The Duniyah Cricket Blog

Last week I attended in London a “summit” organised by the Indian magazine Tehelka, the list of speakers and the title of the summit promised much. However much like anything to do with politics in the subcontinent, it disappointed ultimately as tired cliché after cliché was recycled without respite. Now the seminar was not without its bright spots, but overall, especially given the list of luminaries speaking at the seminar and all that it promised to be it was disappointing and ultimately a waste of my time in my opinion.

In typical Indian organisational fashion the day kicked of late, this was to have consequences later on and ultimately defeat the purpose of a seminar like this, which is to engage the audience and give the ordinary man a chance to engage with the important issues of the day. Frankly Tehelka should hang their heads in shame at the shambolic nature of the event - the room was too small for the number of people, the tardiness, last minute changes to the speaker list. If this is supposed to project an idea of the new India in foreign lands, then this did nothing more than probably remind us of stereotypical ideas about Indian (dis)organization.

The keynote speech was delivered by the former Indian foreign minister, Jaswant Singh of the BJP and currently leader of the opposition in the upper house, the Rajya Sabha. He delivered what was a semi-interesting speech, but one which was hard to hear, primarily because he is an elderly gentlemen who cannot project his voice enough to fill a room and it times I had great difficultly making out what he was saying. The overall thrust of his speech can be summed up in that he relates the problems of the present to the specter of history that looms over India and Pakistan. By this, we are talking about events following independence and mainly the partition.
There was one statement he made – That the India- Pakistan Issue is primarily a Punjabi problem – which really irked me(which according to the organiser and Tehelka editor in chief - Taren Tejpal was recently also made to him by a sitting Cabinet member of the Congress government, so Indians can rest easy that this degree of arrogance and stupidity runs across party lines). I am particularly sure that the Pakistani politicians present must have winced as there has long been an accusation that Pakistan is essentially run by the Punjabis and the rest of the provinces are mere 2nd class citizens. Within India, Punjab is no doubt an important state but really very far from being the anchor on which foreign policy should be based. Secondly if anything the problems between India and Pakistan are rooted in one crucial issue – Kashmir, the solving of which is a precursor to normalisation. So clearly history is very important to Jaswant Singh, but he seems to be stuck back in the era of the partition and not at all in the present, where the issues are far more complex than being a simple “Punjabi issue” or even just Kashmir alone. Kashmir is the starting point of discussions between India and Pakistan but by no means is it the end.

I was surprised when I saw Nawaz Sharif’s name on the speaker list an I thought the if he dared to leave the country Musharaff would take the opportunity to overthrow him again. So as it turned out all we got was a video taped message from him, which was well delivered but really failed to say anything particularly ground breaking. I suppose they were the honeyed words of a man who knew his audience and what they wanted to hear.

The next stage was what was termed a panel discussion on Kashmir entitled “Melting the Snows, Reinventing the Imagination” , but turned out to be anything but a discussion. Instead we were treated to the most mundane speeches lasting about 7 minutes by each speaker. The first of these treats was a lady called Mehbooba Mufti, who is the daughter of a former Kashmir Chief Minister. She called for an open border along the Line of Control, restoration of trade routes so that Kashmir would flourish as it did during the era of the silk road (she wanted more trade with the likes of China , Afghanistan, Tibet) , more autonomy for the state and finally dual acceptance of both the Indian and Pakistani currency in Kashmir. Does she explain how she plans to achieve any of these? NO. Are we told what are the practicalities of how to achieve this. NO. Are we told what is the status quo in terms of autonomy of the state. NO. (Indian Kashmir for the record enjoys more automy than any other state). Are we told how the problem of cross border terrorism will be tackled. NO, in fact listening to this woman one would be left with the impression that Kashmir is a peaceful Shangri-La with no terrorist activity whatsoever. However this is the blight that the subcontinent suffers from - dynastic politicians who carry on raping and pillaging their respective countries with no heed to what the common man wants or needs (Pakistan has their own dynasties just as India does). This woman was utterly clueless, with no idea about the working of economics or commerce or how the world of business works in this day and age. I mean reviving the Silk road? Should we also resurrect camel caravans and caravanserais along the way? Honestly I was cringing as this woman droned on and on, feeling a sense of embarrassment for her.

