With the ground realities in Afghanistan changing and changing really fast in favour of Pakistan, the establishment need not be accommodating towards India any more. What is worse for India is that the US administration now seems to be at its most vulnerable vis-à-vis its relations with Pakistan and its involvement in the Afghan conflict. Is it any wonder that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton seemed more than keen to humour her Pakistani hosts on her recent visit to that country? She even offered to help Pakistan sell its mangoes! Is it any wonder that the Americans reacted to the WikiLeaks controversy the way they have?
More than 92,000 classified documents pertaining to the war in Afghanistan were suddenly placed in the public domain. What do these leaks reveal? Nothing new. Nothing that India and Afghanistan haven’t known all along. They expose the nexus between the Pakistani military establishment and the ISI on the one hand and terror groups on the other. However, what has now become abundantly clear is that the Americans knew this all along but chose to look the other way. This is something the Indian intelligence community had long suspected any way, but always stopped short of going public about to avoid embarrassing their political masters.
So, as things stand now, the dice is heavily loaded in favour of Pakistan. With Hamid Karzai at the helm of affairs in Afghanistan who is favourably predisposed towards India, our strategists had tried to influence the course of events in that country. But, with Karzai’s own writ not running beyond Kabul, and with Indian nationals engaged in diplomatic and humanitarian activity in Afghanistan being attacked and eliminated ruthlessly, India is very much on the back foot. Meanwhile, the US is far too preoccupied with its own troubles at present to be interested in furthering India’s strategic interests in the region. That is what makes Pakistan feel invincible as things stand now. That is what makes its leaders so belligerent and unreasonable in their interaction with India.
However, these are all relatively recent events in the sad saga of Indo-Pak relations, which is the topic of this and earlier posts. The question I have tried to consider is “Will Indo-Pak relations ever be good?” The answer is neither short nor simple. It is far too complex and has a long history to it. In fact, it goes all the way back to the creation of Pakistan itself. And, that is what we shall dwell on in my next post.
* To be continued...
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Will Indo-Pak relations ever be good? (Part 3)
Afghanistan has always been central to Pakistan’s strategic interests in the region. Its military planners have often referred to what they call “strategic depth” that a pro-Pakistan regime in Afghanistan would offer them vis-à-vis India. What precisely this so-called “strategic depth” implies in terms of geo-political advantages remains open to debate. Anyway, with Shiite Iran to the northwest of Aghanistan, which is not exactly an ally of predominantly Sunni Pakistan, Afghanistan is more than just a handy buffer. It also offers a strategic advantage to Pakistan in its attempt to control the trade routes with Central Asian republics.
Afghanistan has also been more than useful to Pakistan’s strategists in dealing with the US. Ever since 9/11, the US has had its gaze transfixed on Afghanistan. The presence of Osama bin Laden and his benefactors, the Taliban, in the Af-Pak region along the porous borders in the Pashtun-dominated areas has remained a cause of concern for the US. That is why every US administration has sought to link its economic and military aid to Pakistan to the latter’s active cooperation in capturing the top leadership of Al-Qaeda and neutralising its cadres, other than suppressing the Taliban in Afghanistan. For Pakistan to be able to do this, it has had to move much of its armed forces to its western borders.
Many in the Pakistani army and the ISI have never been happy about fighting the Taliban. They have played an active role in nurturing the Taliban since the days of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. They have armed them to the teeth and indoctrinated them with radical, jehadi ideology. And, with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the end of the cold war, and the withdrawal of Russian forces from Afghanistan, the Taliban has been a useful weapon in the hands of the Pakistani army and the ISI in its covert, low-intensity war with India in Kashmir. So, destroying its own creation has never found acceptance in the Pakistani security establishment.
These geo-political compulsions dictated by foreign policy hawks within the Pakistani establishment have resulted in a duplicitous double game that Pakistan has played to perfection. Every time its armed forces make gains against the Taliban or Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, there is a terror strike in India. This makes the Indian government react with anger that is followed by the usual sabre-rattling that accompanies it to appease the Indian public. The attack on the Indian parliament when Atal Behari Vajpayee was the prime minister is a typical case in point, which best demonstrates the efficacy of this long-standing strategy of Pakistan.
After that attack on the Indian parliament, public opinion was very much in favour of some kind of action against Pakistan. What exactly this ought to have been was hazy and difficult to determine at the time. Vajpayee decided to rattle the Pakistani establishment. He ordered an unprecedented military buildup along the Indo-Pak border. His speeches began to talk of retribution. “Do do hath ho hi jaye”, he thundered. This made Pakistan respond by relocating its own armed forces to its border with India. The establishment moved its troops bordering Afghanistan in the northwest to its eastern frontier with its traditional foe, India. This it portrayed, to its benefactors like the US, as being defensive action. And, the Americans fell for it. The noose that had begun to tighten around the necks of the Afghan Taliban and the Al-Qaeda was loosened. These forces got a badly-needed reprieve.
