Region 
 

Islamabad

Hard Nut to Swallow

The Muslim population in the subcontinent has become a hard nut for
India to swallow but a more organized offensive is needed to ward
off their nefarious designs.

By Amjad Ali | September 2020

When Pakistan emerged as a sovereign state in 1947, the Indian leadership could hardly digest the new reality as the new country had been carved out of the original Indian subcontinent which was known as British India. Instead of maintaining peaceful neighbourly relations with the newly created Muslim state, the Indians started working for the division of the subcontinent right from the outset. Some of their leaders may have agreed to the two-nation theory but in their hearts of hearts, they never wanted the Muslims of British India to have their own homeland.

Seven decades later, they are still working at undoing Pakistan. The Indian Congress Party did succeed to some extent when, with the collusion of the erstwhile Soviet Union and the other major powers looking the other way, they were facilitated by the Mukti Bahini (also an Indian creation) to break away the eastern wing of Pakistan and form an independent Bangladesh. This happened after the Indians had repeatedly failed to destroy Pakistan altogether. That done, they still continue to destabilise their western neighbour one way or the other. This is because India has never accepted Pakistan’s sovereign existence and has always supported insurgents, whether they were in the former East Pakistan or in today’s Balochistan. India has also ratcheted up attacks along the LoC and Indian media have continued to spew venom to defame Pakistan at every opportunity.

Against this backdrop, Pakistan needs to launch an aggressive diplomatic campaign at the international level in order to expose Indian involvement in anti-Pakistan activities as well as expose its malicious designs of endangering regional peace through a false-flag operation like the Pulwama attack.

The Congress Party’s Maulana Abul Kalam Azad had said at the outset that the state of Pakistan would not survive. After the East Pakistan debacle, Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi had arrogantly proclaimed, “We have taken the revenge of a thousand years.” This shows that the Hindus of India had been seething with anger under Muslim rule for over a thousand years but couldn’t do anything about it because they never had the military wherewithal that the Muslim rulers had. India Gandhi also said, “We have drowned the two-nation theory in the Bay of Bengal”. This was in answer to Pakistan’s founder, Quaid e Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s contention that the Indian subcontinent mainly comprised two nations – the Hindus and the Muslims. The two-nation theory was the basis on which Pakistan was created and the great migration of populations occurred. However, the Indians have always retained their antipathy towards Pakistan. They have not been happy just by dismembering it and would rather destroy it altogether! The way the BJP government of Narendra Modi is going, this is their ultimate aim.

After 9/11, the regional geo-political landscape shifted in India’s favour and they exploited it well. Pakistan, on the one hand, had to join the war on terror due to international pressure; it also faced violent attacks by terror outfits, leading to more than 80,000 deaths of military personnel and civilians and a loss of $150 billion to the nation’s economy. In that period, Pakistan’s strategic installations were ruthlessly attacked, such as PNS Mehran, Karachi Airport, GHQ Rawalpindi, PAF Kamra, Pakistan Navy installations, etc. Furthermore, who can forget the massacre that occurred in the Army Public School (APS) in Peshawar? All these attacks had direct or indirect Indian connections though they were launched from Afghanistan soil. Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval’s leaked video is a testament in this regard. He has confessed that the Taliban (TTP) are mercenaries and they might work for India provided they are given more funds.

Attacks on the Chinese consulate and recently on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) in Karachi were carried out by the banned BLA terrorists who are financed, provided logistics and trained by Indian elements operating from Afghanistan where they have a RAW-NDS nexus working against Pakistan. Prime Minister Imran Khan has expressed his views in the National Assembly that “he had no doubt that India was behind the PSX attack”. Recently, Pakistan’s permanent representative at the UN, Munir Akram while talking to Newsweek said, “We have plenty of evidence that India is sponsoring terrorism from Afghanistan into Pakistan; We have evidence, we presented the evidence, and we’re prepared to present more evidence”. The arrest and confessions of Kulbushan Jhadev have also exposed Indian lies and infiltration in the internal affairs of Pakistan.

In view of such evidence as well as the emerging new challenges at the international level, it is incumbent on the Imran Khan government to launch a massive diplomatic offensive to counter Indian designs as they may endanger regional peace. This has become all the more important as many Arab countries are now in a queue to have diplomatic relations with Israel.

We are living in a world where market interests take precedence over moral values. Pakistan needs to make extra efforts to create an impact at the global level through diplomatic means. Ironically, Pakistan’s diplomatic missions have not been as proactive as the circumstances demanded which can be gauged from the recent statements of Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi who expressed his frustration while talking of the Saudi-led OIC regarding the Kashmir issue and India’s continued high-handedness. The Foreign Minister has urged Pakistani diplomats to plan engagements with host countries and give media interviews besides appearances at think-tanks in support of Kashmir.

Pakistan has to adopt an innovative approach in order to create an impact in the international diplomatic arena while emphasising (i) India has violated the UNSC resolutions of plebiscite; (ii) the Kashmir issue is a humanitarian issue and has morphed into a humanitarian catastrophe; (iii) the Hindutva ideology is inspired by Nazism, hence it seeks extermination of the Kashmiris; (iv) Indian claims on Azad Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan and Indian aggression may drag the two nuclear-armed countries to nuclear war; (v) keep highlighting the possibility of a false-flag operation by India; and (vi) expose India at the SCO.

Pakistan has to ramp up its diplomatic efforts at all platforms to expose India’s aggressive face.

Read More