Keeping in mind the history of bilateral relations between India and Pakistan, the decision of granting India the MFN status was taken in pure militaristic fashion. Neither was it discussed in parliament, nor in the Senate. Political parties from across the board were also not consulted or taken into confidence. No discussions were conducted in the media either. The decision was taken abruptly by the Cabinet; the information minister announced it promptly after. Given this rushed manner of things, the furore that followed was to be expected.
This is not how decisions are taken in a democracy. Especially decisions that relate to the foreign policy, and the most sensitive matter in the foreign policy that will affect the day to day lives of common people at that. It’s worth noting that India has already given Pakistan the MFN status some time back but no Pakistani government was able to take the requisite reciprocal step. This means that their existed strong resistance to the issue. Then why did the government adopt this militaristic approach rather than trying to iron out public opinion? Such approaches are bound to have negative fallouts and this is what happened.
As soon as the information minister made the announcement, a storm of opposition was raised. The lobbies whose interests have been entrenched over decades on the basis of animosity with India cannot bear any betterment in relations. The life of these lobbies depends on India-enmity. Without changing their mindsets and the nature of their interest, no action will amount to anything.
The best time to give the MFN status to India was when they had given it to us. But that action has now gathered the dust of passing time and lost its impact. The goodwill that would’ve been generated if both the countries had taken the action together as per a proper agreed-upon plan would have been significant and the public would then have seen the practical advantages of this decision.
India did not give any trading concessions to Pakistan after granting it the MFN status. This gave the signal that this decision was mere point-scoring in the international arena. If India was indeed interested in generating goodwill, it could have unilaterally taken some steps just as it had given the MFN status unilaterally. If Pakistan had begun to get facilities from the Indian end, pressures from the Pakistani end would automatically have begun to generate. But it is our misfortune that neither of the governments seriously tried to take down the wall of hostility erected between them after India invaded Kashmir. In the pride of power, India never took the Pakistani point of view into consideration. It has always wanted that Pakistan relent and accept Kashmir as its part and this is the condition that it sets for better relations. It is not prepared to give way on the Kashmir issue and its rulers have utterly forgotten that the logic which led them to occupy Hyderabad means also meant that Pakistan had a right to Kashmir.
Pakistan let India strengthen its hold on Kashmir due to its own mistakes and was ready to face the brunt. We had repeatedly tried to persuade India to come up with a Kashmir solution that kept the wishes of the Kashmiris in mind and also was acceptable to Pakistan; Pakistan was no longer talking of taking complete control of Kashmir. The formula that is seen to be evolving after negotiation is acceptable to a large extent to India too.
But India has stepped back after agreeing to certain terms many times. The last time an agreement was seen to be evolving was in the time of Musharraf. But India led to an impasse again and spoiled the matter by using the excuse that no negotiations could be carried out with a military government. Now it’s been more almost four years since a democratic dispensation has been in place in Pakistan. The agreement evolved in the Musharraf era could easily have been formalised but there has been no headway on that front.
I know that this is what the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks wanted to achieve. Even the official circles in India are now beginning to recognise that whenever there will be progress on peace, extremists will try to sully the process. Knowing all of this, why is India dragging its feet about coming to an agreement with the democratic government in Pakistan? Sometimes it comes off that India’s avowals of the desire for peace are mere hollow proclamations and that it is waiting for the time when it can unilaterally impose a Kashmir solution of its liking on Pakistan.
Unfortunately, India now has the backing of our dear friend, the US. The expanding influence of terrorist in Pakistan is a danger to the entire world. The idea that Pakistan’s nuclear assets are not safe has gained credence in the US. Which is why they are making plans of denuding Pakistan of its nuclear assets and international opinion is being prepared to that end. Maybe India is waiting in the wings for such an opportunity as well.
I have explained this background at length to set some context for the unexpected nay vote that came from Bangladesh about the inclusion of Pakistan into the WTO. The US and India both want to capitalise on the fact that Pakistan’s position is weak in the current scenario. Our position is weak because of a host of reasons: terrorists using Pakistan as a launchpad to conduct activities against the allied forces, the presence of terrorist havens in FATA and last but not least, OBL being nabbed in Pakistan. We are on the defensive backfoot because all of these things and more. Using this perception that Pakistan cannot be trusted, the US has been pressurising Pakistan economically and have started levying stern conditions on us. A plan has been put into place to corner Pakistan. If my fears are correct, then Bangladesh’s vote against us may be a link in this chain and a result of India-US confluence. They are acting like our well-wishers apparently but have used Bangladesh to backstab Pakistan. The little leverage that we could gain in European markets has also been lost to us.
And this is not where the loss ends. The US will cinch the pipelines coming out of IFIs and will also put stringent conditions on the aid it is giving to us. When talk of the Haqqani group started to pressurise Pakistan, I wrote that this is not just about the Haqqanis but something bigger. Now I will say that the matter is not just having an agreement about Afghanistan but of something bigger. No wonder Hillary Clinton called the situation a ‘game-changer’.
The writer is one of Pakistan’s most widely read columnists.