To contain Pak, try a smarter strategy

Diwali ushers in seasonal cheer, lit homes and prayers. It also brings fireworks, terrifying animals, birds and humans, besides worsening pollution levels in Delhi and other big cities. This year, it’s also a dark Diwali for the families of martyred servicemen and families living within range of Pakistani weaponry in Jammu and Kashmir. India-Pakistan relations have turned turbulent since August when Prime Minister Narendra Modi abandoned the pro-engagement Ufa spirit of last year. On August 15, Independence Day, the new Modi doctrine was spelt out, encompassing a more aggressive riposte to Pakistan on terror, human rights violations and Sino-Pak complicity. Tactically it involves a no-nonsense handling of J&K civil unrest, a freer hand to the military/BSF to respond in kind to Pakistani infractions and a diplomatic offensive to isolate Pakistan.

This hybrid approach is designed to create new red lines. The challenge is their enforcement and imparting punishment when they are breached. Never have two nations possessing nuclear weapons tested deterrence via calibrated punishment. On the positive side, it questions Pakistan’s assumption of unlimited immunity from Indian retaliatory strikes. The danger is of public opinion fed on jingoism determining the red lines instead of the government’s strategic thinkers. Pakistan has its own domestic constraints. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, under medical treatment in London from April, returned in July to find the Kashmir Valley in ferment after Burhan Wani’s killing. Enfeebled by the Panama Papers allegations on his family’s bank accounts abroad, he yielded to the stoke-fire-in-Kashmir game. He had earlier reneged on the Pathankot airbase attack probe by disallowing an Indian team to visit Pakistan after India cooperated with their team.

He thought international pressure on India by vociferously raking up Kashmir at the United Nations would restore political strength at home and force India back to the negotiating table. He also hoped to checkmate domestic opposition and the Pakistani Army, enabling him to name Gen. Raheel Sharif’s successor when he retires on November 30. The attack by Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, that recently held a funeral service for eliminated fidayeen, at Uri mid-September killing 19 Indian soldiers, undercut the Nawaz gambit as the international focus shifted to Pakistan-sponsored terror and away from Indian security forces’ handling of the Valley unrest. By the end of September and after the exchange of India-Pakistan diatribes at the UN General Assembly, India rallied Saarc members to boycott the planned November summit in Pakistan over Pakistan’s sponsorship of terror.

In two decades of Saarc’s existence never before has almost the entire membership rallied to India’s side on this issue. The Indian retaliation on September 29 was characterised by the government as “surgical strikes”. While military and diplomatic officials underplayed it as action “along the LoC” and an “anti-terrorist” operation, not targeting the Pakistani Army, political leaders, starting with I&B minister of state Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, were less restrained. Subsequent posters in election-bound Uttar Pradesh claiming political credit revealed the BJP’s duality. The ceasefire negotiated in 2003 is, in effect, over. There have been regular exchanges of fire, with the BBC estimating 43 and rising ceasefire violations. The latest provocation is reversion by Pakistan to actions, tantamount to war crimes, employing special forces or militants under their command to behead a soldier of 17 Sikh Regiment, which breaches the Geneva Convention and related protocols. The Indian Army, being a professional one, must eschew aping Pakistan despite the extreme provocation.

The spillover to other fields was immediate. Raj Thackeray singled out Pakistani filmstars in Indian films as Karan Johar’s movie Ae Dil Hai Mushkil prepared for its Diwali release. The multi-crore “settlement” sullied Maharashtra Chief Minister Deve-ndra Fadnavis’ reputation as the Army and public opinion derided it. The tit-for-tat reaction by Pakistan stifles already limited cultural links which counter the toxic jihadi narrative about India. Indian security agencies, meanwhile, uncovered a spy ring operated by Pakistan high commission staffer Mehmood Akhtar. His expulsion invited Pakistani copycat action. The tension has worsened after an attack, jointly claimed by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, on the Quetta Police Training College that killed 62 people. Pakistan’s national security adviser apparently complained to the US ambassador of Indian complicity. The Indian Army, meanwhile, sought revenge for their soldier’s beheading.

Where are India-Pakistan ties headed? After disrupting the Pakistan-hosted Saarc summit and excluding Pakistan from the Brics summit by inviting Bimstec and not Saarc members, India now says Pakistan is welcome to the Heart of Asia conference on Afghanistan in Amritsar on December 4. Imran Khan, meanwhile, will begin a march on Islamabad on November 2. Unlike two years ago, he doesn’t have the Tahir-ul-Qadri’s hordes but may again be acting at the Pakistan Army’s behest to destabilise the polity as Gen. Raheel Sharif’s term ends late November, to force Mr Sharif to grant him an extension.

Mr Sharif may get a new Army Chief but it will buy him transient ability to curb his Army’s aggressive India policy as it won’t alter the basic power differential between the two. But an India-Pakistan meeting in Amritsar could help two BJP allies — the PDP chief minister in J&K and the beleaguered Badals in poll-bound Punjab. It could also be a first step to de-escalate, but Indian public opinion may need convincing about yet another flip by the government. Chinese President Xi Jinping has further consolidated his power and is now a “core” leader like Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. China’s objections to the Dalai Lama visiting Arunachal are ominous. It makes strategic sense not to ratchet up tensions with both Pakistan and China. India needs a smarter defence against cross-border terror, political outreach in Kashmir and open doors with Pakistan instead of artillery duels and medieval eye-for-an-eye approach. The aim should be to contain Pakistan, not outgun it despite, to vary Karan Johar, “Ae Aman Hai Mushkil”.