Stumbling and lurching along

That is when this phase of the three-legged race began. Full marks to the Manmohan Singh government for averting any mean-minded backtracking for partisan reasons. The new government picked up the baton and proceeded. The Indo-Pak process at this stage is proceeding on multiple tracks. Behind the scenes is the script being jointly authored by the two national security advisers. They are receiving inputs from the two establishments and a very active non-governmental second track. The two prime ministers and their respective foreign offices are venturing out into the public domain keeping a steady gaze on three constituencies: domestic, the Kashmir Valley and across the border. The international community is not hovering, distracted as it is by Iraq, but it is around.

Among the hurdles before the peace process are the requirements of the voracious 24-hour news channels and newspapers. I wish there had been a master camera on a crane above that corner of the Taj Mansingh lobby where a battery of cameras had been positioned near the elevators. Word had been put out that Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, after his meeting with Manmohan Singh, would field a few questions here. What followed was a scramble as in rugby, as all the country’s anchors rushed to grab a vantage point where they would catch Shaukat Aziz’s eye. I saw one on all fours, crawling between legs and tripods towards a vantage point on the floor, so close to Aziz he could have untied his laces. Oh, the pictures the master camera would have got!

It was probably in such a melee that Pervez Musharraf’s famous Id statement was picked up. In this competitive craft, there is just no time to seek clarifications. And when Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage endorsed the statement, the spectre of US-Pak conspiracy surfaced. Indeed, Musharraf had talked of Kashmir being divided into seven enclaves under a UN umbrella, or with shared sovereignty, but it was no more than loud thinking, designed to promote internal debate in Pakistan. This is what Aziz said at a breakfast arranged for the media. Indeed there is a positive way to regard Musharraf’s musings: his willingness to depart from traditional positions.

At the breakfast meeting, Shaukat Aziz came across as the face of Pakistan Musharraf has been promising post 9/11 — enlightened, moderate. He has, by his own admission, worked in “ten countries at the head of big businesses”. This was clear from the cogent picture he presented of Pakistan’s economic success in the last five years. Pakistan’s growth rate will touch 8 per cent in the next few years, he said, and Pakistan’s requirements for hydrocarbons was going up. India too needed energy and the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline’s extension to India “would be a win-win for both”, he said. But if there was hesitation in New Delhi on this score “we in Pakistan are going ahead, regardless”. The three-legged movement requires Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar to retard progress on the pipeline to keep pace with the composite dialogue. And the composite dialogue is progressing at its three-legged pace.

Separate orchestration on Kashmir was exemplified by the two PMs, who accorded hospitality to separate sets of Kashmiri leaders. Shaukat Aziz hosted the Hurriyat, including Ali Shah Geelani. Manmohan Singh had Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti among the guests at his lunch. Aziz’s dinner was private. Manmohan Singh’s was official. Choreography is significant. Which Kashmiri leaders will be on the first bus that leaves Srinagar, once the Srinagar-Muzzafarabad service is established?