Opinion With Pakistan, dialogue must be conditional upon Islamabad dismantling terror infrastructure

Let us be clear: The idea of “talks” or “discussions” with Pakistan has become the most tragic of farces. This is not reflexive aggression — it is the wisdom of a nation long schooled in the cruel arithmetic of misplaced trust. Time and again, India has made gestures of staggering goodwill, far beyond the call of strategic logic. Jawaharlal Nehru’s early overtures were founded on idealism — dangerous, perhaps, but pure. Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s journey to Lahore in 1999 was a poet’s gamble, laden with sincerity. Yet the ink on the Lahore Declaration had not dried before Pakistani troops, masquerading as mujahideen, violated the Line of Control in Kargil. That betrayal was not an anomaly. It was an announcement by the Pakistani state — or at least the powerful part of it that matters — that it had no interest in peace.

Then came the back-channel diplomacy of the 2000s. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, along with General Pervez Musharraf, quietly built the contours of a possible future. The two nations inched toward an unspoken understanding — one that blurred borders in favour of economic interdependence, that suggested peace might emerge not from treaties alone, but from trade and trust. Yet even in that moment of fragile promise, India could not ignore the fundamental instability at the heart of the Pakistani state. Whether it was the tragic assassination of Benazir Bhutto or the upheaval led by lawyers against General Musharraf, these were the convulsions of a nation wrestling with its own contradictions. What, truly, could India have done? Sympathy, however sincere, cannot be mistaken for strategy.

And then, in November 2008, that tentative vision of peace was drowned in the Arabian Sea, as Pakistani terrorists launched a brutal assault on Mumbai. The killers were guided, trained, and financed by elements nestled comfortably within Pakistan’s military-intelligence architecture. The evidence was irrefutable. The denial was insulting. The pattern was, by now, unmistakable. It was not India that abandoned the possibility of peace. It was Pakistan that defaulted once again to the language of ruthless violence, shattering the illusion that dialogue could overcome entrenched hostility.

Still, India tried again. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, so often projected as a hardliner, took the extraordinary step of visiting Lahore unannounced in December 2015. It was a rare and audacious gesture, one that defied the conventional wisdom of diplomacy. Spontaneous, unscripted, and bold, it represented a leap of faith in the possibility of peace, a calculated risk that sought to break the unrelenting cycle of suspicion. But once again, the reaction came soon — not in words, but in bullets. Pathankot. Uri. Pulwama. Pahalgam. Each attack, a reminder of the same grim reality: The cycle of violence and betrayal, perpetuated by forces entrenched within the very heart of Pakistan’s military establishment.

Here, the world must be reminded: The violence India faces is not the product of anarchic extremism, but of deliberate policy. The pursuit of “jihad” in the Pakistani context is not a rogue deviation — it is doctrine legitimised by the “two-nation” theory. It is crafted, cultivated, and unleashed in open-air seminaries, training camps, and garrison towns. The distinction between state and non-state actors collapses upon examination. These “non-state” actors are the long arm of a strategy that treats terrorism as an instrument of negotiation.

Now, with Trump’s announcement of a ceasefire and talks on Kashmir, the masquerade resumes. Yet one must ask: By what mandate has Trump inserted Kashmir into a dialogue India has categorically refused to enter? It legitimises the very premise India rejects in totality — that Kashmir is disputed terrain subject to external adjudication.

Therefore, India must now do what wise nations have always done when faced with persistent duplicity: Speak a new language. Not the naïve lexicon of hope, but the austere grammar of deterrence. Dialogue must be conditional upon accountability. Any engagement must be predicated on verifiable action — dismantling of terror infrastructure, prosecutions, extraditions, and visible restraint by the military-intelligence complex. Anything less is unacceptable.

India will have to pivot to precision policy. That means sustained military readiness, punitive capability, economic levers through water-sharing agreements, diplomatic isolation of Pakistan in every meaningful forum, and an internal security doctrine that treats infiltration and sabotage not as emergencies, but as constants. The question also is not whether India should talk to Pakistan, but whether Pakistan has anyone worth talking to. So long as generals pull the strings and terrorists play the tune, there is no interlocutor — only illusion. Negotiation with a state is the province of diplomacy; a negotiation with a shadow is an act of self-deception.

Until Pakistan undertakes a fundamental reformation of its internal character — abandoning the strategic indulgence of jihad by its military establishment and binding its overtures of dialogue to the anchor of genuine accountability — India must dispense with illusions of peace. What is required, instead, is vigilance sustained by a posture of hard-eyed prudence.

The writer is assistant professor, Department of International Affairs and Security Studies, Sardar Patel University of Police, Security and Criminal Justice Rajasthan, India and Non-Resident Fellow, Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore