Revive Lahore

India8217;s purring satisfaction at Pakistan8217;s discomfiture is there to see, and it is an understandable reaction. A shift in the country8217;s favour has come about and it could have long-term consequences. Pakistan8217;s Kargil misadventure had already put it into a corner.

That being so, the advice Clinton gave about Kashmir and the resumption of dialogue with Pakistan does not weigh too heavily, the more so as he recognised that India could not be expected to start talking while Pakistan was promoting cross-border violence. It was thus no problem at all for India to dismiss a hasty offer by Pakistan. A number of statements by senior leaders how that New Delhi is in no mood to talkthe release of Hurriyat leaders and the expressed readiness of the Indian authorities to talk to them is another matter. This is the real dialogue and Pakistan has no part in it. Perhaps only after arrangements are worked out between India and parties in Kashmir would there be scope for Pakistan to be brought in.

If this is indeed the way our policy is moving, then there is a harsh logic to it. It looks like a way of arriving at a final settlement in Kashmir, on India8217;s terms. Maybe, fina-lly, the chips are stacked in our favour, and resolute pursuit of our goal will be rewarded. And if that is so, we can forget about dialogue or any step that will ease the pressure on Pakistan.

Yet there are a few flies in the ointment. There is little to suggest that following the Clinton visit Pakistan regards its surrender to Indian purposes as inevitable. The internal mood is not of resignation but of indignation. There is no backing off from the long-established policy of trouble-making in Kashmir.

Nor can one see any easy way forward within the Vale. No solution is anywhere on the horizon and the recent incidents there have only underlined the intractability of the problem. It is not clear whether any momentum has developed in the talks between the Indian authorities and Kashmiri representatives, among whom the recently released Hurriyat leaders are prominent. And what about the ruling party in Jamp;K and its leadership? There are complications enough to challenge even the most inspired leadership.

Meanwhile, we are squandering diplomatic capital through our world wide pursuit of Pakistan. If Clinton put us in a different bracket from Pakistan, our own actions risk pulling us down again. Paradoxically, diplomatic victories8217; here and there over Pakistan lock us once more into the unwanted embrace with a foe we are always trying to escape. In the multilateral arena, deliberate neglect of our neighbour might serve us better.

Behind it all is the danger of escalating conflict in Kashmir between two nuclear powers. We do not accept a nuclear scare story in the subcontinent but it cannot be denied that Pakistan has the capacity to pose a military challenge to us. Our superior might is no consolation in the nuclear age, for it does not take many bombs to create a rough parity between rivals. Reducing the risk of conflict is imperative and this pushes us towards some form of engagement with Pakistan on this sensitive issue.

The pendulum of international opinion swings, this time in our favour, who knows what comes next. What is all too likely to remain, even as international opinion shifts and alters, is the harsh reality on the ground. The question is whether this is best tackled through ignoring Pakistan or by talking to it. The long and bitter experience of the past 50 years suggests that neither course offers an immediate prospect. Hostility is too well-entrenched to encourage facile conclusions. But the few moments of revived expectation have been through meeting and talking, most recently in the rendezvous in Lahore.

Such an approach is far more likely to yield results than the rather haughty dismissal of Pakistan that we are presently witnessing. Yet a full-dress meeting of accredited representatives is virtually guaranteed to fail in the present circumstances. We have already had an instance of this in the Pakistani proposal for talks and its summary rejection by India. To agree to talk implies readiness to compromise and that is not something that either side can presently acknowledge.

The alternative, thus, is for explorat-ory, unpublicised meetings between persons of understanding and trust from the two sides who can talk freely without committing their governments. Judging from what has come into the media, something of that sort happened before the Lahore meeting. Even though Lahore has become a bad word, one should not forget that it provided a rare moment of hope. The methodology of that diplomatic initiative was sound. It came adrift on account of overarching Pakistani policy makers who rushed into a disastrous misadventure. What is needed now is a revival of that effort. Ultimately there is no escape from dialogue. A free exchange can begin to explore the limits of tolerance on either side of the border.