The Western audience has a lot of misconceptions about the India-Pakistan relationship and the tensions that have ensued between the two countries since the Pahalgam Terror Attack in Kashmir. There is a tendency among westerners to club India and Pakistan together and blame both for tensions whenever they erupt sporadically. There is a complete lack of understanding among them regarding the Indian point of view, how India views Pakistan in terms of strategic national interests, national security and domestic stability and also the sentiments of the Indian masses towards our western neighbour and what sustains these sentiments. In this series of articles, I will attempt to explain the Indian stance on these matters and clear some of these misconceptions. Here We Go.
The Indian Political Establishment, regardless of which political party holds power, considers Kashmir an inalienable and integral part of India. The Indian approach towards Kashmir will not change regardless of who is in power in the corridors of Delhi. Kashmir is one of the Red Lines of Indian Politics. The nature of the approach towards ensuring stability in Kashmir differs between the BJP and the Indian National Congress (INC), the only two political parties that have a legitimate shot at forming the Government at the Federal Level, but it is the consensus among both parties that Kashmir will not be permitted to separate from the Indian Union.
What actually differs between the two parties is the approach towards Pakistan. The INC believes that cordial relations with our problematic neighbour is essential for India’s national security and domestic stability. Therefore, it has a tendency to ignore or look past Pakistan’s many transgressions. It is also fairly certain that the INC pursues such a policy because of its domestic political concerns as even they are aware that significant sections of the Indian Muslim Community harabour extraterritorial loyalty towards Pakistan. To be fair, cordial relations with Pakistan have been the top priority of every single Indian Prime Minister since Independence in the initial days of their Government, including Narendra Modi. It has been memory-holed by most people but back in 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi broke protocol to attend a marriage in Pakistani Prime Minister Nawz Sharif’s family, only to be rewarded with the Uri Attack in 2016.
The BJP, on the other hand, believes that Pakistan is India’s mortal enemy and peace between the two countries simply is not possible. India’s National Security can only be secured when Pakistan is in no position to bare its fangs against India. The BJP of today simply does not believe cordial relations could ever exist between India and Pakistan. And any efforts towards that pursuit is doomed to failure from the very beginning. Thus, while the INC believes that a stable Pakistan is conducive towards Indian National Interests, the BJP believes precisely the opposite. Let me emphasise here that I am only illustrating the ideological differences between the two parties. These ideological differences have mostly not manifested themselves in actual policy until very recently. Let me also emphasise here that the ideological differences between the two parties have had no impact on how they have been treated by the Pakistan Establishment.
Now that I have briefly explained the political establishment of India, let me now touch upon that of Pakistan from the point of the Indian Consensus that exists today. The Pakistan Establishment, since independence itself, has consistently overestimated its abilities. Due to the religious fundamentalism that is etched into the very fabric of their national character, Pakistan believes that they are destined for victory against India. It was this overestimation of their abilities that motivated them to instigate the 1965 War, which they lost. In 1971, India under Indira Gandhi was forced to intervene in the Bangladesh War of Liberation which led to a huge loss of territory for Pakistan. Following that nightmare scenario, Pakistan decided to bank entirely on its infamous policy of ‘Bleed India through a Thousand Cuts’. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, India was forced to reckon with Khalistan Terrorism, which sought to secede Punjab from India. The Khalistani Terrorists were trained by the Pakistan Establishment and were provided safe havens within the Pakistani territory whenever things heated up here. Nevertheless, India managed to crush Khalistani Separatism with an Iron Hand and emerged from it a lot stronger.
From 1999 until 2016, the Pakistani Policy towards India has been marked by, what I call, the ‘Three Great Betrayals’, under three different Indian Prime Ministers. In February 1999, India and Pakistan launched a Bus Service between New Delhi and Lahore to foster friendly relations between the two countries. In its inaugural run on the 19th of February, it carried Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to a summit in Lahore, where he was received by his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif. Vajpayee was rewarded for it with the Kargil War three months later. That was the First Betrayal.
In 2008, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh attempted to negotiate a peace deal with Parvez Musharraf, Pakistan’s Military Dictator, over Kashmir that would have required India to make significant concessions over the matter. These negotiations were ongoing despite the fact that India was wrecked by consistent terror attacks in its major cities the previous 3 years by terrorists based out of Pakistani territory. Singh was rewarded for it with the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai. That was the Second Betrayal. Manmohan Singh’s lukewarm response to it in its aftermath has forever tarnished his legacy and was one of the prime reasons for the rise of Narendra Modi.
In 2015, as previously mentioned, Narendra Modi landed in Lahore to attend the marriage of the granddaughter of his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif. By doing so, he risked severe damage to his reputation and lost a lot of political capital, since he had adopted a hardline stance against Pakistan during the campaign for the Lok Sabha Elections only a year earlier. ‘Talks and Terrorism cannot go on together,’ was the way he famously described his stance towards dialogues with Pakistan. And yet, like his predecessors, he gave Pakistan a chance. For that, he was rewarded with the Pathankot Terror Attack in January, 2016. Yet, Narendra Modi gave them another chance and allowed Pakistan’s Joint Investigation Team, that included an ISI official, to visit India in March and complete its investigation into the matter. For that, Narendra Modi was rewarded with the Uri Attack in September that year. That, my dear readers, was the Third Betrayal.
Unlike his predecessors, Narendra Modi decided he had seen enough. Everything that has followed since then is the implementation of a series of policies that seeks to decimate Pakistan’s ability to pursue Terrorism as a State Policy against India. Finally, the official policy of the Modi Government was in sync with the BJP’s ideological stance. A series of measures were initiated in 2016 towards that effect, which were only accelerated in the aftermath of the Pulwama Terror Attack in February 2019. The Indus Water Treaty may have been kept in abeyance only now but the seeds of it were sown in 2019 itself. The Pahalgam Terror Attack, where civilians were murdered in Cold Blood, will only strengthen the resolve of the Indian Establishment and will serve as confirmation of the fact that they are on the right path. It’s almost a certainty now that things will be taken to their logical conclusion in the years to come.