* To be continued...
Afghanistan has also been more than useful to Pakistan’s strategists in dealing with the US. Ever since 9/11, the US has had its gaze transfixed on Afghanistan. The presence of Osama bin Laden and his benefactors, the Taliban, in the Af-Pak region along the porous borders in the Pashtun-dominated areas has remained a cause of concern for the US. That is why every US administration has sought to link its economic and military aid to Pakistan to the latter’s active cooperation in capturing the top leadership of Al-Qaeda and neutralising its cadres, other than suppressing the Taliban in Afghanistan. For Pakistan to be able to do this, it has had to move much of its armed forces to its western borders.
Many in the Pakistani army and the ISI have never been happy about fighting the Taliban. They have played an active role in nurturing the Taliban since the days of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. They have armed them to the teeth and indoctrinated them with radical, jehadi ideology. And, with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the end of the cold war, and the withdrawal of Russian forces from Afghanistan, the Taliban has been a useful weapon in the hands of the Pakistani army and the ISI in its covert, low-intensity war with India in Kashmir. So, destroying its own creation has never found acceptance in the Pakistani security establishment.
These geo-political compulsions dictated by foreign policy hawks within the Pakistani establishment have resulted in a duplicitous double game that Pakistan has played to perfection. Every time its armed forces make gains against the Taliban or Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, there is a terror strike in India. This makes the Indian government react with anger that is followed by the usual sabre-rattling that accompanies it to appease the Indian public. The attack on the Indian parliament when Atal Behari Vajpayee was the prime minister is a typical case in point, which best demonstrates the efficacy of this long-standing strategy of Pakistan.
After that attack on the Indian parliament, public opinion was very much in favour of some kind of action against Pakistan. What exactly this ought to have been was hazy and difficult to determine at the time. Vajpayee decided to rattle the Pakistani establishment. He ordered an unprecedented military buildup along the Indo-Pak border. His speeches began to talk of retribution. “Do do hath ho hi jaye”, he thundered. This made Pakistan respond by relocating its own armed forces to its border with India. The establishment moved its troops bordering Afghanistan in the northwest to its eastern frontier with its traditional foe, India. This it portrayed, to its benefactors like the US, as being defensive action. And, the Americans fell for it. The noose that had begun to tighten around the necks of the Afghan Taliban and the Al-Qaeda was loosened. These forces got a badly-needed reprieve.
* To be continued...
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Will Indo-Pak relations ever be good? (Part 2)
As it turns out, our much-maligned home secretary’s remarks to The Indian Express were not off-the-cuff personal opinions after all. G.K. Pillai was only stating what had come to light during the interrogation of David Coleman Headley in the United States. It has now become abundantly clear that Pakistan’s ISI did not just have a peripheral role in the 26/11 carnage in Mumbai. They actively planned and executed the entire operation.
If that is indeed the case, it is not just a random act of terror by “non-state actors”, a term the Pakistani establishment is particularly fond of using, but a carefully calibrated act by the Pakistani state itself against India. And, if that is indeed well established, then in perhaps any other country of the world it would have been construed to have been an act of war. So then, is the Opposition unjustified in demanding an explanation from the UPA Government? Are they wrong when they object to talking with Pakistan?
The question is what has made Pakistan so belligerent in recent times? What has made even super powers like the United States, on whose economic and military aid Pakistan heavily relies, totally ineffective in reining in an adventurist Pakistani army? The answer lies in the turn of events across the Durand Line in Afghanistan. Thanks to increasing domestic pressure, coupled with the responsibility of having to honour his election pledge, Obama seeks a speedy withdrawal of the US forces from Afghan soil. The thinking among his NATO allies is not entirely dissimilar.
Meanwhile, the ground realities in Afghanistan have turned much to Pakistan’s strategic advantage. They know the western armed forces are weary of war in a theatre of conflict in which they see no direct stake. They are more than keen in handing over charge to a fledgling Afghan army and police force by 2014, a decision at least Obama has taken for the US forces. In the mean time, the Afghan Taliban have regrouped and look stronger now than in the recent past, especially in the Pashtun areas adjoining Pakistan.
