Interview

“ ... only the Congress can guide India-Pakistan relations in a rational direction.”

- Mani Shankar Aiyar

Mani Shankar Aiyar is an Indian diplomat, politician and government servant. He has served in Belgium, Iraq and Pakistan.

May 2021

mani-shankar
In your opinion, is it U.S. pressure behind the recent thawing of relations between Pakistan and India?
In my opinion, there is neither any US pressure nor any “recent thawing” in relations between Pakistan and India. All that has happened is that in the attempt to ready themselves for the post-NATO troops withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Pakistan army (or elements in it) are hoping to free troops from the Indian border for deployment on the Afghanistan border or, if circumstances permit, even into Afghanistan. As the post-withdrawal scenario is in total confusion, including the very question of withdrawal itself, I do not think there is anything very much to the Bajwa pronouncement of 18 March that, in any case, have not been followed up at the political level.

Do you think that the current Indian leadership has failed to positively engage with Pakistan?
I think it is futile to expect the current Indian leadership to “positively engage” with Pakistan. Its entire domestic platform hinges on its anti-(Indian) Muslim postures and acts, and that plank would stand removed if the government were to engage “positively” with Pakistan. Meaningless gestures and dramatic statements are essential to the BJP’s foreign policy; so, there will be “alarms and excursions” from time to time, but I foresee no possibility of sustained engagement driven by the desire to arrive at a constructive conclusion, however long that might take. As I have often said before, if we are to arrive at lasting solutions, there will have to be an “uninterrupted and uninterruptible” dialogue between the two countries. I do not think Modi has the stomach for that kind of sustained dialogue and, in any case, would be severely restrained by the leadership and mindset of the sangh parivar.

Will the relationship between Pakistan and India become more complicated when the US forces withdraw from Afghanistan?
I think a great deal depends on India’s policy towards Afghanistan if the US forces do indeed withdraw from that country. That will inevitably leave the Taliban in a commanding position, even if initially they are in coalition with Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah. Can you see the BJP engaging positively with the Taliban? And can you see Pakistan not exulting in welcoming back the Taliban? So, I am afraid these return questions are the answers to your question.

Could the political and security leaderships of Pakistan and India move forward on their own to settle their disputes permanently?
That is exactly what is envisaged in the 1972 Simla Agreement. But in the nearly 50 years that have passed since July 1972, India, having achieved its goal of dealing only bilaterally with Pakistan on Kashmir and other issues, has consistently, over many governments, refrained from engaging with Pakistan in an “uninterrupted and uninterruptible” manner. Having closed, very sensibly, the multilateral approach to issues being raised by Pakistan, we have very stupidly, failed to avail of the opportunity opened by Simla to engage with them even bilaterally - except in a sporadic, un-sustained manner. Pakistan too has shown no signs of engaging with us seriously.

Is Indian premier Narendra Modi using Hinduism to turn India into a Hindu-dominated autocracy?
No, he is not using “Hinduism” but “Hindutva” to turn India into a Hindu India from being a secular democracy and thus make it, as Jinnah predicted, into a Hindu-dominated autocracy. Hindutva is a vicious political philosophy; Hinduism is a gracious, multi-faceted religion.

Do you think that Pakistan-India relations could have been better if the Indian National Congress were in power?
Yes, as Dr Manmohan Singh irrefutably demonstrated, only the Congress can guide India-Pakistan relations in a rational direction. But, perhaps, that era is gone, for Nehru’s secular fundamentalism no longer seems to guide the INC. Only a secular India can come to terms with a religion-obsessed Pakistan

Cut from the same geographic and ethnic cloth, why is India considered a working democracy while Pakistan is always projected as being under military rule and, as such, a dictatorship?
I regret India and Pakistan are no longer cut from “the same geographic and ethnic cloth”. Since the last 75 years, Pakistan has remained religion-obsessed and Islam constitutes its principal ethnic characteristic. But because of this religion-based conception of itself, which did not take into account the other ethnic diversities of Pakistan, more than half the country’s population broke away in 1971. The ethnic diversity of (west) Pakistan continues to persist and is the principal source of domestic instability in that country. So, whether from 1947 to 1971, or since 1971, democracy is only a trapping for a pretended unity of an “Islamic Pakistan” that does not adequately take into account provincial and intra-provincial diversities that can only be contained within a true democracy. This tends to leave Pakistan as an army-dominated quasi-democracy. But I do not think any of this needs to stand in the way of our entertaining good relations with Pakistan because, if you look around, many of our best friends in the world are dictatorships.

Why is India shy of holding state-level dialogue with Pakistan or opening the way for third-party mediation to resolve the long-festering Kashmir dispute?
The reasons for our being shy of a state-level dialogue with Pakistan have already been explained, but I remain firm in my insistence that we must not allow any third party mediation because all “third parties”, as we have discovered to our cost, prioritize their own state interests above the state interests of India and Pakistan. To put the burning Kashmir problem in the hands of an outsider would only aggravate the situation, as it has in the past, because both parties would play to their respective galleries instead of engaging with each other.

Would liberalised trade and economic ties between Pakistan and India provide a more conducive environment to address the Kashmir issue?.
Liberalized trade and economic relations would, of course, lead to a more conducive atmosphere for tackling more complicated issues but I think, much more than trade or economics, it is a liberalized visa regime, intensive people-to-people interaction and sporting and cultural events that would be important to stage-setting. This would be a “no-cost”, “win-win” position. Unfortunately, both governments continue to punish their own people by making them the scapegoats for misplaced policies in Islamabad and New Delhi.

In your opinion, what could be a pragmatic roadmap to bring Pakistan and India closer?
As I have consistently maintained over the last quarter century, after spending three delightful years in Pakistan and visiting that country some 40 times in the last 40 years since I returned from my Karachi posting, the only pragmatic road map to bring Pakistan and India closer is to embark on an “uninterrupted and uninterruptable” dialogue. More than once I have written about how such a dialogue might be structured and would refer your readers to my 1994 publication “Pakistan Papers” published by UBSPD, New Delhi, now out of print but available in selected libraries. Alas, I personally am down to my last copy.

One thought on “only the Congress

  • May 11, 2021 at 5:24 am
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    I agree with Mr Mani’s views. He’s an experienced and wise diplomat

    Reply