Pathankot attack: Talks with Pakistan a must but focus should be terror, says editor of pro-RSS weekly

He said that perhaps more than pressure from India, it is pressure from China and the US which is forcing Pakistan to come to the dialogue table.

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Security personnel at the Pathankot airbase during PM Narendra Modi’s visit, Saturday. Gurmeet Singh

Insisting that talks with Pakistan must go on, Prafulla Ketkar, editor of RSS inspired weekly Organiser, Saturday said talks should however address terrorism. “Talks should go on with Pakistan but they (talks) have to be on terror; both countries have to walk the talk on terror,” Ketkar, who was in Jaipur Saturday, told The Sunday Express in the wake of the Pathankot terror attack.

He said that perhaps more than pressure from India, it is pressure from China and the US which is forcing Pakistan to come to the dialogue table. “If the dialogue breaks, India has nothing to lose and Pakistan has everything to lose,” said Ketkar.

He said Pakistani Army survives on “anti-India sentiment” on one hand and financial support from the US and arms from China on the other, but now time has come to choose between the two. “I feel Pakistan military has come to a point where they have to downplay anti-India sentiment for direct monetary benefit from US. This is the first time India has achieved that, not only through US but through China too,” he said.

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He added that “revenge attacks” since the 2007 Pakistani military operation on Red Mosque have led to deaths of about 40 Chinese nationals. “Pakistani military could not save them, which shows that it is losing control in these regions and this is a serious concern for China.

So these pressures are working and India is leveraging them,” he said, adding, “It is the first time Pakistani military, ISI and Pakistani PM have met thrice in two days.” He also claimed there will be action against terrorists Hafiz Saeed and Dawood Ibrahim in time to come.

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