Terror on the AGENDA
Nawaz needs the army on board to end terror and deliver better trade ties with India
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh congratulated Nawaz Sharif on his electoral victory even as votes were being counted in Pakistan’s historic election. Nawaz, who had spontaneously invited Prime Minister A. B. Vajpayee to Pakistan in 1999, invited Manmohan to his swearing- in.
The invitation was politely turned down by Manmohan a day later. Indian diplomats say they are in favour of small, incremental steps with Pakistan rather than grand gestures that run the risk of spectacular failure. The Lahore peace initiative disintegrated when the Pakistani army occupied the Kargil heights. Officials say they are unsettled by the prospect of what could happen in case of the Indian PM’s state visit: Lashkar- e- Toiba ( LET) supremo Hafiz Muhammad Saeed addressing a press conference. Saeed, whom India accuses of being the chief plotter of the November 26, 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai which killed 166 people, roams free in Pakistan. As do Dawood Ibrahim and Tiger Memon, plotters of the March 1993 Mumbai serial blasts. The trial of the 26/ 11 Mumbai attack main accused in Pakistan drags on.
Nawaz’s landslide may have swept him into the prime minister’s secretariat on Islamabad’s Constitution Avenue but New Delhi doubts whether he can lean on a sprawl of creamcoloured low- rise buildings that mark Pakistan’s biggest power centre 20 km north: The General Headquarters, Rawalpindi.
Indian officials say the Pakistan army’s calibrated support to terrorist groups like LET has led to the trust deficit. “Everything pales in comparison,” says a senior intelligence official. “Our core concern is terrorism, Pakistan’s core concern is Kashmir. Every time we try to paper over this reality, a terrorist strike reminds us of it,” he says. G. Parthasarathy, former Indian high commissioner to Islamabad, is sceptical of Nawaz’s ability to change the ground reality or rein in militant groups like LET, Lashkar- e- Jhangvi and Sipah- e- Sahaba. “Don’t forget these people supported him during the election,” he says.
Terrorism has corroded the composite dialogue that Nawaz began with his Indian counterpart I. K. Gujral in 1997. It now hovers over the 1999 peace process Nawaz has recently vowed to resume with India along with mutually beneficial economic ties.
The 2013 election was remarkable for its lack of an anti- India agenda. The PML- N manifesto did mention a dialogue with India on Kashmir. But it also spoke of Pakistan as being a bridge between the energy- rich central Asia and Iran and the energy- deficient India. Nawaz’s focus on an economic agenda has brightened the prospects of the Indo- Pak Free Trade Agreement ( FTA). The FTA, one of the most ambitious by India with another nation, puts only 100 items outside the trade basket ( India’s other trade pacts exclude at least 1,000 items). It was put on hold by Pakistan’s electoral process. Coupled with the grant of Most Favoured Nation status to India, it could open up Pakistan to Indian electricity, one of Nawaz’s key electoral promises.
Reaching out to India will mean getting the Pakistan army on board. Only then can Nawaz deliver on the economic promise of his manifesto.