This was followed by a Pakistani bureaucrat who as far as I could remember did not say anything of particular interest except that Indians and Pakistanis are the same culturally and we are moving forward in the right direction blah , blah, blah. Mundane to the extreme and not worthy of any sort of pulpit. So far no semblance of discussion just nonsense from one halfwit and one bureaucrat. Next we had Arun Jaitley of the BJP who made some points about cross border terrorism and how that had to be stopped before any genuine resolution could take place. He also made a point about reducing poverty (25% of India is still living in poverty) and how this was a key issue to sort out in order to move forward. I do genuinely believe that trade could be the way forward to genuine prosperity in the region. However before this can be achieved the issue of terrorism needs to be tackled and rooted out. Pakistan needs to do its part and weed out all terrorist outfits from its lands so that any progress can be made. In my opinion the ball is in the Pakistani court at the moment. However let us be clear the issue of rooting out terrorism in Pakistan is no small task and it will take them a while before they can achieve it. Until then there can be no question of open borders between the two nations.

The next speaker was from the Indian side and spoke at some length about the benefits of peace and reaching a resolution to the problem. He pointed out the benefits of how defense spending could be reduced if India and Pakistan sorted out their differences. That would be great if we live in a bipolar world where the only threat to either nation was the other, but this is not the case and India has far greater issues to think about – from an increasingly belligerent China to issues within India with Naxalite guerillas. So in my opinion we will not see any drop in defense spending of either country, especially given the employment that the military services create in both countries. This is yet again an example of an insipid politician who likes to wheel out some convenient phrases for the right occasion or he is a complete idiot who has no clue about the strategic realities on the ground, or even economics for that matter. I can now only remember him as a bald man stating some bald facts.

The whole formula of one Indian speaker followed by a Pakistani one continued and not a single one them managed to shed any new light or divulge any great insights. I would like to make a special mention of former ISI chief Asad Durrani, who I thought was a great speaker with a good sense of humour (he made some jokes at his one expense – about how all the ISI wants is peace etc).  His overall understanding of the strategic issues and the balance in the region was excellent as you would expect, so this was a rare ray of light as far as the speakers go.

The least speaker and probably the most colourful was Farooq Abdullah. This man has been in politics for over 7 decades and been Chief Minister of Kashmir several times. He talked in an impassioned way about how the Kashmir issue has been unresolved owing to the failures of politicians and the greed and avarice of those in power. This may serve to fool someone who is not familiar with the issues, but anyone who knows the record of this man knows what he truly is : a scoundrel who is lamenting now not so much for the people of Kashmir but for himself and the lack of a legacy he can leave behind. He realizes very well that he is an old man at the end of his life who has failed to achieve anything substantive. His career is peppered with failures and change of postures adopted depending on the way the wind blew. So I was not buying what this old man was trying to sell, particularly as I know that he has asked for clemency for terrorists in the past – the most recent case being where he said “India would burn if Afzal (the Delhi Parliament Bomber) was hanged”, this statement to me sounds like almost a threat. Hardly the words or actions of a man who wants peace in the region. There are also rumours that he has disowned his daughter for marrying a Hindu. The final nail in his coffin was the way he shouted down a member of the audience who dared to bring up the issue of the Kashmiri Pandits that have been force to flee from Kashmir or the Buddhists in Ladakh who do not get adequate funding from the state government in Kashmir. With scant regard for the forum he was present in this cantankerous old man shouted the questioner down. I think the audience was left rather amazed.

This reaction from Farooq Abdullah does serve to highlight the whole concept of democracy in South Asia. It is not democracy in the sense we are used to in the west. You certainly are not allowed to question the people at the top. They will talk some honeyed words to you every now and then out the goodness of their hearts and you should count yourself lucky to be in such lofty company. God help you if you dare to question them. This made even more sense to me in the light of what Tarun Tejpal said at the beginning that the Kashmir Issue can only be solved from the top down. So essentially the people have no stake, it is down to the politicians and bureaucrats in India and Pakistan. The shame is when every single politician speaking mentions how India and Pakistan are the same culture and the same people and therefore peace should be easy. Well if it’s a top down process what does it matter about the people? While I am all for celebrating all the similarities between people, it is a necessity that we also understand the differences if we are to have any constructive dialogue and hope for conflict resolution. It was a glaring omission that not a single speaker mentioned the greatest thing that separates India from Pakistan – the question of religion.  To me this omission only highlights the fact that the they were never serious about the panel or the discussion. For the majority of the politicians and panelists it was a free junket to a nice place in Europe where they can put their feet up and regurgitate an old speech they might have made elsewhere. What a shame for the people of India and Pakistan and particularly Kashmir.