Musharraf’s mindgames

Subcontinental ghosts need to be exorcised

WHY did General Pervez Musharraf break the confidentiality of summit discussions on the last day? To everyone’s amazement his breakfast with Indian editors, during which he spoke extensively about what he thought of India’s approach to Kashmir, was put on television even though it was supposed to be off-the-record. It was then broadcast in Pakistan and India even as India’s prime minister and Pakistan’s president were talking one-on-one in Agra and trying to narrow differences in the drafts of the joint declaration.

Consequently, it is probable that Atal Bihari Vajpayee was not aware for some time what and how much Musharraf had said publicly. No negotiating leader should be blind-sided like that. Second, it is quite unprecedented for one of the parties to talks, in this case extremely delicate ones, to go public in the midst of them. Why did Musharraf do it at this point? Perhaps to prove to his own people that, contrary to what Sushma Swaraj had said, the Pakistani delegation was giving nothing away. As he admitted, no Pakistani leader can survive if he ignores Kashmir. Perhaps it was because he felt he was not going to get all that he wanted in Agra. However, there was one definite benefit: the televised conference served an important public information function. Indians and Pakistanis have not been so close to a summit process before and rarely has a subcontinental leader revealed so much about his thinking.

For the first time a Pakistani leader has spoken of ‘‘solutions’’ to the Kashmir issue. Although he did not spell out his ideas he did lay out a sequence of steps to bring about peace. Step Two is what he apparently came to Agra to achieve but went back frustrated. As he sees it, India must overcome its problem with words. He pretends to be perplexed by Indian word games and says it does not matter whether Kashmir is called a dispute or an issue. But he is being disingenuous. While it may be called a dispute in unofficial Indian settings, he knows full well why in bilateral political and diplomatic contexts India does not and cannot characterise it as a dispute. As is well known, such usage would bestow a legitimate locus standi and imply disputed territory. Knowing what Musharraf’s Step Two actually involves, it is important that Indian policy-makers find out what factors encouraged him to think India would take the step in Agra.

There is some purchase for Indian negotiators in other Musharraf statements. If he holds to his repeatedly stated position that Kashmir can be taken up bilaterally ‘‘in tandem’’ with other outstanding issues — a position close to India’s own — the next round of talks could be more productive. He also seems prepared to keep ‘‘the Kashmiri people’’ (a Pakistani euphemism for the Hurriyat) out of the talks process at the early stages. That too is an arrangement India can live with. Perhaps most revealing, and significant from the point of view of breaking the stalemate on Kashmir, is the difficulty Pakistani leaders have in banishing the ghosts of history. The 1971 war and Siachen in 1984 were brought up, to the surprise of Indians, when Musharraf answered a question about Kargil. Evidently some sort of special effort is required by both sides to get rid of the ghosts.