Where have we to go

Track II and III circles are agog and the governments are engaged in frenetic activity to restore normal relations between India and Pakistan. The whole world favours the burying of the hatchet between these two nuclear powers. Is peace beginning to break out? It is too early to say.

What is happening is a rather limited normalisation between the two rivals. Pakistan originally wanted to restore the Pak-India ties to the level of December 12, 2001, i.e. before India broke off most links. It appears that momentum of events might force the two to go beyond this limit.

One reason forcing the pace, apart from major powers' prodding, is the Islamabad Summit of the Saarc. This implies multiple but minor pressures on the two bigger member states: the governments and the public opinion of SAARC countries does not want SAARC to be a hostage to Indo-Pakistan quarrels. There is also the inherent appeal of regional cooperation.

Most important reason is international pressure on both New Delhi and Islamabad to change their inflexible stances on Kashmir that left no scope for compromise. It is led by the sole superpower, though EU, China and Russia are supporting the desire to effect at least a detente between these powers. It is not clear if the US is suggesting a Kashmir solution as a guarantee of stable peace in the region. The four options for a Kashmir solution, now in the air, are meant as agenda for drawn out negotiations, while normalisation plus a military dŽtente (CBMs) based on stoppage of Jihad take care of a possible conflict.

Role of non-official peacemakers (tracks II and III) is important, though official bureaucracies' cussedness had greatly hampered them. Perhaps bureaucracies need not be blamed; they do what their political masters tell them. Recent events have demonstrated that the common people on both sides want nothing but peace and friendship between India and Pakistan. Here a clarification is necessary.

The original track II diplomats were first assembled by the Americans for assisting the two governments. They comprised influential members of the ruling establishments or were otherwise close to them. Ideas discussed at their level did not commit the governments while consensus thus arrived at can safely be pondered over by the real rulers. This track II, a convenience for the governments, should be sharply distinguished from track III wallahs who are primarily representatives of the people of the respective countries (civil society) and can ignore what governments think or say on any issue.

The much postponed sixth Joint Convention of Pakistan-India Peoples Forum for Peace and Democracy, recently held in Karachi, illustrates what Track III can do. The kind of comfortable agreement that was witnessed on most issues on which the two civil societies' representatives pondered was heart-warming. How representative the two delegations were can possibly be questioned. There was preponderance of left and liberals on both sides, though the right-wingers were not absent. True, stalwarts of the right like Ram Jethmalani did not turn up. On the whole, the two sets of delegates did represent most schools of thought.

There was unanimity over the main aim of the Forum: a people-to-people reconciliation between the peoples of India and Pakistan so as to banish inter-state as well as inter-people conflict, especially communal politics and riots or pogroms. The Convention recommended a 25 per cent reduction in the armies and a number of measures to demilitarise the society on both sides. It visualised a non-nuclear South Asia, at peace within itself and working for popular welfare and democracy. It denied Kashmir was a territorial dispute; Kashmiris' wishes were recognised as the criterion for a solution of the problem.

Among the old and young - yes there were students and young people on both sides - the upsurge of friendly feelings was evident. Convention was mainly engaged in rational discussion but sentiment of love broke loose outside the discussion hall or rooms and during cultural programmes. On departures, some delegates burst into tears.

This is an important element in the situation, though it has to contend with powerful, entrenched interests in politics, ruling establishments and of course governments and bureaucracies. Pak India cold war, interspersed with hot ones, and arms races have created powerful vested interests on either side to keep the two countries on the edge of perpetual war. These interests dominate governments. This hard fact has to be remembered to guard against easily aroused high expectations about peace as soon as government leaders shake hands. A long hard struggle in order to reach the shores of peace and reconciliation impends; governments are capable of throwing snares across people's path. They need to be aware.

For setting the course basic questions have to be asked: what is it that Pakistanis should strive for? Is it Pakistan's or Islam's glory that is the ultimate aim which the state should achieve? If so, what is the relationship of this aim with that of all the people's human rights and their material well-being, including the vital necessity of social security for citizens? Can these two goals co-exist? If so why not demand full fundamental rights and social security for all in a clear, coherent and credible manner?

Also, what about Kashmir? Is the aim its inclusion in Pakistan? Or is it the Kashmir people's right of self-determination that Pakistan should seek? In the latter case, other questions arise: Will Pakistanis abide by Kashmiris freely expressed wishes, if their decision goes against a Pakistan that is perpetually under military occupation? There is another basic question: Does this Kashmir commitment override the earlier formulated main aim? Can Pakistan envisage a solution other than UN-supervised plebiscite as visualised by Gen. Musharraf? What about the people's wishes if Kashmiris' rights are Pakistan's criterion.

It is not a matter of cleverly used words. It will affect the lives of common and desperately poor folks. It is the rich who can afford to involve the country and the people in airy-fairy objectives that seem noble but have negative effect on poverty stricken sections of population. Clarification of aims is crucial for fixing priorities and the criteria of governmental actions. All political parties and rulers should be forced to disclose their aims, priorities, objectives and their criteria. That will make politics rational and democratic.

As for relations with India, common Pakistanis should insist on the desired relationship. Time was when demagogues talked of a thousand year war with India. In changed circumstances the people want to arrive at agreements and to solve the Kashmir problem. Lately Islamabad began its peace offensive. It came not a day too soon. Peace is what suits Pakistan and peace is a high enough objective in its own right.

Anyhow relations with India need especially careful thought. After all Pakistan has fought three and a half wars and has run an open ended arms race with it. The arms race now encompasses nuclear weapons and missiles; it is becoming impossible for Pakistanis to keep up with Indian Joneses; there are just not enough resources. Even if it had those resources, it would be a stupid policy to waste them in destructive arms races.

India is Pakistan's closest neighbour, the way Afghanistan or China are not. Pakistan itself came out of India's womb. It was claimed as a solution of India's festering communal problem. All its problems deal in one way or another with India. And the origins of both are in the same history and the Indo-Persian civilization that grew around India's central authority, Muslim in middle ages. But the fate of each is a matter for the other's concern - despite the 80 year long legacy of hate and conflict and nuclear weapons.

Despite the obvious hatred of India or of Pakistan in India, whenever common people of India and Pakistan come face to face, they are attracted to each other the way no other two peoples do. One's inference is that these relations are ambivalent: if the wave of friendship and cooperation were to prevail, scope of friendly cooperation becomes unlimited. But should leadership foment hatred, the era of distrust and conflict can be sustained, as indeed happened from the second decade of Twentieth Century-but was not the case earlier.

It will be economically ruinous, socially futile and politically dangerous to continue along the present path. There is no option but to change tack and reverse the trend of communal distrust and emphasising separatism. Pakistan can reverse, work for genuine friendship - from the grassroots up-cooperate and rely on strong a millennium-old commonalities. United voice of India and Pakistan will make a tremendous difference to Asia and the world. Today, they undercut each other. If both cooperate bilaterally and regionally the whole world will take note of a new factor. If a progressively greater proportion of resources is devoted to development based on meeting human needs of the millions in both the countries, eradication of the direr forms of poverty will take no longer than a decade or so.