The Pakistani establishment, particularly its army, has always patronised the Afghan Taliban even as it has sought to crush its counterpart within its frontiers. Pakistan sees itself holding all the aces at present. No withdrawal of the allied forces can take place without some kind of a deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan. Even the Hamid Karzai government in Kabul seems to have reconciled itself to this fact. Any future administration in Afghanistan which is propped up by the Taliban is bound to be favourably predisposed towards Pakistan and inimical to Indian interests in the region.
Pakistan has played its Afghan card brilliantly. More, in my next post…
* To be continued...
If that is indeed the case, it is not just a random act of terror by “non-state actors”, a term the Pakistani establishment is particularly fond of using, but a carefully calibrated act by the Pakistani state itself against India. And, if that is indeed well established, then in perhaps any other country of the world it would have been construed to have been an act of war. So then, is the Opposition unjustified in demanding an explanation from the UPA Government? Are they wrong when they object to talking with Pakistan?
The question is what has made Pakistan so belligerent in recent times? What has made even super powers like the United States, on whose economic and military aid Pakistan heavily relies, totally ineffective in reining in an adventurist Pakistani army? The answer lies in the turn of events across the Durand Line in Afghanistan. Thanks to increasing domestic pressure, coupled with the responsibility of having to honour his election pledge, Obama seeks a speedy withdrawal of the US forces from Afghan soil. The thinking among his NATO allies is not entirely dissimilar.
Meanwhile, the ground realities in Afghanistan have turned much to Pakistan’s strategic advantage. They know the western armed forces are weary of war in a theatre of conflict in which they see no direct stake. They are more than keen in handing over charge to a fledgling Afghan army and police force by 2014, a decision at least Obama has taken for the US forces. In the mean time, the Afghan Taliban have regrouped and look stronger now than in the recent past, especially in the Pashtun areas adjoining Pakistan.
The Pakistani establishment, particularly its army, has always patronised the Afghan Taliban even as it has sought to crush its counterpart within its frontiers. Pakistan sees itself holding all the aces at present. No withdrawal of the allied forces can take place without some kind of a deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan. Even the Hamid Karzai government in Kabul seems to have reconciled itself to this fact. Any future administration in Afghanistan which is propped up by the Taliban is bound to be favourably predisposed towards Pakistan and inimical to Indian interests in the region.
Pakistan has played its Afghan card brilliantly. More, in my next post…
* To be continued...
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Will Indo-Pak relations ever be good?
Yet another attempt at kick-starting the dialogue process with Pakistan has come a cropper. Viewing the televised Qureshi-Krishna joint press conference live from Islamabad was as amusing as it was upsetting. Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the foreign minister of Pakistan snubbed his Indian counterpart in his characteristically arrogant fashion. And, our external affairs minister, the meek-as-a-mouse S.M. Krishna sat next to him looking quite out of depth in the arena of international diplomacy. Perhaps, he would have been better off crossing swords with the likes of Deve Gowda in his native Kannada in the Vidhan Soudha in Bangalore. He seemed totally ill-equipped to match his wits with Qureshi, the hawkish, India-baiting, feudal from Pakistani Punjab.
It was not an anti-climax that the contrived bonhomie between the two interlocutors evaporated as quickly as rainwater in a desert. The press conference soon degenerated into a public display of the complexities and contradictions that plague Indo-Pak relations. It became clear that the talks had failed to make much headway. Shah Mehmood Qureshi’s public pronouncements only added fuel to fire. While his Indian counterpart was still on Pakistani soil, Qureshi queered the pitch further by claiming that Krishna did not have a clear mandate and that he kept taking phone calls from New Delhi. He, of course, retracted a part of that statement subsequently, by clarifying that he had not meant to say Krishna himself took calls, but much damage had already been done by then.
Obviously, talks progressed well when proceedings commenced. A joint press statement acceptable to both sides and addressing each other’s core concerns seemed a certainty. However, somewhere along the way, things seemed to have gone horribly wrong. General Kayani latched on to the opportunity provided by our indiscreet home secretary, G.K. Pillai. In an open interaction with The Indian Express on the eve of the talks, Pillai had blamed the ISI for masterminding and controlling the entire 26/11 operation in Mumbai. General Kayani met President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani before S.M. Krishna could be granted an audience with them. Whatever transpired between the Pakistani general and Pakistan's civilian leadership at that time, the atmosphere became irreversibly vitiated after that.
Expectedly, our opposition parties back home in India cried foul and wasted no time in denouncing the government for having bent over backwards to talk with an intransigent Pakistan. Qureshi was dubbed “uncouth” and accused of being somebody who was “lacking in diplomatic etiquette”. This was not entirely unjustified, given the man’s penchant for giving a go-by to diplomatic niceties when it comes to expressing his views on India and Indian leaders. The outcome of these parleys was perhaps made to look even worse than it actually was due to the media hype that built up quickly over them.
