Govt works on one voice for Armitage

The meeting became all the more necessary following George’s statement yesterday, repeated today, that the proposal for joint Indo-Pak patrolling to check infiltration was not workable. A denial had to be issued by the Ministry of External Affairs this evening as it became evident that India was serious about the idea.

In fact, this is one of the key proposals that will be put on the table to Armitage. And the challenge for the Vajpayee Government is not just on the diplomatic front but also to package the idea for the domestic audience, particularly constituents of the Sangh Parivar which have been demanding that India ‘‘do something’’ to teach Pakistan a lesson.

The crux of the proposal is that it will involve a resumption of dialogue with Pakistan, if only at the expert level, to discuss modalities for joint patrolling.

Although India has taken the stand that there can be no talks without an end to cross-border terrorism, PMO circles are of the view that restarting the expert level dialogue, say by the DGMOs, to check infiltration does not imply that India is backing down under pressure.

In fact, the official assessment is that the six-month-old strategy of ‘‘coercive diplomacy’’ backed by a military standoff along the Indo-Pak border has achieved what the Agra Summit failed to do. It got Musharraf to admit that Pakistan has been sponsoring terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir and it got him to agree to tackle this issue first, before India and Pakistan get down to discussing Kashmir.

An additional gain has been the international community’s recognition that India has been a victim of Pakistan-backed terrorism in J&K.

These are the points that the Government will have to put across to the hawks in its establishment in the coming days as it puts the next phase of its diplomacy into action once it is convinced that Musharraf has actually delivered on the ground.