Opinion Will Nawaz Sharif be able to soften the Pakistan army’s India policy?

The army generals’ group, of which Asim Munir was a part, fell out with Khan in autumn 2021 on account of the latter opposing the then army chief, General Qamar Bajwa, transferring Lt General Faiz Hameed from the post of DG ISI. The Pakistan army has never allowed prime ministers to intervene in its internal working or to become final decision makers in the country’s security and critical areas of foreign policy. Any prime minister who has sought to take on the army and exercise his constitutional right in these spheres has fallen foul of it. So it was for Nawaz Sharif in his earlier avatars, even though he was a one-time protege of the army. Clearly, Khan did not heed Nawaz Sharif’s example. He felt secure because he had won the 2018 election, ascending to the prime minister’s chair with the army’s help. He also thought that the army had no choice but to go along with him because of its animus towards Nawaz Sharif. However, when he crossed the army’s red lines, he had to go and so he did in April 2022. He did not do so easily. Indeed, he demonstrated, even after he was thrown out of office, that he was immensely popular in Punjab — politically and otherwise too — the country’s most important province. That worried Munir but on May 9, PTI members and supporters openly took on the army and “defiled” its sacred monuments because of Khan’s arrest. That led to a permanent rupture between Khan and Munir. Now, Munir obviously needed the PML (N) to succeed in Punjab and it is this that has led to Nawaz Sharif’s return. His younger brother, Shehbaz (whom the army would have preferred) and who became the prime minister after Khan’s ouster, does not have the older Sharif’s charisma; Shehbaz led the multi-party Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government.

The military is the dominant institution in Pakistan’s polity. For a decade and a half, it has not been directly in power and under Bajwa, it gave the assurance that it will play only its constitutionally mandated role. That pledge was meaningless, for the army believes that it alone can hold the country together and keep India, the permanent enemy, at bay. Hence, it expects that on basic policy issues the elected leadership will bow to its wishes. The question is whether Nawaz Sharif has finally accepted this reality and will agree, if he returns to the Prime Minister’s seat for the fourth time — as is possible — that security and India policy will ultimately remain with the army.

In the past, he convinced some of his Indian counterparts that he was trying to curb the army’s “interference” in his governments’ decision-making on India. He did so with Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who met him for the first time in Colombo in July 1998 on the margins of the SAARC summit. I was Joint Secretary in charge of the Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran Division in the MEA at that time and was present in Colombo. After Vajpayee’s one-on-one meeting with Sharif, I crouched next to his chair and asked “Sir, kaisa laga Nawaz Sharif?” He told me “Aadmi theek hai.” And then added words which I would not like to reveal. Perhaps Prime Minister Modi developed a similar attitude towards Sharif which led to his positive policies towards Pakistan from 2014 to 2016. Both Vajpayee and Modi’s endeavours with Sharif were destroyed by the Pakistan army which made it abundantly clear that it would never allow an elected leader to drive Pakistan’s India policy.

Nawaz Sharif undoubtedly shares the army’s strong feelings on Jammu and Kashmir. However, unlike the army, in the past, he believed that Pakistan could both pursue a hard line on J&K and normalise commercial and economic ties with India. The 2019 constitutional changes will make it difficult for him to pursue this line unless India at least restores statehood to J&K. Also, while Bajwa talked of geo-economics as more important than geo-politics for Pakistan’s future, Munir has not given any indication that he thinks so. He seems to be cast in the army’s typical anti-India mould. But Pakistan continues to be in deep economic difficulties. Despite the assistance of China and other donors, it cannot move on a sustained upward economic path without comprehensively adopting realistic policies towards India. As of now, there is no indication that the army is willing to drink from the poisoned chalice of realism. Will Nawaz Sharif want to and be able to nudge it in this direction? Only time can tell.

As of now the focus of both countries will become increasingly domestic. National elections will be held in the first half of 2024 in India, as also in Pakistan, even if they are delayed beyond January. Nothing should therefore be expected on the India-Pakistan front till after their conclusion.

The writer is a former diplomat