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| Forget cricket and mudslinging : Seize the real issues | | |
Jasbir Sarai
The media spectrum across India is completely engrossed in two issues, India’s performance in the world cup and the fall out of the recent Wikileaks exposes. India is plodding along in its rather sluggish tryst for the world cup and in the process providing the media ample opportunity to dedicate space to this insipid non-event. The Wikileaks exposes have, on the other hand, given an opportunity to the opposition to exercise its vocal chords in a manner tailored for its disruptive band of official spokesmen. We have witnessed the media stalwarts of the opposition baying for the blood of the UPA government on the issue of a “US tilt’ in the cabinet reshuffle of 2006 and the issue of cash for votes in 2008. It is also being said that the Prime Minister soft corner for Pakistan (Having been born there) has led to his isolation with respect to the government’s policy towards the neighbouring country
In the midst of this melee the macro issues are being forgotten or have been conveniently sidelined. Nobody has commented on the US attitude towards India as highlight in the tone and texture of the exposed documents. What the Wikileaks discloses about India pales in the front of the very negative impression that it creates about the US. The US bureaucracy comes across as opinionated and suffering from an acute superiority complex. It has a proclivity to take a one sided approach, completely divorced from ground realities. The language used reeks of an attempt to project the incumbent diplomat as some sort of a demigod who leaves the Indian leadership weak kneed in the face of his aggression and clout. What defies comprehension is that the US leadership buys such naïve and his infantile ideas and recommendations. No wonder the US policy in South Asia is so lopsided.
There are other more important disclosures that should come up for consideration and debate. The New York Times reported on Sunday, July, 18, 2010, that US military field documents exposed by Wikileaks suggest that Pakistan has been allowing “representatives of its spy service to meet directly with the Taliban to organise networks of militant groups that fight against American soldiers in Afghanistan”. What this implies is that, while Washington is blindly paying Pakistan massive amounts of money, the ISI has been functioning against US interests. Yet another leak of December, 02, 2010 refers to the Indian Army’s mobilisation plan as slow, slumbering and incapable of sustaining the cold start doctrine allegedly designed to punish Pakistan in a limited manner without triggering a nuclear response. This dispatch suggests that the Pakistani government is not unduly worried about a possible attack from India should its hands in a terrorist action in the future become visible.
Now, the question that comes to mind is - if the US holds such a poor opinion of India and is not relenting in its pursuit to equip Pakistan with military capability against India and if Pakistan is not worried about a threat from India then what is India doing to safeguard its interests? Despite being privy to this information why is India resolutely following the path of dialogue with Pakistan? In fact, such is India’s spirit of accommodation that Union Home Minister P Chidambaram has given his consent to a Pakistan commission questioning the main accused in the Mumbai attack of 26/11, Ajmal Kasab. Pakistan has taken no reciprocal action of allowing India to question Zaki-ur-Rahman Lakhvi who is s said to be the master mind of the said attack.
There is a need to study the situation in Pakistan in tandem with the intelligence made available through the recent Wikileaks exposes. While all eyes are focused on the Afro-Asian region, in the aftermath of the Tunisian and Egyptian upheaval followed by volatile situation now unfolding in Libya, the fact that Pakistan is fast hurtling into a crevice of Islamic fundamentalism is passing off largely unnoticed. The blatant day light murders of Salman Taseer and Shahbaz Bhatti for holding liberal views spells of a political disaster waiting to happen in the Sub continent. It is a wonder that, in Pakistan, political leaders are being killed so easily while militant Jihadi’s like Hafiz Mohammad Saeed and Mohd Asghar manage to roam freely and remain untouched? That the government of Pakistan is ineffectual is well known, but this indifference towards its own leader’s amounts to taking things a bit too far. In Pakistan it is not clear as to who is calling the shots presently. Definitely it is not the government and a guess between the US, the Army, the Islamic fundamentalists or all of the three would not be wildly off the mark and none of these three have Indian interest in mind.
It is time to confront the US and insist that it comes out clean with respect to its policy on India and Pakistan. It simply has to stop running with the hares and hunting with the hounds. It has to cease looking at India as a soft and pliable State which can be manipulated in furtherance of its very myopic and misplaced interests in the Af-Pak region. Next, India cannot go on tolerating Pakistan’s propaganda of projecting itself as a reasonable and responsible State living under the shadow of a constant threat from a belligerent neighbour. It is time for the US and the Pakistani government to ensure that General Kiyani takes all possible steps to dismantle terrorist infrastructure targeted against India, it is common knowledge that he has the wherewithal to do so only the intention is missing. It would be expedient for the Indian Nation to get over its preoccupation with cricket and mudslinging to address the real, significant and critical issues at hand. The world is in turmoil and we, like Nero, seem to be playing the flute.
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