Pervez Hoodbhoy | SabrangIndia News Related to Human Rights Wed, 23 Nov 2016 06:23:19 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.2 https://sabrangindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Favicon_0.png Pervez Hoodbhoy | SabrangIndia 32 32 The Truth About Dr. Abdus Slam A Documentary by Pervez HoodBhoy https://sabrangindia.in/truth-about-dr-abdus-slam-documentary-pervez-hoodbhoy/ Wed, 23 Nov 2016 06:23:19 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2016/11/23/truth-about-dr-abdus-slam-documentary-pervez-hoodbhoy/ Mohammad Abdus Salam ( 29 January 1926 – 21 November 1996),was a Pakistani theoretical physicist. A major figure in 20th century theoretical physics, he shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics with Sheldon Glashow and Steven Weinberg for his contribution to the electroweak unification theory. He was the first Pakistani and first Muslim to receive […]

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Mohammad Abdus Salam ( 29 January 1926 – 21 November 1996),was a Pakistani theoretical physicist. A major figure in 20th century theoretical physics, he shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics with Sheldon Glashow and Steven Weinberg for his contribution to the electroweak unification theory. He was the first Pakistani and first Muslim to receive a Nobel Prize in science and the second from an Islamic country to receive any Nobel Prize (after Anwar Sadat of Egypt).

Salam was a top level science advisor to the Government of Pakistan from 1960 to 1974, a position from which he played a major and influential role in the development of the country's science infrastructure.Salam was responsible not only for contributing to major developments in theoretical and particle physics, but also for promoting the broadening and deepening of high calibre scientific research in his country.He was the founding director of the Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (SUPARCO), and responsible for the establishment of the Theoretical Physics Group (TPG) in the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC). As Science Advisor, Salam played an integral role in Pakistan's development of the peaceful use of nuclear energy, and may have contributed as well to development of atomic bomb project of Pakistan in 1972; for this, he is viewed as the "scientific father" of this programme. In 1974, Abdus Salam departed from his country, in protest, after the Pakistan Parliament passed a controversial parliamentary bill declaring the Ahmadiyya movement, to which Salam belonged, as not-Islamic. In 1998, following the country's nuclear tests, the Government of Pakistan issued a commemorative stamp, as a part of "Scientists of Pakistan", to honour the services of Salam.

 
Video Courtesy: GICK Education

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To JNU with love, from Pakistan https://sabrangindia.in/jnu-love-pakistan/ Mon, 15 Feb 2016 05:57:17 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2016/02/15/jnu-love-pakistan/ A tribute to the ethos at the university, not from Hafiz Saeed, but scientist, essayist and staunch secularist Pervez Hoodbhoy (In an email to Sabrang India)   In 2005, having won the UNESCO Kalinga Prize for science popularisation, I toured seven Indian cities at the invitation and expense of the Indian government. One of my […]

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A tribute to the ethos at the university, not from Hafiz Saeed, but scientist, essayist and staunch secularist Pervez Hoodbhoy

(In an email to Sabrang India)

 
In 2005, having won the UNESCO Kalinga Prize for science popularisation, I toured seven Indian cities at the invitation and expense of the Indian government. One of my most vivid memories is that of my visit to Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi. There was intense, but totally peaceful, political activity of every kind. There were banners of student organisations with political leanings all the way from left to middle to right, together with seminars, discussions, and protests. Clearly independent thought in India’s better universities was alive and well.

I particularly remember that I gave a talk and showed my documentary film on Kashmir, at JNU. This was just the day before I was scheduled to meet President APJ Abdul Kalam in his office at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. I learned that office bearers of the JNU student union had been requested by the university’s administration to present flowers to President Kalam at the annual convocation. They flatly refused, saying that he is a nuclear hawk and an appointee of a fundamentalist party that does not respect human rights. Moreover, as young women of dignity they could not agree to act as mere flower girls presenting bouquets to a man.

Eventually the head of the physics department, also a woman, somewhat reluctantly presented flowers but said that she was doing so as a scientist honoring another scientist, not because she was a woman.

Bravo! I have not seen comparable boldness and intellectual courage in Pakistani students. Student unions in Pakistan have been banned for three decades. I felt envious.

It is therefore with sadness that I read of intolerance taking over in India. I hope it is temporary and will go away with the next government.


