By Kuldip Nayar
Kashmir again. Coup leader Pervez Musharraf has to keep it on the front burner. The war in Afghanistan, increasingly unpopular in Pakistan, needs to be balanced by emotions _ and outbursts. The anti-India rhetoric is a useful digression even in a highly volatile situation.

What is depressing is that a democratically elected Prime Minister Atal behari Vajpayee is equally keen on playing to the gallery. That his party, the BJP, faces a crucial election in UP is understandable. After having been ousted from 24 out of 28 states to political parties in the opposition, losing the government in the most important state can shake the alliance at the Centre. But the PM’s observation of kara in response to Musharraf’s bravado that he was not wearing bangles did not enhance his dignity. He sounded as childish as the Pakistan President.

Almost every power on earth has asked for talks between India and Pakistan. Vajpayee has said so many times: how long can you avoid talking to a neighbour? Both he and Musharraf have been told by foreign powers during their recent visits abroad.

It is not that they have not met. The sitting at Agra was a marathon session. Still nothing came out of it. The reason is their diametrically opposed positions. It means that someone should help. But an outsider is ruled out because his role may become that of an arbiter or a mediator. The two countries have to settle the problem of Kashmir bilaterally.

Perhaps the way out is to entrust the job to non-officials. Both countries can choose one person of their confidence. They can meet and do the spadework. In fact, during the Nawaz Sharif time, the two such non-officials almost found a solution. In the words of Vajpayee, "we were almost there."

Over the years I have seen that when it comes to Islamabad, New Delhi throws restraint to the wind. The bureaucrats on both sides do it all the time. Their hatred or one-upmanship against each other provides grist to the propaganda mills of difference and defiance. When their superiors begin to speak in the same vein, they raise only concern.

It is a familiar scenario _ some kind of political dŽjˆ vu. Even the sequence has not changed. First there are inflammatory statements from both sides. Then some firing at the border and ultimately there is a build-up which is provocative enough but does not indicate hostility. Every time America calls for restraint and every time the temperature comes down.

The show looks like the threat which a spoilt child gives to his mother that he was going to jump into a river but does not do so because of her imploring. Both countries are probably vying with each other to catch Washington’s eye. Once in a while, at America’s prodding, there is a summit meet between the two countries. Then the period of animated pause begins. And everything is back to square one. The same exercise starts all over again.

Pakistan understands it. But after the death of its founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who favoured a secular nation, the country has been made a theocratic state where the liberals have only little role or say. The war in Afghanistan is strengthening the hold of the jehadis and other fundamentalists. How can they reconcile themselves to the idea of a secular Jammu and Kashmir when they want to grab the Muslim majority valley of the state?

There is no dearth of agreements between India and Pakistan. Starting right from the Jawaharlal Nehru-Liaquat Ali pact after the partition to the Lahore or the nearly-signed Agra Declaration some time ago, the joint communiquŽs have not been the problem. They have analysed the situation correctly whenever the two countries have wanted to do so.

Take, for example, the Shimla Agreement text. Both countries declared: "The Government of Paksitan and the Government of India are resolved that the two countries put an end to the conflict and confrontation that have hitherto marred their relations and work for the promotion of friendly and harmonious relationship and establishment of durable peace in the subcontinent so that both countries may henceforth devote their resources and energies to the pressing task of advancing the welfare of their people."

Nobody can take exception to the sentiments expressed. The problem is not that New Delhi and Islamabad do not know what ails their relationship. The problem is the absence of desire to implement the understanding they reach, either in letter or in spirit. Pakistan is largely to be blamed because it raises Kashmir even before the ink of signatures on any agreement dries up.

Musharraf is blunt enough to say that Kashmir comes first and other problems later. But this does not mean that he is right in his approach. He knows that the path he has taken cannot end up in a solution of Kashmir. The entire approach is too religious and violent. India can never agree to it because it will hurt its pluralistic policy. Even a party like the BJP has begun to argue that Pakistan is seeking to undo India’s secular society. It is significant that Vajpayee brought in partition of India for the first time in his recent speeches and said that the country would not allow the partition to be repeated.

One leader at Srinagar has said: The Afghanistan war has highlighted Kashmir and it will now be pursued by the Muslim world. Again, the approach is communal. No amount of religious colouring will resolve the Kashmir problem. It will only get tangled. The liberal approach of Kashmiriyat may help. But that is where the Kashmiri pandits come in, not the Muslim world.

A letter which I have received from Ghulam Rasool Kar, once the Congress president of Jammu and Kahsmir, rightly points out that "Muslims and pandits are two inseparable components of Kashmir society." The problem is how to bring back the community to the valley after 20 years and how to give them the confidence. Islamabad can never understand, much less appreciate, this aspect. Even New Delhi does not.

Bringing the Kashmiri Muslims and the pandits together is important to normalise the situation in the valley. But attending to the alienation of the Jammu population is equally important if the state is to stay together. Just as the valley has got communalised in the past few years, so has Jammu. The Hurriyat which claims to represent the state should make efforts to retrieve the situation in Jammu. But it faces the pressure of the Islamic lobby from within. Were New Delhi to start negotiations with the Hurriyat and other elements in the state, the focus must be political, not religious, as the case is today.

Such a process will also defeat the efforts of fundamentalists from across the border. They should have realised by this time that the Indian state is no pushover. By making Kashmir a religious state _ as Osama bin Laden wants to _ the extremists are complicating further an already complicated problem. Theocracy is an outdated ideology which could attract people in the Middle Ages, not in the 21st century.

And what about the elements in Pakistan who believe that the pressure on Kashmir will make India disintegrate one day? Even in a recent interview to The Nation, published from Lahore, former ISI chief Hamid Gul has said: "I believe India cannot live as a political entity as it is today. It has to be fragmented."

But when one comes to know that Hamid Gul is the person who wove the web of fundamentalism in Afghanistan in which thousands of simple, gullible people were caught, one can only have pity for those who think likewise in Pakistan. They are sick. The Muslim society should be wary of them. Look at what they have done to Afghanistan.