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| Musharraf anxiously awaits Indian PM in Pakistan | | Islamabad insists on forward movement on Kashmir | |
B L KAK
NEW DELHI: Even as both President of Pakistan, Gen. Parvez Musharraf, and Foreign Minister, Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri, have made a pointed reference to what they term as "slow progress" the ongoing peace talks between India and Pakistan have registered, Islamabad has been found involved in the task of encouraging the talk in Pakistan's political and media circles in support of a decisive and result-oriented move on Kashmir. Significance is attached to Indian Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh's decision to visit Pakistan in the beginning of next year.
Equally significant is the latest report from Islamabad: Gen. Parvez Musharraf is anxiously awaiting the Indian Prime Minister, who has already accepted the former's invitation to undertake a trip to Pakistan. Even as Manmohan Singh's office has yet to decide on the actual date of his proposed visit to Pakistan, reports have begun to be circulated by some Pakistani newspapers about some forward movement on Kashmir during Indian Prime Minister's talks with Pak rulers.
Manmohan Singh has already made it clear that there would be no changes in territory and all solutions would have to be on the basis of the current map. Now he is said to have given the go-ahead to "begin a dialogue with the people in their areas of control (Indian Kashmir and Pakistan held Kashmir) to improve the quality of governance to give people on both sides a greater chance of leading a life of dignity and self respect, as well as the setting up of consultative mechanisms to maximise the gains of cooperation in the social, economic and political spheres". Is this intended to keep the two Kashmirs in their old positions within India and Pakistan but bound together by mutal cooperation?
One must normally suppose that the two sides have already arrived at some kind of common ground where to reach an agreement. On the face of it, the proposal - said to be based on recommendations made by some retired Indian diplomats - is realistic and tends to put trade and economic relations on high priority as a solvent of a dispute that has defied all past approaches. It is worth serious consideration and Pakistan must do all in its power to make India move ahead on it.
India knows that Gen. Musharraf is the first leader of Pakistan to opt for self-governance in preference to self-determination which implies a change of borders, to keep the UN resolutions aside, to give up the options of plebiscite as well as that of independence, to desist from demanding any territory for Pakistan, to reject the communal criteria, not demand Kashmir's secession from India, and to encourage Kashmiris to talk to New Delhi. This is no mean offering.
For the first time the people of Pakistan seem ready to see an end to jihad in exchange for an economic solution. In India too the people would welcome a denouement that hurts no one while bringing prosperity to the people of Kashmir on both sides. The Line of Control (LoC) - not acceptable to Pakistan as a border - will, therefore, be transformed as a result of opening of trade routes, not only between two Kashmirs but between Indian Kashmir and India itself via Pakistan!
It would be a wonderfully lucky strike if India and Pakistan should arrive at common ground over Gen. Musharraf's rather courageous one-sided formulations on autonomy and self-governance. Lucky, because the bureaucracies of India and Pakistan have not seriously pondered the essence of what he has been saying and therefore no variations on the theme have emanated from his brave effort except a lot of snobbish dismissal of the thoughts of a transitional figure.
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