“What is in a name”. This is not Shakespeare asking. This is Nirupama Rao, India’s Foreign Secretary asking. She was speaking to media persons on being queried about the future of composite dialogue. She doesn’t believe in that terminology and therefore the answer “what is in a name’?
Sir, the memory of our top bureaucratic as well as political leaders especially ruling leaders are seeming to be short. Otherwise they are suffering from selective amnesia.
26/11 Mumbai carnage is two years old. The fretting and fuming on our part is a thing of the past. 166 died, many maimed, properties destroyed leaving a black mark on the psyche of not only Mumbayits, but the average Indian citizens like us. Hemant Karkare’s family, Sandeep Unnikrishnan’s parents. Vijay Kamte’s near and dear ones similarly many other family members lost their kith and kin in the carnage which shook the financial capital of India, so what, many similar explosions, deaths and injuries took place, many commissions of enquiry instituted but nothing came out of them.
Two years after 26/11 carnage even after our Home Minister continued to keep his eyes on Pakistan’s balls, the story is back to square one and the heat and dust already subsided. Pity. Really pity. How many times dossiers presented to them and when each dossier presented, Pakistan asked for more dossiers nothing other than that took place. Pakistan was taking India for a ride, still taking India for a ride, the culprits still scot-free and roaming freely in Pakistani soil. David Coleman Headely, the notorious double agent of both Pakistan and America on being questioned by Indian Intelligence officials spilt out the beans and we Indian citizens came to know about the nexus between him, LeT and Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence Agency, its acronym being ISI.
On the other hand, see the ‘audacity’ of Pakistan, in their words the guts in arresting a so-called American ‘diplomat’ for gunning down to Pakistani citizens ‘in self-defence’. Soon after the incident US State Dept snapped its ties with Pakistan Embassy in US. Furthermore in spite of US demanding the arrest of the man named ‘Raymond Davis’ the dispensation in Punjab has not cowed down to anybody’s pressure. US State Secretary Hilary Clinton on the sidelines of a conference in Munich, evaded talking to Pak Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi.
However both nations continue to declare before the world that both are on good terms ad both do not have any problems outstanding which need a solution. The gunning down of two Pak men in ‘self-defence’ so he claims and since being a white man hailing from US is entitled to have a gun to protect himself from attacks, thus the argument goes.
As long as this man named ‘Raymond Davis’ – the identity itself is of doubtful nature – who reportedly claims diplomatic immunity the US-Pak relationship is set to be in doldrums. In addition to it the widely talked about trilateral talks between US, Pakistan and Afghanistan scheduled to be held at month end seems doubtful.
The guts that Pakistan does have, India doesn’t have and now after the talks held at Thimphu, Bhutan on the sidelines of SAARC Meeting between Nirupama Rao and her Pakistan counterpart Salman Basheer which lasted for 90 minutes in a press release came out with a decision to go on with the bilateral talks. Her plea to the media in this connection was not to ‘kill’ the decision which was taken on a cordial atmosphere and she continued with the plea to ‘let it breath’. No one has taken any objection to the decision, cordial talks are needed otherwise as somebody put it, it would lead to a damaging vacuum which will be filled by enemity. Agreed. But this should not lead to the closure of 26/11 carnage and related procedures, it should also go on with equal vigour and see to it that the culprits are booked and brought to justice even after a prolonged dithering. Both countries do have many agendas and they are Kashmir, peace and security, terrorism, cross-border infiltration and LoC trade.
Nobody would question the good intentions behind this, all welcome it but we shouldn’t forget the dark events of the past at the hands of Pakistan. The most heartening thing being India unlike Pakistan never tried to intervene in the internal affairs of Pakistan and such reciprocity India also expects from Pakistan’s part at least in future. True, a stable, prosperous Pakistan, India always want and for that Pakistan should extend the generosity of being friendly with India always. Let this be a good beginning covering all matters of concern and here begins as Nirupama Rao told the busiest days in the coming months since Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi is set to land in India in the middle of 2011.
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