A creditable show by the BJP in Maharashtra could propel the PM to explore talks with Nawaz Sharif on the margins of the SAARC summit next month, says Ramesh Ramachandran
For Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the road to peace with Pakistan will likely pass through Maharashtra. A creditable performance in the Assembly election to be held on 15 October will have consequences far beyond the ordinary, setting him on a trajectory that few could rival.
How well the BJP performs in Maharashtra will determine the
following:
♦
Balance of power between his government, on the one hand, and the party and its
ideological mentor, the RSS, on the other. A handsome win in Maharashtra,
leading to the installation of a government with the BJP playing a key role in
it, will further cement his authority in the party and vis-à-vis the RSS. But
for that to happen, first Modi and his protégé Amit Shah’s gambit of going it
alone in Maharashtra will need to pay off. A BJP win will also silence some, if
not all, of his sceptics, critics and naysayers who wondered whether the
party’s unprecedented win in Uttar Pradesh in the Lok Sabha election was a
flash in the pan or the result of a carefully-crafted strategy executed by
Shah, who, as BJP president, now represents a formidable duopoly along with
Modi. No doubt, therefore, that the results of the Maharashtra election will be
an acid test for the duo
♦ The
extent to which Modi would be able to free himself from the pulls and pressures
from the BJP, the RSS and their core constituents (who run the risk of becoming
restive if Prime Minister Modi doesn’t quite continue to catch their fancy as
much as Candidate Modi) and go about fulfilling his mandate, that of delivering
on his promise of a fast-track development agenda, putting the economy back on
rails and creating jobs, among others. Modi could go in for a reshuffle of his
council of ministers, too; and
♦ Last
but not the least, whether Modi will be able to transcend the dichotomy between
his image and reality and steer his government’s foreign and security policies,
particularly vis-à-vis China and Pakistan, in a direction he wants to
The SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation)
summit to be hosted by Nepal in November will pose a challenge and an
opportunity for Modi. The summit, sandwiched as it will be between the Assembly
election that would have concluded by then in Maharashtra and the Assembly
election due in Jammu and Kashmir, could well see Modi hold a meeting with his
Pakistan counterpart Nawaz Sharif.
While a favourable result in Maharashtra would likely shape
Modi’s “intent” to re-engage with Sharif, the talks, structured or otherwise,
could well go on to impact the “outcome” of the Jammu and Kashmir election,
whenever they are held. Not only would re-engaging with Pakistan find a
resonance in the Kashmir Valley, it could induce a salutary response from a
section of the voters, if not towards the BJP then at least to one of its
potential allies.
If the Modi-Shah duo redeem themselves in Maharashtra after
a less-than-spectacular performance in the 54 Assembly constituencies across 14
states (Uttarakhand in July; Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab and Karnataka in
August; and Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh,
Assam, West Bengal, Tripura and Sikkim in September) where bypolls were held
since the BJP-led NDA came to power on 26 May, then a possible meeting with
Sharif on the sidelines of the SAARC summit could lay the groundwork for
resumption of talks between the officials of the two countries, to begin with.
India called off foreign secretary-level talks a week before
they were to have been held in Islamabad on 25 August, after Pakistan High
Commissioner Abdul Basit went ahead with his meeting with a Hurriyat
representative disregarding New Delhi’s objections. Sartaj Aziz, adviser to the
Pakistan PM on national security and foreign affairs, has since said that
probably the meetings with Hurriyat representatives were a mistake and they
could have been avoided. For his part, Basit has said that in diplomacy one
leaves the door ajar, implying that talks in the future could not be ruled out.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj echoed similar
sentiments at her maiden press conference in September, when she said,
“Diplomacy mein kabhi bhi poorna viraam nahin lagta, there is no full stop in
diplomacy. It’s always (a) comma or semicolon. And, after all this, people
always move forward. There are no full stops in (the) diplomatic journey.”
As if on cue, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval held
talks with Basit on 13 September. This was followed by a meeting between Basit
and Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh a few days later.
For his part, Modi iterated in his United Nations General
Assembly (UNGA) speech, “I am prepared to engage in a serious bilateral
dialogue with Pakistan in a peaceful atmosphere, without the shadow of
terrorism, to promote our friendship and cooperation. However, Pakistan must
also take its responsibility seriously to create an appropriate environment.
Raising issues in this forum is not the way to make progress towards resolving
issues between our two countries.”
The message to Islamabad was clear: Choose between the
Hurriyat or the Indian government, and between bilateral engagement and raking
up outstanding issues in international fora. Although the two PMs did not meet
in New York on the margins of the UNGA later that month, they could meet in
Kathmandu.
A meeting on the sidelines of the SAARC summit in Kathmandu
seems “unavoidable”, says former foreign secretary Kanwal Sibal. “Provided
there is no major provocation” from the Pakistani side between now and the
summit on 26- 27 November, he hastens to add. Sibal was in office when India
and Pakistan signed a ceasefire agreement in November 2003.
MK Bhadrakumar, a former diplomat, feels that either side
could have pleaded scheduling difficulties in New York but a Modi-Sharif
meeting in Kathmandu “cannot be avoided”. He says that it will be embarrassing
for Modi if he does not follow up on his talks with Sharif in May, when the
latter was invited to New Delhi for the inauguration of Modi as PM.
A strategic analyst with a New Delhi-based think-tank, who
did not want to be identified, said that a bilateral meeting would be par for
the course but cautioned that should Modi decide to meet Sharif in Kathmandu,
they should go beyond restating their respective positions. Otherwise what
purpose would be served by only exchanging courtesies? he asked.
Some others cite the asymmetry between the two prime
ministers (Modi came to power riding on the back of a huge mandate while Sharif
has been rendered weak even as the Pakistani Army gains in influence) to
question the wisdom of exploring the possibility of talks.
If the two principals indeed hold a meeting next month, the
expectation in some quarters is that it will be followed by an announcement
that their foreign secretaries would either meet soon or that they will remain
in touch and explore how to move forward.
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| A house damaged by cross-border shelling in Arnia sector near the India-Pakistan border |
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| Victims undergo treatment at a government hospital in Jammu |
However, repeated ceasefire violations (more than 150 this
year) by Pakistan at the border and the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir,
which claimed the lives of five innocent Indians on 6 October — the highest
toll in one day since 2003 — and left some injured, has compelled the BJP to
take a position that is patently different from that of its predecessor, which
was perceived to be soft on Pakistan.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh warned Pakistan to stop violating
the 2003 ceasefire agreement. India, he said, will not tolerate Pakistan’s
ceasefire violations anymore and that it should understand the reality that
times have changed in India (“Zamaana badal gaya hai”).
Defence Minister Arun Jaitley, in turn, said that the Indian
Army was “fully ready” and was responding to the Pakistani provocations.
The Indian Army and the Border Security Force say they
retaliated effectively with the same calibre weapons used by Pakistan to
repeatedly violate the ceasefire, which was variously described by security
sources as an attempt by Pakistan to push in infiltrators into India before
winter set in, with a view to disturbing the peace ahead of the Jammu and
Kashmir Assembly polls; to deflect attention from political turmoil inside
Pakistan; and to keep the Kashmir issue alive and not allow it to recede into
the background.
In spite of the recent provocations by Pakistan, a
resounding victory at the hustings in Maharashtra could yet resolve Modi’s
Hamletian dilemma of how to solve the Pakistan conundrum.
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