If Pakistan hangs Jadhav, India must snap all ties with it

It is now common knowledge that the Taliban abducted Kulbhushan Jadhav, an ex-naval officer, from Iran’s Chabahar port on the Pakistani army’s orders in December 2015.

Jadhav, who took premature retirement from the Indian Navy in 2000 to run his own business, used to go to Chabahar for business on his own ship.

The Taliban sold Jadhav to the Pakistani army which planned to use him to undo the peace process which Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had launched with India. This peace process was further boosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Pakistan on December 25, 2015.

Jehadis loyal to the Pakistani army launched a terror strike on the Pathankot air base on January 2, 2016 at the behest of the Pakistani army. The Pakistani army expected India to retaliate in a big way there, finishing the peace process once for all.

India not only identified Jaish-e-Mohammad as the jehadi group which attacked the Pathankot air base but gave permission to a Pakistani investigation team, which included ISI, to visit the air base. This spooked the Pakistani army. It was surprised. So, in a hurry, it painted Jadhav as an Indian spy caught in Baluchistan. There is no evidence with Pakistan against Kulbhushan except what he has been forced to confess to Pakistani army under torture. This evidence is of no value in any court so the Pakistani army has tried Kulbhushan in a hush-hush manner in its military court. Despite India asking Pakistan to allow the Indian ambassador to meet Kulbhushan 13 times, Pakistan refused.

This is against the Geneva Conventions. A day or two before Jadhav was suddenly awarded the death sentence, the Pakistani media reported that a lieutenant colonel-rank officer, most probably an ISI spy, went missing from the border town of Nepal with India. The Pakistani media is awash with news that he has been kidnapped by the Indians so that he can be swapped for Kulbhushan Jadhav. Looks like Pakistani army believed this news and hurriedly awarded the death sentence to Kulbhushan to pre-empt any possible Indian plan. The big question is that if that ex-Pakistani army officer is really in Indian hands are they prepared to sacrifice him? Looks like somebody in the Pakistani army has botched up the plan. With Indians standing as one for the release of Jadhav, they are suggesting ways as to how their President can grant mercy. Jadhav, in any case, is of no value to the Pakistani army because they have achieved their aim of spoiling relations with India.

The Indian political masters, who for the last 70 years have been trying to have good relations with Pakistan, should finally learn the lesson that Pakistan, which is run by their army, will never allow good relations with India. The reason is not far to seek.

Seventy per cent of the population in Pakistan believes their army’s propaganda depicting India as an enemy about to gobble up Pakistan but for the army. As a result, the Pakistani army not only enjoys popularity but also runs 20 billion dollars worth of business in Pakistan. Surely, Pakistani army is not going to give all this for good relations with India. If Pakistan goes ahead and hangs of Kulbhushan Jadhav, then India should break all relations with Pakistan. India must go all out to support the independence movement of Baluchistan and even Sindh. It must also go hammer and tongs with the Indus Water Treaty. Let us starve Pakistan of water till it stops cross-border terror.