Breakdown averted, breakthrough awaited

The bad news, however, is that India and Pakistan are yet to iron out the two hard wrinkles on the fabric of the peace process.

One is how to address the question of Jammu and Kashmir. The other is the relationship between progress on Jammu and Kashmir and the rest of the peace process.

On the first, India has apparently assured Aziz that there is no dilution in its commitment to sincerely explore all options for a negotiated settlement of Jammu-Kashmir.

There had been some concern in Pakistan that recent statements from India were signaling a lack of flexibility on the Kashmir negotiations.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s message to Aziz was simple: What he had said in Srinagar was no different from the Indian positions he had conveyed to the President of Pakistan General Pervez Musharraf in New York on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly on September 24.

The thrust of the consistent Indian line is that it will not countenance another territorial partition of the country. And within that all-important benchmark, India would be prepared to explore creative options on Jammu-Kashmir.

Those reassurances look good enough for the second round of talks to proceed. But they might not have removed all the apprehensions in Pakistan that India has no radical solutions to offer on Kashmir.

The central obstacle to the Indo-Pak peace process seems to come from Musharraf’s expectations of an instant solution to the Kashmir question.

In most peace processes in the world, the difficult ‘‘final status’’ issues are back-loaded—left towards the end of the process. Gen Musharraf, however, wants to front-load the most contentious issue—Jammu and Kashmir.

If Manmohan Singh can’t be rushed on J&K, Shaukat Aziz insists that there can be no sustainable peace process without tangible progress on Kashmir.

The trick, then, for the two sides is to find progress ‘‘in tandem’’ on both Kashmir and the rest of the relationship. The idea of simultaneous progress—even at different speeds—is in fact the political underpinning of the peace process.

It is in this context that the proposed bus services across the divide in Kashmir and the pipeline project come into focus.

India had proposed two bus services—between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad and Jammu and Sialkot. Pakistan has added another—between Poonch and Rawalkot. In both parts of J&K, the proposals have fired the imagination of the people.

What holds back the bus services is procedure. An early agreement on travel documents—technical discussions will take place next month—could be the much-needed tonic for the Indo-Pak dialogue on Kashmir.

Finding a way to move forward on the pipeline project, which Pakistan has been promoting, while addressing at the same time India’s desire to send its goods via Pakistani territory to Afghanistan, Central Asia and the Persian Gulf would be equally important.

If Pakistan is ready to bring gas into India why can’t it accept transit trade from India in the other direction? Aziz says he is not averse to the idea, but says it must wait until there is greater trust.

Bus links across J&K and the pipeline project are transformational projects. Making them happen would reduce the trust deficit and promote wider Indo-Pak integration that could embed a final settlement of Jammu and Kashmir.