China, a rebellious North Korea and the Gulf connection, but there is widespread fear among nations that the deadly nuclear weapons could fall into wrong hands and wreak havoc at some stage if Pakistan remains unbridled.
If India gets wind that the Pakistanis are planning a nuclear strike, it could, with a pre-emptive strike, destroy the nuclear arsenal. There could, then, be serious repercussions for the civilian populace in Pakistan which could unwittingly come to grief in the crossfire. The Pakistanis take great pride and comfort in their nuclear status, oblivious of the fact that some sinister forces have covetous eyes on the nuclear facilities.
It goes without saying that India has to be on constant watch against a country that justifiably has taken on the form of a “rogue nation”. For its own survival, India cannot ignore the Pakistani nuclear threat.
There is also the growing threat from the growth of fundamentalism in Pakistan. Terrorists like Hafiz Saeed and Masood Azhar are roaming the streets freely, breathing fire against India, even as terrorist attacks in various countries show that Pakistan is the fulcrum of world terror activities.
The manner in which Hafiz Saeed, designated as a global terrorist by the UN as well as the US, was recently freed by a Pakistani court because repeated demands on the Pakistan government to file a charge sheet against him were ignored sent out an ominous message to the entire world. The US called for his re-arrest and proper trial, but the warning has so far fallen on deaf ears and for some reason the Americans are not pushing enough.
The US under Donald Trump is more inward-looking than ever in the recent past. It reacts to situations only according to its perceived self-interest and not in support of principles of establishing peace and order in the world at large. But it is bound to see merit in the long run in measures to nip terrorism in the bud in Pakistan.
Depending on Pakistan still as a means to control terror in Afghanistan from spreading to its shores, the US is committing a grave folly. How long will it wait in declaring Pakistan a terror state is a moot question, but the situation could force its hand in due course. Added to all other woes is the fact that the Chinese are, by building the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, striking at Pakistan’s sovereignty which could prove costly for Islamabad in the long run. This is like playing with fire.
The Pakistan government is blind to the dangers of leaning too heavily on Beijing. The fear that the country could end up as a virtual vassal state of China is brushed aside by Pakistanis who see in China a true friend and bulwark against India.
In potential, Chinese hegemony over a section of the world through control over the sea-lanes, the Pakistanis see a bright future for themselves as China’s prime friend but the fact of Chinese hegemony affecting their own fate is lost on them.
The US, too, is not about to surrender control over the sea-lanes to the Chinese. There will be a confrontation inevitably with the US, Japan, Australia and India arrayed on one side as a counterpoise against China.
Potentially, there can be little doubt that the China-Pakistan tie-up poses a grave challenge to the world. So long as Pakistan remains tied to Chinese apron-strings, there is much for India to be vigilant about.
The author is a political commentator and columnist. He has authored four books.
