Captain Imran set to become PM Khan
GROUND REALITY Analysts doubt the possibility of the Pakistani army giving Imran Khan any elbow room in charting a different course with India
NEWDELHI: India is not surprised at the outcome of the elections in Pakistan that ended three decades of the two-party dominance of Pakistan Muslim League-nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), and placed cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan at the helm.
Nor does the country expect a sudden turnaround in its testy relationship with Pakistan, analysts tracking the bilateral relationship said. According to them, the army will continue dictating Islamabad’s policy towards New Delhi. They also see friction within the coalition Khan might cobble up as well his own political posturing as a populist campaigner being tested as the political executive of the country.
Based on this, most analysts say it makes little sense for the Narendra Modi government, which is into the last year of its five-year tenure, to spend too much political capital on ties with Pakistan, considering that any negative fallout can have a huge impact on the 2019 elections.
There was no official response from the Indian government on the election of Khan as a formal announcement of the results was still awaited.
One analyst said the friction between Nawaz Sharif and the army made the writing on the wall clear. Sharif, who too enjoyed the support of the army once, and his daughter Maryam were jailed this month on corruption charges. Khan’s critics allege that he has the army’s backing, despite his own denials.
Khan, once seen as a progressive liberal, and the Cricket World Cup-winning captain of Pakistan, has undergone a major political transformation in the little over two-decade history of his political party, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf (PTI).
He has endeared himself to the army and also echoed right-wing Islamist voices on certain issues, analysts said.
“To me this is like the early days of Nawaz Sharif when he pandered to the right-wing religious elements and wrongly believed that such elements could be handled politically,” said MK Bhadrakumar, a former career diplomat who headed the ministry of external affairs’ PAI (Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran) division.
For sure, Khan did not make any overt anti-india noises in his campaigns, and what he said on Kashmir for most part reflected the stated position of Pakistan on the issue.
“In my view, Imran Khan has ended up doing better than anticipated. Nevertheless whether this will lead to greater stability has to becomes main opposition party in Punjab and Sindh
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