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| In Pakistan hatred for India is “Iman” | | | Jasbir Sarai | 6/17/2011 9:22:30 PM |
| On May, 15, 2011, Pakistan’s ISI Chief, Ahmed Shuja Pasha, was called upon to address an in-camera joint session of the Pakistani Senate and National Assembly to submit a report on the incident involving the killing of Bin Laden in Abbotabad. In the course of his address, the ISI Chief also warned India that any Abbotabad like attack by it would invite a befitting response from Pakistan as targets inside the country "had already been identified" and "rehearsal" carried out. Earlier on May, 05, Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary, Salman Bashir, had also stated that any country that attempts to "mimic" the unilateral act of the US will find it has made a "basic miscalculation". “We feel that sort of misadventure or miscalculation would result in a terrible catastrophe," Bashir said rather emphatically. By “any country” he meant India and the “catastrophe” he was referring to was a nuclear riposte should India attempt to target terrorist installation in Pakistan territory. Even in its blackest hour the country could not ignore its anti-India sentiment and concentrate on its internal problems.
India had, over the last few decades, given very little reason to Pakistan to feel insecure. Pakistan has created and sustained a Proxy war in India, especially in Kashmir, and yet India has not gone in for a war like reaction. Even during the Kargil War, despite a gross infiltration into India by Pakistani soldiers, care was taken to keep the conflict localised and fighting was resorted to only on Indian territory. Despite regular infiltration of terrorists, cease fire has held out on the borders of Jammu and Kashmir since 2003. Yet, the establishment in Pakistan is not ready to shed the fears that it harbours against India. It is actually the US and China who have blatantly violating Pakistan’s sovereignty and continue to do so, but the country perceives danger only from India.
What is the underlying reason behind this perception? Is it isolated to the Pakistani Army or is it more deep rooted? What is the way out for both India and Pakistan? Mohammad Ali Jinnah had envisioned Pakistan as an Islamic State with secular credentials. However, what finally emerged, within less than a decade of gaining independence, was a sham democracy with self serving politicians and an overambitious Army that held a very superior self view as the savior of the nascent nation state. Both these power bases needed an issue for sustenance and the best issue that emerged was an anti-Indian sentiment. The Pakistan army was not solely responsible for the fast developing anti-India sentiment in the era of the forties and early fifties of the last century. It had its roots in the politics of partition. As time passed, the idea of a thousand years of war and ‘we will eat grass but will have nuclear weapons’ was given by Zulfikar Bhutto, Pakistan’s civilian Prime Minister. Even today, no political leader in Pakistan gives a positive statement on India. Politicians in Pakistan win elections on anti-India and Kashmir rhetoric. The only political party which is pro-India is the Awami National Party, which is labeled as Indian agents.
It was the Indo-Pakistan war for Kashmir in 1947-1948 which sent the first message that Pakistan’s national interest could be defended only by the Pakistan army. The first demand of the Pakistan government to the US was to strengthen its army. Within a decade of Pakistan’s existence the Pakistan Army rose to prominence, began to rule the country and became the custodian of whatever Pakistan stood for. This place of prominence was achieved by projecting national defence as a primacy in the wake of delusions of a potent threat from a much stronger India.
Kashmir is but a bogey that the power centre’s in Pakistan exploit to flame the fires of the anti-India rhetoric. There is no politician or military-man in Pakistan who does not understand that Pakistan cannot wrest Kashmir from India, now or ever. Also, a stage has come wherein the monsters created by Pakistani leaders to sustain the conflict in Kashmir and Afghanistan have turned back on to their masters. This is the time when support from India can help the country to tide over its problems. Yet, the country is not ready to give up its rigid anti-India posture and move ahead towards a more positive engagement.
On the basis of the foregoing argument it is indisputably established that the Pakistan army, though a very significant keg, is not the base on which this anti-India edifice is standing and neither is it the largest entity that opposes India. It is merely riding a political wave that helps it in maintaining its position of prominence in the affairs of the country. The malaise is much more deep rooted and it encompasses a much larger section of the Pakistani polity and society. That it has been engineered and nurtured by vested interests is also a reality.
Let there be no doubt that a large section of the Pakistani population, including its army, is highly intolerant about the very existence of India. This intolerance has brought economic and political debacle to Pakistan yet the country is not ready or not willing to learn any lessons. Its leadership is simply not willing to build cordial relations with a Hindu majority nation, nor is it ready to allow its people to think in this direction. The hatred for India has become part of their ‘Iman’. In this scenario, the Pakistan army exploits its role as savior for its own gain. This apart, it has a core group with fundamentalist leanings which is ideologically opposed to India. We should not miss the woods for the trees and live with false illusions
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