Need to ease travel between India and Pakistan
The writer is a senior journalist presently working with Islamabad Policy Research Institute, Pakistan’s premier think tank working under the GOP’s National Security Division. He can be reached at iamehkri@gmail.com
Pakistanis who cherish their roots in India have a price to pay, and vice versa. They have been suspected as a security threat since the 1947 divide. It is not ‘normal’ for either side of the families to even think of visiting their wards or relatives, as the cumbersome visa regime is utterly inhumane. Notwithstanding the fact that the Muslims of the Indian Subcontinent created Pakistan with their blood and sweat, they have lived a life of second-class citizens. Same is the mistrust prevalent in India for those who visit the ‘land of the pure’. Perhaps, their freedom at midnight haunts them to this day, making intermingling across the borders an uphill task.
Karachi, as of today, is home to more than 20 million people whose ancestors migrated from India. It also has a good mix of Biharis and Bengalis who to this day face trials and tribulations of 1971 truncation. Moreover, there are hundreds and thousands from the second and third generation of partition who opted to tie the knot across the divide. Thus, India became the new home to hundreds of brides, and likewise Pakistan. The first impediment to their matrimonial life is attaining the new citizenship, which is hard to come despite favourable laws. Then comes the enigma of a visa to travel across the hubris in real time. There is no room for emotions, sentiments and exigency, and obtaining a valid visa promptly is like milking the tiger!
The point is that there are no legal, political or social voices, or valves, to cater to this faceless migrant constituency. It is ironic that the Indian consulate in Karachi was closed in 1994 on ‘security’ pretext. Apparently in a real estate row, Pakistan’s mission in Mumbai was also shut the same year.
Since then, it is Islamabad and New Delhi missions that take on the flood of applications. The Urdu-speaking community has seen red since then. Now even travelling to the Indian High Commission in Islamabad to seek a visa is out of bounds, and not to speak of the wait-time for mandatory clearance.
I vividly remember MQM MNA Kunwar Khalid Younus from Karachi striving to table a piece of legislation, calling upon both the governments to treat ‘genuine’ visa-seekers on a priority, and also to come up with multiple entry visas for the inmates of divided families, who long to see their parents and siblings, especially in times of exigency. The move did not see the light of the day. The MQM failed the Karachiites by never keeping this issue on its agenda of demands with the Centre.
Not to speak of the euphoria from the media and businessmen who eulogised the dream of visa on arrival. Last but not least to recall is the royal resolve from Jaswant Singh, India’s External Affairs Minister, to which I was privy at a gathering of intellectuals in Delhi, as he promised visa-free travel to journalists and intelligentsia. Nothing changed on the plateau of mistrust and hate on either side.
Pakistan and India are in this human misery together. Migrant families in Pakistan, and likewise Indian Muslims with blood connections in Pakistan, are a reality and cannot be put under the carpet. There is no point in suspecting their loyalties, and treating them as pariahs as they exhibit their fondness for each other.
The enigma is that both countries have deliberately marginalised a sizable peace community who could go on to touch-base the denominators of literature, poetry, music, films, theatre, history and interfaith harmony. What we have today on the surface is a brigade of hawks. Doves are down and out!
It may be reminded that ‘terrorists’ do not travel on visas, as they have their own deep-state nexus to get away with from each side. Then why penalise and harass citizens who believe in lawful interactions and a serene module of co-existence?
We are living in an era of connectivity, and geo-economics teaches nothing but amalgamation of interests. Unhindered trade and travel is the need of the hour, and this is how we can overcome the bitterness prevailing in our jaundiced societies. Pakistan and India have impregnable defence edifices, and it is out of question that a few thousand easy-travelers could come to threaten them. Come to think of it and make life easy for their respective sovereigns.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 10th, 2024.
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