So then, has nothing been gained from this latest round of talks between the two countries? Are we back to square one? Is there a way forward? Can we break the deadlock? Is peace possible? Can Indo-Pak relations ever be good? I will be considering these questions in the next few posts…
It was not an anti-climax that the contrived bonhomie between the two interlocutors evaporated as quickly as rainwater in a desert. The press conference soon degenerated into a public display of the complexities and contradictions that plague Indo-Pak relations. It became clear that the talks had failed to make much headway. Shah Mehmood Qureshi’s public pronouncements only added fuel to fire. While his Indian counterpart was still on Pakistani soil, Qureshi queered the pitch further by claiming that Krishna did not have a clear mandate and that he kept taking phone calls from New Delhi. He, of course, retracted a part of that statement subsequently, by clarifying that he had not meant to say Krishna himself took calls, but much damage had already been done by then.
Obviously, talks progressed well when proceedings commenced. A joint press statement acceptable to both sides and addressing each other’s core concerns seemed a certainty. However, somewhere along the way, things seemed to have gone horribly wrong. General Kayani latched on to the opportunity provided by our indiscreet home secretary, G.K. Pillai. In an open interaction with The Indian Express on the eve of the talks, Pillai had blamed the ISI for masterminding and controlling the entire 26/11 operation in Mumbai. General Kayani met President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani before S.M. Krishna could be granted an audience with them. Whatever transpired between the Pakistani general and Pakistan's civilian leadership at that time, the atmosphere became irreversibly vitiated after that.
Expectedly, our opposition parties back home in India cried foul and wasted no time in denouncing the government for having bent over backwards to talk with an intransigent Pakistan. Qureshi was dubbed “uncouth” and accused of being somebody who was “lacking in diplomatic etiquette”. This was not entirely unjustified, given the man’s penchant for giving a go-by to diplomatic niceties when it comes to expressing his views on India and Indian leaders. The outcome of these parleys was perhaps made to look even worse than it actually was due to the media hype that built up quickly over them.
So then, has nothing been gained from this latest round of talks between the two countries? Are we back to square one? Is there a way forward? Can we break the deadlock? Is peace possible? Can Indo-Pak relations ever be good? I will be considering these questions in the next few posts…
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
A poem penned while at college...
This poem, which I wrote when I was 20 years old, is special to me for several reasons. First, it was my first serious attempt at poetry. Second, it was published in my college magazine. I went to Fergusson College. And third, it was appreciated by my professors of English, some of who told me personally how much they had liked it.
The poem has been written in "free verse" and dwells on a common human experience. Read on...
Three hours and a quarter after dusk
When oft-times I retire
To enjoy a well-earned rest
After a laborious day
And, when my back meets my bed
In a tight embrace
My flesh frail, dormant lays
As if it were a body
That was from its soul divorced!
But, my mind refuses to go my body’s way
And, rises like mist to meet a deep dark sky
Over valleys deep and mountains high
Where sweet dreams and fleeting fantasies
Like a magnificent bird fly
Across my imagination’s airspace...
My mind, much like a busy bee
Flits across with youthful energy
After courting every fantasy’s flower
Its sweet nectar to suck
Returns to its temple
Wherein to prepare
Sweet honey of deep sleep
To preserve me for another day!
All those of you who appreciate poetry, do let me know what you make of it. Thank you.
The poem has been written in "free verse" and dwells on a common human experience. Read on...
Three hours and a quarter after dusk
When oft-times I retire
To enjoy a well-earned rest
After a laborious day
And, when my back meets my bed
In a tight embrace
My flesh frail, dormant lays
As if it were a body
That was from its soul divorced!
But, my mind refuses to go my body’s way
And, rises like mist to meet a deep dark sky
Over valleys deep and mountains high
Where sweet dreams and fleeting fantasies
Like a magnificent bird fly
Across my imagination’s airspace...
My mind, much like a busy bee
Flits across with youthful energy
After courting every fantasy’s flower
Its sweet nectar to suck
Returns to its temple
Wherein to prepare
Sweet honey of deep sleep
To preserve me for another day!
All those of you who appreciate poetry, do let me know what you make of it. Thank you.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Remembering MJ — one year on...
