Afghan instability is of deep concern to India

Seen from the strategic perspective, the distance between New Delhi and Kabul is nearer than we think, and that is a reason for this country to be deeply concerned following a series of recent military attacks by the Taliban in the Afghan capital that have taken scores of lives and injured hundreds. Attacks from the Pakistan side — by the Taliban and other extremist outfits nurtured by the Inter-Services Intelligence — across Afghanistan have indeed escalated manifold since the United States announced the end of its combat mission in Afghanistan last December.

This is leading to creeping political instability in Kabul that cannot but have a negative impact on India’s long-term engagement with Afghanistan — both in development assistance and the political understanding that a democratic and sovereign authority in Kabul is important to India’s strategic interests and its security paradigm.

As far as the level of Pakistan-induced violence is concerned, it seems to have made no difference whatsoever that Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has for long been engaged in peace negotiations — chaperoned by the US and China — with the section of the Taliban leadership that is in Islamabad’s direct control. That leads to the inference that the peace talks are a ruse by Pakistan to allow the Taliban to overwhelm the Ghani government to the point that it becomes politically so handicapped as to be crippled in the eyes of his own people.

If Islamabad is not about to install a Taliban regime as freshly returned rulers in Kabul, the primary reason is that this could conceivably cause the non-Taliban sections in Afghanistan to lean in the direction of a civil war. That, of course, will be bad news all around, and it is unlikely that Pakistan will be in a position to control the outcome.

Deep-going uncertainty, and the political and social vulnerabilities likely to ensue in such a scenario, are a prospect this country must do what it can to pre-empt. If national security adviser Ajit Doval is serious about his belief that India must punch proportional to its weight and not below it, the current situation in the Afghan theatre is an opening for it to energise its commitment to act meaningfully — and responsibly — in Kabul so that its deep-going friendship with the Afghan people is not at risk due to contrary factors.

The violent attacks launched at multiple locations that shook Kabul over the weekend are the first since Mullah Mohammed Omar’s death was reported around a week ago. These point to Pakistan’s determination to bring the Ghani government to its knees even in circumstances in which the Taliban are thought to have lost their unifier. That should worry all friends of Afghanistan.