Hoodbhoy who was in India last month gave a series of lectures at Indian universities, colleges, and various public places. On his return to Pakistan, he wrote an article for the daily Dawn making some interesting observations on India today:

Rarely are Pakistanis allowed to cross their eastern border. We are told that’s so because on the other side is the enemy. Visa restrictions ensure that only the slightest trickle of people flows in either direction. Hence ordinary academics like me rarely get to interact with their Indian counterparts. But an invitation to speak at the Hyderabad Literary Festival, and the fortuitous grant of a four-city, non-police reporting visa, led to my 11-day 12-lecture marathon at Indian universities, colleges, and various public places. This unusual situation leads me here to share sundry observations.

At first blush, it seemed I hadn’t travelled far at all. My first public colloquium was delivered in Urdu at the Maulana Azad National Urdu University in Hyderabad. With most females in burqa, and most young men bearing beards, MANUU is more conservative in appearance than any Urdu university (there are several) on the Pakistani side. Established in 1998, it seeks to “promote and develop the Urdu language and to impart education and training in vocational and technical subjects”. Relative to its Pakistani counterparts, it is better endowed in terms of land, infrastructure and resources.

But there’s a still bigger difference: this university’s students are largely graduates of Indian madressahs while almost all university students in Pakistan come from secular schools. Thus, MANUU’s development of video “bridge courses” in Urdu must be considered as a significant effort to teach English and certain marketable skills to those with only religious training. I am not aware of any comparable programme in Pakistan. Shouldn’t we over here be asking how the surging output of Pakistani madressahs is to be handled? Why have we abandoned efforts to help those for whom secular schooling was never a choice?

To my embarrassment, I was unable to fulfil my host’s request to recommend good introductory textbooks in Urdu from Pakistan. But how could I? Such books don’t exist and probably never will. Although I give science lectures as often in Urdu as English, the books I use are only in English. Somehow Pakistan never summoned the necessary vigour for transplanting modern ideas into Urdu. The impetus for this has been lost forever. Urdu, as the language of Islam in undivided India, once had enormous political significance. Education in Urdu was demanded by the Muslim League as a reason for wanting Pakistan!

Modern face
A little down the road lies a different world. At the Indian Institute of Information Technology, the best and brightest of India’s young, selected after cut-throat competition, are engaged in a furious race to the top. IIIT-H boasts that its fresh graduates have recently been snapped up with fantastic Rs1.5 crore (Indian) salaries by corporate entities such as Google and Facebook.

This face of modern India is equally visible at the various Indian Institutes of Technology, whose numbers have exploded from four to 18. They are the showpieces of Indian higher education. I spoke at three ‒ Bombay, Gandhinagar, and Delhi ‒ and was not disappointed. But some Indian academics feel otherwise.

Engineering education at the IITs, says Prof Raghubir Sahran of IIT-GN, has remained “mainly mimetic of foreign models (like MIT) and captive to the demands of the market and corporate agendas”. My physicist friend, Prof Deshdeep Sahdev, agrees. He left IIT-K to start his own company that now competes with Hewlett Packard in making tunnelling electron microscopes and says IIT students are strongly drill-oriented, not innovative.

Still, even if the IITs are not top class, they are certainly good. Why has Pakistan failed in making its own version of the IITs? One essential condition is openness to the world of ideas. This mandates the physical presence of foreign visitors. Indeed, on Indian campuses one sees a large number of foreigners ‒ American, European, Japanese, and Chinese. They come for short visits as well as long stays, enriching universities and research centres.

Not so in Pakistan where foreigners are a rarity, to be regarded with suspicion. For example, at the National Centre for Physics, which is nominally a part of Quaid-i-Azam University but is actually ‘owned’ by the Strategic Plans Division (the custodian of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons), academic visitors are so tightly restricted that they seek to flee their jails soon after arrival. Those who came from Canada, Turkey and Iran to a recent conference at the NCP protested in writing and privately told us that they would never want to come back.

Tensions apparent
Tensions between secular and religious forces appear high in Modi’s India. Although an outsider cannot accurately judge the extent, I saw sparks fly when Nayantara Sahgal, the celebrated novelist who was the first of 35 Indian intellectuals to hand back their government awards, shared the stage with the governor of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. After she spoke on the threats to writers, the murder of three Indian rationalists, and the lynching of a Muslim man falsely accused of possessing beef, the enraged governor threw aside his prepared speech and excoriated her for siding with terrorists.

