Can India and Pakistan ever be friends?

It’s a general tendency amongst Indians to feel good whenever there is some news of Pakistan being humbled anywhere in the world, be it in any sports event or anything else. It’s like if it’s bad for Pakistan then it has to be good for India and vice versa. With the kind of animosity and distrust that the two countries have towards each other it is quite natural for Indians to feel the way they do. And I’m pretty sure that there are quite a few Pakistanis as well who feel the same way for India. Like I said, it’s rather natural, for them too. Having said this I would like to add that this a pretty short sighted approach on both our parts. And today I will talk about why a strong and stable Pakistan is good for India, in particular.

The first and foremost thing to understand are the implications of the current situation inside Pakistan. As things stand today according to experts in US, Taliban is poised to take over Pakistan. This may happen as soon as within six months, according to Daivid Kilcullen, a former adviser to top US military commander General David Petraeus (read this report from Times of India here). God forbid, but if this was to happen it would be catastrophic to say the very least. These are the following scenarios which could emerge.

(a) Pakistan will surely not remain a united country anymore. There are enough indicators to that. Baluchistan will break away. So will POK and quite likely so will Punjab, which is the financial hub of Pakistan.

(b) If this were to happen no one knows who will gain control of Pak’s nuclear weapons. The integrity of Pak army in such a scenario is also quite doubtful. I’m sure US does have plans to secure these weapons in such a scenario but you can’t be sure if they’ll succeed or not. Can you imagine Taliban having nuclear weapons? After US and Israel we’ll be next against whom they’ll use these weapons, for sure. Not just this, these weapons will be on sale in black market for anyone to buy. It won’t be long before countries like Libya, Iran, N Korea and a whole lot of others who aspire to have this weapon acquire it using these means. You also can’t rule out Maoists in India or LTTE in Sri Lanka (if they survive the current battle) and other insurgent groups around the world gaining access to such weapons. So it will not just be India which will get affected but the whole world in general. And most definitely it will lead to a Third World War which can consummate this whole planet. All it will need is a nuclear trigger. That’s how serious this threat is.

(c) Now coming to the conventional weapons, Taliban will also use all those missiles like Hatf, Ghauri and the like which means none of our cities will be spared. This, essentially is a bigger danger than nuclear weapons which are quite limited in number.

(d) What will happen to Kashmir? If we have to deal with someone who will we be dealing with? I can’t imagine India talking to Taliban for resolving this issue. That won’t happen. So what will happen? A war. That’s what will happen in which hundreds of thousands of innocents will be killed on both sides.

All said and done it is quite a scary scenario which no one can afford to live with. Now let’s talk of a stable Pakistan. What good will that be? A lot, actually.

(a) We know whom to deal with. However difficult the dealings may be but we know whom we are dealing with.

(b) Kashmir issue may be resolved, even if it takes a few more years of dialogue. It sure is a very complex issue and there will be no easy solutions either but it can be resolved.

(c) With terrorism getting abated both India and Pakistan can concentrate more on developmental issues including bilateral trade. Once our trade reaches a more than a few billion dollars Kashmir will lose it’s predominance in our relations. The business community within Pakistan will not let anything come in their way to prosperity. This may seem far fetched but actually it’s not. An existing example of this is the kind of relations US has with China. Though the Chinese and Americans don’t see eye to eye on many issues yet they have learnt to live with each other just because it makes perfect business sense to do so. With terrorism not being a threat anymore our govt may well be able concentrate more effectively on poverty alieviation, education, health services and so on.

(d) Our security forces will not be stretched as they are right now. We can reduce the number of troops deployed in Kashmir and that will result in savings of billions of dollars for the country which in turn can be used for developmental purposes. Also, our forces can be redployed to tackle other security issues more effectively like the threat from Maoists and the other terrorist outfits operating in our north eastern states.

(e) With improvement in relations with Pakistan within India too the issue of communalism will be less prominent. We can expect much more harmony between Hindus and Muslims in such a scenario.

(f) Last but not the least is the humanitarian issue. You would appreciate the fact that poverty and joblessness are the biggest reasons why people take to terrorism in the first place. With Pakistan becoming more stable and strong they will be able to improve the living standards of their poor people and with improvements in job prospects and a decent standard of living less number of people will be drawn towards militancy and extremism, which is very good for us.

You can see for yourself which option is better for us, a strong and stable Pakistan or a weak and vulnerable Pakistan. Though there may be some variations in each of these scenarios but I very strongly feel  this will be the basic script. Believe you me, this world will be a better place to live in if Pakistan achieves the kind of stability which I talk of. Off course, you guys are at liberty to disagree with me. But do consider all these issues before you decide what’s best for us. And in case you feel strongly about something, let everybody know through your comments. I’ll be more than happy to receive a feedback on my thoughts.

Related Post
No related posts

 If you like this post subscribe to my RSS feed. See how?

Register for Newsletter | Email this post | Download this post

Posted on April 9th, 2009 Best Articles, India calling, Track the world • Tags: development, India, Pakistan, poor, stable, terrorism, trade. • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback