Will Modi live-up to His Newly Found Wit

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has found some new facts about Pakistan, it seems. As a career Sangh Pracharak and an icon of hardline Hindu nationalists, Modi brandished all kind of rhetorical sarcasm in the run up to the Lok Sabha elections while campaigning. His “biryani” jibe against UPA govt. and the “Miyan Nawaz Shareef” sloganeering with a clear connotation got jubilant echoes from the crowds during his campaign for May 2014 elections. But after he got an unprecedented single party majority for his Bhartiya Janata Party to take the reins of the country, everything changed overnight. Showing an extraordinary bonhomie, he invited Shareef in his swearing-in ceremony. The move was widely acclaimed by “Aman ki Asha” brand day-dreamers. The rightists took solace from the fact that Nawaz Shareef was only one of the SAARC nation heads.

In the days to come, the nation had to hear many high voltage statements from the Home Minister Rajnath Singh about BSF acting in vengeance to reply Pakistani rangers’ misadventures on border and terrorists getting befitting replies from paramilitary forces. Apart from such strong statements (which we heard nth times in last 2 decades or so), everything else remained the same on ground. Then came the decision of Modi government to cancel the secretary level Indo-Pak talks after the Pakistani High Commissioner in Delhi went ahead with meeting Kashmiri separatists despite Modi government’s strong reservations. People like me got ecstatic saying this was the first instance the Government of India showed its backbone. But with egg on my face, I heard just weeks after that the same secretary level talks were going to be resumed. I thought I missed some very important development regarding the Indo-Pak relationship. May be, Pakistan had given some assurance about not repeating such misadventure anytime in future again. Or, may be Pakistan had expressed, at least a superficial sorry for the recent past. I surfed google frantically cursing myself about not being up to date about such important developments. On the contrary, I found same stubborn provocating statements from Pakistani ministers and diplomats. And could never understand what made Narendra Modi to take an U-turn on his erstwhile stand of cancelling the talks.

Then came the Pathhankot air base attack. Again we heard all kind of blistering which were also used after 26/11 Mumbai attack. And then, Modi government did what no Congress government would have dared to do, of course, fearing a political backlash on back of BJP’s nationalist chest thumping had it been out of power. Mr. Narendra Modi permitted a Pakistani security apparatus comprising personnel of Pakistani army and infamous ISI to take a stroll across the air base for investigation. There couldn’t have been found a more stupid parallel in the world of international diplomacy. At one hand, Indian government claimed it had proof of direct handling of Pathankot attackers throughout their mission by Pakistan based terrorists who have openly been enjoying the patronage of Pakistani government and army. And on the other hand, the same Indian government, invites the Pakistani army in the garb of a legitimate Pakistan government investigation team to investigate the attacks and hands over the proof to them. In other words, you had a robbery in your house. You have clear-cut knowledge or proof that your neighbor committed the crime. Still, you call him to inspect your house and try to prove to him by giving him the proof that he was the robber. Great diplomacy!!! May be, we common people do not have a sense of true diplomacy. So would the great diplomats of the Modi government spell out what they really achieved by inviting Pakistani army and ISI officials to investigate the Pathankot air base attack venue.

And now the masterstroke has come right from the horse’s mouth. The one and the only protagonist of this government, Narendra Modi has declared that the only talking point will be PoK. But he has already lost his credibility as far as his government’s policy towards Pakistan is concerned. The image of a no-nonsense leader with a clear focus and result oriented determination that Modi acquired with a subtly calibrated campaign over years have been damaged badly by his UPA-style confused and fearful Pakistan diplomacy. Now this is the last chance Modi has got to reclaim the image of his hard minded focused national leader. Only giving a statement that PoK is the part of Jammu and Kashmir won’t work. Pakistan occupied part of Kashmir by force and so the only unfinished task is to take the PoK back. But unfortunately, we have been on pains for last 70 years to explain the oneness of J&K (one third of the original that we had in 1947) with India. Now the Modi government has left with about 32 active months in office. So does it really plan to take this point forward and make it a centre point of Indian policy towards Pakistan?

Besides, Baluchistan and Gilgit are two provinces that are undergoing unbelievable formidable atrocities on human kind. Pakistan has even used its air force for bombing on Baloch people. It has lost its moral right to govern Balochistan. And even from diplomatic point of view, to help Balochistan and Gilgit in getting independence from Pakistan is the only practical solution to get rid of this disease called Pakistan. Modi has already tried Noble peace prize winning gestures to tame Pakistan. But, we may only hope that he would have understood it that getting into the history with “Aman ki Asha” bandwagon may leave him fumbling in the no man’s land. Rather, he may carve his place in the lanes of history by helping struggling Pakistani provinces to get independence. Indira Gandhi is an example who is always revered as an iron lady for what she did on the eastern borders.