- The latest ‘Kashmiri intifada’ has been too hot for Indian leadership to handle
Perhaps, like my ownself, there are millions of compatriots who have, after a very long gap, felt proud to be Pakistanis.
We have since the 1980s developed for ourselves an extremely negative perception internationally, both by default and by being besieged with a hermit mentality. We said to ourselves, we are good, while the world thought otherwise. But today, things stand radically changed. We have as a nation behaved extremely maturely by demonstration of great responsibility as a state that has in its arsenal, the nukes.
India, since our independence, has been waging war upon us and has always excelled in making the international community believe that we are warmongers. In the same spirit for the last many years, they have been teasing us along the LOC, with usual shelling and incursions killing innocent peasants and villagers. Our repeated reminders not to provoke have been falling upon deaf ears. The Indian arrogance of self deception that they can get away with any act of belligerence, took them towards the recent misadventure. They miscalculated!
On a quiet morning, their aircraft crossed over into our air-space — as per the captive pilot, he was still in search of his target, when our agile air force brought them to the ground, in a flash of a second. India hasn’t thanked yet, they got back “alive” wing commander and in exchange we received Shakirullah’s body, who in a Jaipur Jail, was stoned and kicked to death. Does the international media’s camera have a lens that is clean from partiality?
It is a fact, that the successive governments in Delhi haven’t been able to eliminate, the fastidious Kashmirs from their right to self determination. The latest ‘Kashmiri intifada’ has been too hot for Indian leadership to handle.
Narendra Modi until recently couldn’t manage to get a US visa on his passport for reasons of being a butcher of Gujrat, where he single-handedly ordered the massacre of over 2,000 innocent Muslim women, men and children. With this mental makeup, he decided possibly to have some of his own armed personnel, killed for a few gains at the forth coming elections. Indian media and politician are now exposing him and his intentions.
The downing of the enemy aircraft has been much celebrated. But, now it should end. We have as a nation serious business of mending the economy
The deft and mature handling of the situation by Imran Khan, the armed force and the government of Pakistan, arising out of Indian act of aggression, is indeed commendable. It is through magnanimity that Imran Khan conquered the hearts of the enemy. The role of Indian media is more a matter of comedy than of any serious consideration. The anchors they have hired seem to be specialists in beating the war drums. The hysteria and the panic they created for their own masses must be evaluated by the Indian public. The spectacle of an anchor pointing to some wreckage, claiming that it is of an F-16 and while trying to seek endorsement from his guest, who is a defense analyst for his foolish assertion; the anchor is shocked, when the analyst says, looks more like wreckage of our MIG-19 or 21 aircraft, downed by Pakistan, was hilarious, to say the least.
By waging a war upon Pakistan, New Delhi just cannot indemnify itself from its gross miss-handling of the Kashmir issue and from its injustices perpetrated upon the innocent Kashmiri youth. The United Nation resolutions for India are worth the respect of a garbage can. If at the height of tensions between two nuclear states, the UN secretary general has only this to say, that both countries must de-escalate and negotiate; then why do we need the UN?
What secular India forgets are the words of their own Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, “I object to violence (war) when it appears to do good, the good is temporary, the evil it does is permanent”. Indian leadership today lacks the imagination and wisdom of its founding fathers, who prima-facie believed in secularism — what farce! The Indian intelligence is so inept and incompetent that it can find in the deep freezers of a Muslim home, a kiilogram loaf of beef, but they miserably fail to find, despite heavy military presence, whose numbers exceed the local population figures, the ‘terrorist’ who is thought to have carried out the attack! How much more comical can you get to Modi Ji.
Imran Khan’s appeal for peace is akin to FDR’s comment, “More than an end to a war, we want end to the beginning of all wars…” For again a pleasant reason, our media behaved extremely with maturity and reasoning. The maturity was all too visible. The analyses were balanced and there was more appeal for sanity of peace than war-mongering. But this lasted for only about two days or may be less. Immediately after handing over the captive Indian, the media changed its tune. Suddenly, they became critical about the decision to release the pilot. There is no middle road; they are either for Imran Khan or against.
The narrow mindedness of politicians and journalists is so demeaning. They have now embarked to block the campaign for the Nobel peace prize for Imran Khan which I am certain the PM doesn’t want. But why resist the campaign? Only Bilawal Bhutto, emancipated as he is, was magnanimous to acknowledge the good work done by Imran Khan, the government and the armed forces. He did not at this hour stoop to indulge in petty politics.
Even the performance of our Foreign Minister Qureishi needs recognition. He spoke with clarity, confidence and conviction at every single briefing. His resolute refusal to sit alongside his Indian counterpart at the OIC meeting is commendable. Let’s give ourselves some self-respect. Standing up to OIC and reminding them of our role in OIC was a good step.
The downing of the enemy aircraft has been much celebrated. But, now it should end. We have as a nation serious business of mending the economy. There is no luxury to undertake frequent processions. Instead, we have to concentrate on greater productivity. The war hysteria must stop too. No need to fan hatred. The olive branch held out by Imran Khan is flying high in the international diplomatic circles. Let’s not squander the respect we have gained as a responsible nation state, through childish comments or reactions. Wisdom always lingers. It is humble. It has roots in goodness. A major characteristic of wisdom is it does not bring you to do desperate acts. War is a crime. We should not honour it. “Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind.”(JF Kennedy)