It is just over a year now that the world on this side of the Atlantic woke up to the chilling news. I still remember those disturbing pictures on CNN. I had just got out of bed and was having a shave. As my gaze alternated between my stubble-ridden chin and the TV screen, my heart missed a beat or two. Still pictures of attempts to revive Michael Jackson, in the ambulance that drove him to the hospital, will remain etched in my memory forever. As news trickled in and his death was confirmed, my mind raced back in time…
I was still a teenager when a young singer shot into fame. He was young and innocent, and still black. Money and fame had not tainted him yet. He was still known as one of the 'Jackson 5', when not many music lovers outside America knew him. But, that state of bliss was soon to be over, never to return. He won award after award and his chartbusting music broke every record there was to break. Fame and money became his constant companions and the world of music was at his feet. He became the presiding deity in the pantheon of demi-gods of pop music. Life was never the same again.
Michael shocked the world by the way he died, just as he had shocked the world by the way he lived. His obsession with cosmetic surgery and skin bleaching agents, his addiction to prescription drugs, his controversial marriage and the manner in which he chose to have his children, all of it kept the paparazzi busy. Add to that child molestation charges and allegations of paedophilia and paederasty, and his life was the stuff of a best-selling novel. Reviled as much as he was adored, the beleaguered celebrity withdrew into a shell. And, that was the beginning of the end.
He became increasingly paranoid of the outside world and converted his own home into a fortress. He surrounded himself by paid henchmen who gradually took complete control of his life. As he sank into depression and began to suffer from myriad forms of psychosomatic illnesses, he turned to prescription drugs, an overdose of which finally cut short his life. A deadly cocktail of anti-depressants, pain-killers and anti-anxiety medication proved too much for his frail and much-abused body to handle. The writing was on the wall. What happened had to happen. It was just a matter of time.
What pains me and many others is the hypocrisy of the world. When the man was alive they wouldn’t leave him alone and give him his space. He was harassed and hounded, reviled and persecuted. Once in the wake of the child molestation allegations, some investigating police officials who raided his mansion humiliated him by going so far as taking pictures of his private parts! The media carried on a vilification campaign against him. Imagine the mental state of a lonely celebrity under such extenuating circumstances. The deadly drugs that killed him eventually, only drove the final nail into his coffin.
The moment he died, though, he regained his crown of King of Pop. He was hailed as a legend. All his faults and foibles were whitewashed by crocodile tears shed by a fawning media. Now that he had become “late”, automatically, he seemed to have become “great”. MJ was not the first celebrity to have been treated this way, and will probably not be the last. Does it have to be this way? Must we kill people for their sins, and then elevate them to the status of demi-gods to wash away our own?
I was still a teenager when a young singer shot into fame. He was young and innocent, and still black. Money and fame had not tainted him yet. He was still known as one of the 'Jackson 5', when not many music lovers outside America knew him. But, that state of bliss was soon to be over, never to return. He won award after award and his chartbusting music broke every record there was to break. Fame and money became his constant companions and the world of music was at his feet. He became the presiding deity in the pantheon of demi-gods of pop music. Life was never the same again.
Michael shocked the world by the way he died, just as he had shocked the world by the way he lived. His obsession with cosmetic surgery and skin bleaching agents, his addiction to prescription drugs, his controversial marriage and the manner in which he chose to have his children, all of it kept the paparazzi busy. Add to that child molestation charges and allegations of paedophilia and paederasty, and his life was the stuff of a best-selling novel. Reviled as much as he was adored, the beleaguered celebrity withdrew into a shell. And, that was the beginning of the end.
He became increasingly paranoid of the outside world and converted his own home into a fortress. He surrounded himself by paid henchmen who gradually took complete control of his life. As he sank into depression and began to suffer from myriad forms of psychosomatic illnesses, he turned to prescription drugs, an overdose of which finally cut short his life. A deadly cocktail of anti-depressants, pain-killers and anti-anxiety medication proved too much for his frail and much-abused body to handle. The writing was on the wall. What happened had to happen. It was just a matter of time.
What pains me and many others is the hypocrisy of the world. When the man was alive they wouldn’t leave him alone and give him his space. He was harassed and hounded, reviled and persecuted. Once in the wake of the child molestation allegations, some investigating police officials who raided his mansion humiliated him by going so far as taking pictures of his private parts! The media carried on a vilification campaign against him. Imagine the mental state of a lonely celebrity under such extenuating circumstances. The deadly drugs that killed him eventually, only drove the final nail into his coffin.
The moment he died, though, he regained his crown of King of Pop. He was hailed as a legend. All his faults and foibles were whitewashed by crocodile tears shed by a fawning media. Now that he had become “late”, automatically, he seemed to have become “great”. MJ was not the first celebrity to have been treated this way, and will probably not be the last. Does it have to be this way? Must we kill people for their sins, and then elevate them to the status of demi-gods to wash away our own?
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