Bishkek pleasantries offer a ray of hope?

Arun Joshi

A fleeting meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Pakistani counterpart Imran Khan during the Shanghai Cooperation organisation in Kyrgyzstan capital Bishkek, termed as “exchange of usual pleasantries”, is a pleasant development.

In diplomacy, such developments gain extra significance when the leaders happen to represent the nations whose relationship is, perhaps, at one of the lowest points in their history that is a case study how not to do things.

Irrespective of the circumstances and the place where the two leaders met and exchanged pleasantries, it should be read as an attempt to take baby steps in removing misunderstandings in the relationship that has gone sour over the past few months. Pakistan foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said his premier “congratulated Modi on his election victory”. That Imran Khan had done before as well through a decently drafted letter and tweets with stress on regional peace, but when such words are expressed during a face-to-face meeting, howsoever brief it may be, the significance multiplies manifold.

To say that it was an ice-breaking moment would be an exaggeration, but nevertheless it was an opening of opportunity for that. The past cannot be ignored. The relationship is reeling under the weight of things that have gone wrong between the two. A sudden shift in the relationship may be a premature expectation, such meetings do leave positive dots that can be counted as the points to counter the doomsayers who present Kashmir as a flash point that could trigger catastrophic consequences.

At the risk of repeating, it should be understood, and the people of Jammu and Kashmir understand it better than anyone else, that the violence, whether it is called terrorism or justified by some as a natural means to fight the “oppression”, has made the state a killing field. Pakistan should look at the weakness of its own argument when it says that the violence against the “repression” and genuine “freedom struggle” doesn’t qualify as terrorism. Such a justification runs against Pakistan’s own internationally propagated theme that: cooperation and not confrontation” would help resolve matters. Violence forms core of the confrontation, and the terrorist violence provokes the worst form of confrontation. And, if Pakistan needs an example, it should view how the terror group Jaish-e-Mohammad, based in Pakistan, executed the Pulwama terror attack on February 14 this year and instantly changed the complexion of the relationship between India and Pakistan. The war cries were heard all over.

Kashmir has suffered a lot because Pulwama happened here. The soil was Kashmiri, the suicide bomber was Kashmiri, rest everything was from across the border. Had the international community accepted its deniability in the attack, Jaish chief would not have been listed as “global terrorist” by the United Nations Security Council. In diplomacy, things are not notified in black and white.

Modi has outlined the roadmap for peace that the nations sponsoring terrorism should be held accountable. It would be in the interest of mutual relationship and also in the interests of the people of Jammu and Kashmir longing for normal life that his words are heeded more seriously this time. That is the only way out to pave ground for dialogue, as dialogue cannot be held when the voices of reason and peace are drowned by guns and bombs.