The Indian Prime Minister has been invited by his Pakistani counterpart Shehbaz Sharif for the meeting of the heads of government of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization due to be held in Islamabad in coming October. There is no indication as yet whether Modi will attend. However, from the remarks of Foreign Minister S Jaishankar it seemed the government was not inclined to accept Sharif’s invite. When asked at a book review event in the national capital last week Jaishankar said, “The era of uninterrupted dialogue with Pakistan is over. Actions have consequences. Insofar as J&K is concerned Article 370 is done…” Quite clearly, the MEA reflected the well-known view of the ruling party that without calling an end to its terrorist activity there could be no question of a dialogue with Pakistan. The Congress approach of a structured dialogue in the hope that something good might come, and the tensions between the two neighbouring countries could be reduced, if not altogether removed, did not find favour with the BJP. Though both Prime Minister Vajpayee, and even Modi early in his first stint, did extend the hand of friendship to our western neighbour, both had found the goodwill gesture spurned. Indeed, even while Vajpayee was seeking to build bridges of understanding and friendship in Lahore, it subsequently turned out, the permanent establishment in Islamabad was in the advanced stages of implementing the Kargil aggression against this country. The rest, as they say, is history. As for Modi, in a surprise detour on his way back from Afghanistan, he had landed in Lahore to attend the wedding of the granddaughter of then Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in December 2015. That both Vajpayee and Modi with these goodwill gestures intended to improve ties with Pakistan is undeniable. And it makes sense for any Indian Prime Minister to try and do so, given the long shared history and the close people-to-people ties.
Centuries of shared socio-cultural ties cannot be obliterated with the demarcation of a boundary on the ground. But, unfortunately, every time successive Indian leaders have sought to put Indo-Pak relations on an even keel, and encourage closer people-to-people contact, each time the permanent establishment in Islamabad has rebuffed them, playing the spoilsport. It may sound a hackneyed argument but it is true that unless the Pakistani army can be taken out of the Indo-Pak equation there can be no genuine peace between the two countries. Despite a section of the people, particularly the sizeable Muslim population and, of course, the bleeding hearts of the secular-liberal brigade who light candles at the Wagah border amidst the popping of news camera flash lights, pressing for talks with Pakistan completely ignoring the ISI-induced terror operations against this country ought to be a big no-no. We cannot talk while Pakistan is plotting another Kargil-type or Pulwama-type attack. That the Pakistani army has not given up its evil single-point agenda to stay relevant and rule the roost over the long-suffering, poverty-stricken people of Pakistan is also amply clear from the stepped-up terror attacks in recent weeks in Jammu. The ISI appears to want to destabilise the Jammu region now, after it had substantially penetrated Kashmir with its sleeper agents and active operatives among the lay people. And with that objective in view, a slow but certain effort has been underway for some time to alter the demographic character of the Jammu region as well. The pressure on the Indian security forces in the Valley coupled with the heightened threat of terrorist attacks in Jammu may have become a new headache for the Indian government but that will not, cannot, cause it to bow under the pressure of Terror Inc in the Rawalpindi GHQ.
The late US President John F Kennedy had said that nations should not negotiate out of fear but nonetheless should never fear to negotiate. In the Indo-Pak context, however, when the outcome of each such high-table pow-wow is a foregone conclusion, with the ISI determined to persist with its jihadi operations, come what may, while the Pak PMs like the Sharif brothers are made to look silly and helpless nobodies by the army brass, no purpose may be served by the Indian Prime Minister showing up for photo-ops in Islamabad next October. As it is, the SCO is widely regarded as a China-dominated outfit meant as a counterpoint to NATO, and India cannot be seen participating actively in its superficial deliberations, that too when the host country itself is in the throes of a veritable crisis of its own economic and political survival. That the poor people of Pakistan are reeling under back-breaking consumer inflation and its government lives on sufferance, with its most popular leader locked up arbitrarily by the army generals on trumped-up charges, is another good reason to decline the Pak invite. Another may be the widely suspected ISI hand in the anti-India activities in Bangladesh following the overthrow of the popularly elected Sheikh Hasina government. As it happens, in the past the PM has only attended SCO summits of its heads of states, not governments. He cannot be seen to be making an exception this time. With the post-Article 370 poll in J&K due to be held around the same time, it may not be advisable even otherwise for the Indian PM to attend the SCO meet in Islamabad.
