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| India refuses to walk into Pakistani trap | | Nation's psyche asserts | | Neha
JAMMU, Jan 18: Had anyone in India expected that the ardent champion of one-sided "peace process" with Pakistan, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, would take the stand that he took on Tuesday that there can't be business as usual with Pakistan and that Pakistan must punish the perpetrators of the January 8 Mendhar brutal killing and mutilation of two soldiers and decapitation of Lance Naik Hem Raj? Certainly not. Then what happened that forced our Prime Minister, who remained silent for seven days despite the fact that the entire outraged nation had been criticising the Prime Minister and demanding stringent action against Pakistan, to come out with a very strong statement? Obvio-usly, the people of India, who left him with no other option but to dissociate himself from what External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid, Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde and Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tiwari had said outraging further the sensitivities of the already rather angry nation and make a strong statement.
Khurshid had, it may be recalled, said that the Government of India will not be dictated by the parties like the BJP which had been demanding some credible action against Pakistan and that India had put in hard work and invested heavily to revive the "peace process" with Pakistan and that the same would not be allowed to be derailed. Shinde had virtually snubbed those in India who had been urging him not to enforce the relaxed visa regime and emphatically asserted that the Government of India was not considering the option of putting on hold the relaxed visa regime in view of the Pakistani intrusion deep inside the Indian territory and brutal killing of two Indian soldiers. Tiwari had ridiculed the parties like the BJP and the Shiv Sena and accused them of indulging in jingoism. He had termed these parties as "ultra-nationalist" in negative sense.
Had anyone in India and elsewhere till Tuesday afternoon ever expected that the Indian political establishment would talk tough and tell Pakistan that it was not interested in talks with Islamabad? Certainly not. Then what happened that forced it not to go in for foreign minister-level talks between the two countries aimed at salvaging the so-called peace process? The answer is the same: The unwillingness on the part of the nation to allow Pakistan to go scot-free.
Remember, Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, who had two days ago charged India with engaging in "war-mongering", offered to hold "discussion and dialogue" with Indian Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid to deescalate tensions on the Indo-Pak border and Line of Control (LoC) and resolve the crisis. "Instead of issuing belligerent statements by the military and political leaders from across the border and ratcheting up tension, it is advisable for the two countries to discuss all concerns related to the LoC with a view to reinforcing respect for the ceasefire, may be at the level of the Foreign Ministers, to sort out things," Khar said in a statement issued in Islamabad on Wednesday evening. What was the response of the Indian political establishment to the Pakistani offer of talks? India, according to reports from New Delhi, said that it did not favour talks between the Foreign Ministers to "ease tensions along the LoC as proposed by Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar". "Let us not rush into the matter and (let us) move step by step," said Khurshid, adding that "it is for the Prime Minister to decide on talks with Pakistan". What did all this suggest? It suggested that the Indian establishment had come to the conclusion that continuation of dialogue process with Pakistan at this stage would not be tolerated by the Indian nation.
However, to say this is not to suggest that the Indian political establishment will not take a U-turn by restarting talks with Pakistan. It can take a U-turn, as it took at Sharm-el-Sheikh (Egypt) in 2009. It is necessary on the part of the people to maintain pressure so that the possibility of the Congress government again taking a U-turn is averted.
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