Time for a new dawn

Age-old territorial issues must not remain intractable, must find accommodation for mutually beneficial resolutions.

There are two games in town these days: what happens to South Asia post-2014; and what will become of India and Pakistan post the Indian elections of April 2014. The latter with a hint of a foreboding remorse since Narendra Modi has been all over in the four regional elections where his party, the BJP, has virtually swept. Both are engaging and vital to the region, and remain enigmatic.

The post-2014 scenario is centered on Afghanistan and the American drawdown, as some want to call it. I still think, it will be a withdrawal; in effect, if not physical. Though, the physical, too, will follow soon when the futility of it all becomes obvious. For the moment, though, let things be, in any number under the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA). That will only help save the fracas of a debilitating bloodshed.

And if the Afghans can just be kept off the impending civil war long enough, just because Afghanistan will still not wholly belong to them because of a continuing American presence; and it will not be up for grabs as would be if the Americans were to leave lock, stock and barrel, they may just forget to brandish their weapons on each other, instead slipping into an ensuing order that may just become their default new normal — more pacifist, more civil.

This will be good for Pakistan and the region. Militancy may subside and terrorism may lose its centrality in how business is conducted in Afghanistan. Without doubt, it will need a decent helping hand by those around; and this is where India and Pakistan will become relevant to the Afghan issue, as they have been till date in an insidious and competitive proxy juxtaposition. South Asia, thus, is correctly placated; and Afghanistan for reasons known to it alone has decided to join this compact called Saarc to suck in all what Saarc had on offer. Mostly obnoxious, at the hands of its two principals: India and Pakistan.

Outside of what might ensue, were Afghanistan to slide further into an irrecoverable mess, there will remain the abiding and inherited schism of the Durand Line that even the Afghan Taliban, purportedly the friendlier of any disposition that has ruled Afghanistan, were reluctant to regularise with Pakistan. The line that divided British India and Afghanistan thus continues to be a sore between today’s Pakistan and Afghanistan, even if all else was smooth as silk between them. How a 350,000 military and paramilitary Afghan National Security Force will impact this conundrum is only a matter of interesting conjecture. The helpful presence of some up to 15,000 foreign troops (mainly US) will add some more to Afghan stridence, especially if on Karzai’s vehement insistence, the clause to ‘jointly fight Afghan enemies’ does find an entry into the proposed BSA .

On to the other front now; the eastern front, where historical enmity — calling it animosity takes the sheen away — has tied both India and Pakistan into a Gordion knot that even Alexander today will find difficult to untangle. Kashmir, Siachen, Sir Creek, water, terrorism and proxy vendettas, all conflate into one intractable characterisation that will leave even the most sought statesmen in South Asia hopelessly short of the miraculous potions to undo what the geographical divide of British India has bequeathed to its two successors. And then arrives the Prince of Gujarat and the BJP, Narendra Modi, to add to perceived complexities. But then who knows; the greatest promise for better days that India and Pakistan ever had was under the BJP’s Vajpayee ji.

The underlying root in these various formulations of dissonance remains a fuzzy territorial divide that the Brits left for South Asia to behold and reckon. This has given cause for intricate politics to muddle what lies at the core. To cut through these layers of intractability, if we could resolve Kashmir, all else should fall in place. Resolving Kashmir though, is a loaded proposition in an environment where symbols matter; and where national pride has greater value than peace and material well being. It helps to explain thus that a solution must of essence be ‘mutually acceptable’. If it seems like inching towards accepting the status quo, perhaps that is what it is. A territorial solution that does not entail additional cost in territory to any side is what will be of mutual interest and is more likely to work. It may, in the end, also be the final arbiter for South Asia to open its doors to what has been till now the forbidden land of simple, peaceful coexistence.

With the changes afoot in South Asia, and the greater likelihood of the current spate of strife subsiding as Afghanistan and Pakistan deal with the aftermath of a vicious tryst with militancy and terrorism, through a combination of dialogue, mopping operations and some introspective improvements of how these nations have worked within and without — this perhaps is now the moment for the region to think itself anew. Governments and societies need to resolve their distortions that become the trigger for such radicalism and militancy. Neighbours need to be helpful and not disruptive. Age-old territorial issues must not remain intractable and must find accommodation on all sides in mutually beneficial resolutions.

If nations have lived with the issues that have neither been resolved through wars, nor through dialogue, over decades and centuries, chances are those are irresolvable and must be so accepted. Which really means that beyond a given date in history, post-Bangladesh perhaps, what is, should be so accepted. If in the bargain, both India and Pakistan can give up claims on each other’s parts of Kashmir, that can be a swell beginning and real tectonic shift. We can then proceed to work together on how to organise Kashmir and its associated territories as unified sociocultural and territorial entities while remaining within the joint protectorate of both India and Pakistan. India can continue to retain its stated position on border issues with China on territories that are contiguous to India. Such a resolution will subsume irritations such as Siachen too. A similar approach towards a mutually beneficial final resolution can be found for Sir Creek, too. Both nations must equally benefit from the potential and increase complementarities, simply because confrontations is the wrong way to live and exist.

This simply might convince Afghanistan, too, to relent on the Durand Line, enabling border control mechanisms that can minimise transgressions and enable better control. Trade, travel, exchange of people and ideas, and innovation are then sure to follow. Now is the moment, while a new dawn awaits. This may then be the only game in town.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 14^th, 2013.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.