Hindutva ideology has put the ‘scientific temper’ of Nehruvian times under visible stress. My presentations on science and rationality sometimes resulted in a number of polite, but obviously unfriendly, comments from the audience. Legitimate cultural pride over path-breaking achievements of ancient Hindu scholars is being seamlessly mixed with pseudoscience. Shockingly, an invited paper at the recent Indian Science Congress claimed that Lord Shiva was the world’s greatest environmentalist. Another delegate blew on a ‘conch’ shell for a full two minutes because it would exercise the rectal muscles of Congress delegates!

Pakistan and India may be moving along divergent paths of development but their commonalities are becoming more accentuated as well. Engaging with the other is vital ‒ and certainly possible. Although I sometimes took unpopular political positions at no point did I, as a Pakistani, experience hostility. The mature response of both governments to the Pathankot attack gives hope that Pakistan and India might yet learn to live with each other as normal neighbours. This in spite of the awful reality that terrorism is here to stay.

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Instruments of Murder https://sabrangindia.in/instruments-murder/ Tue, 01 Apr 2008 06:40:14 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2008/04/01/instruments-murder/   Pakistan’s bombers: The war of drones Drones, machine and human, have drenched Pakistan with the blood of innocents. On the one side are US-made drones such as the MQ-1B General Dynamics Predator – a remote-controlled, self-propelled, missile-bearing aerial system. On the other side are the low-tech human drones, armed with explosive vests stuffed with […]

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Pakistan’s bombers: The war of drones

Drones, machine and human, have drenched Pakistan with the blood of innocents. On the one side are US-made drones such as the MQ-1B General Dynamics Predator – a remote-controlled, self-propelled, missile-bearing aerial system. On the other side are the low-tech human drones, armed with explosive vests stuffed with ball bearings and nails.

These lethal engines of destruction, programmed by remote handlers, are very different. But neither asks why it must kill, nor cares about the death and suffering it causes.

On January 13, 2006 a bevy of MQ-1Bs hovering over Damadola launched a barrage of 10 Hellfire missiles at the village below. They blew up 18 local people, including five women and five children. Such cold statistics say nothing about the smashed lives of the survivors or the grief of the bereaved. The blame was put on faulty local intelligence.

Then, on October 30, 2006 a Hellfire missile hit a madrassa in Bajaur, killing between 80-85 people, mostly students. Even if those killed were allegedly training to become al-Qaeda militants, and even if a few key al-Qaeda leaders such as Abu Laith al-Libi have been eliminated, the more usual outcome has been flattened houses, dead and maimed children and a growing local population that seeks revenge against Pakistan and the US.

The human drone has left a far bloodier trail across Pakistani cities.

From six suicide attacks in 2006, the tally went up to 62 in 2007. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, at least 1,523 civilians were killed in terror-related violence in 2007 and more than twice that number injured. The average is now more than one per week – the last week (early March) saw three in a row. Those praying in mosques, imambaras or at funerals have been no safer than others at political rallies or while crossing a road.

It is possible to imagine how an American soldier or CIA operative controlling a Predator drone can distance himself from the death and destruction it causes in a remote country on the other side of the world that they imagine is full of enemies. For them it is a job and a way to defend their country. What is harder to understand is how the Pakistani suicide bomber can kill people who are so close to him in so many ways.

A spine-chilling suicide bomber training video, one of the several videos that freely circulate in Pakistan’s tribal areas, offers the beginning of an explanation. About 30 masked fighters are filmed in this video, speaking a language that is not any of Pakistan’s regional languages, Arabic or Persian. They are training in some barren mountainous area.

One fighter, randomly selected by their leader, proceeds to climb a huge rock, perhaps 100 feet high. He reaches the highest point and then stands motionless. His arms are outstretched as though on a diving board. On a signal from the leader below, without hesitation and without closing his eyes, he hurls himself into the void.

The camera cuts to the body lying on blood-soaked ground. It slowly pans over the faces of the other masked fighters. Their eyes betray no emotion. A second signal from the leader and they trot, military-style, to the body, dig a shallow grave, toss their dead comrade into it and cover it up.

Then, amazingly, they march over the grave several times, chanting Koranic verses. This is astonishing because to trample a grave is the ultimate mark of disrespect in a Muslim culture.

Why sacrifice a human life for a few minutes of footage? English subtitles reveal that this is obviously a propaganda video. Its message: the group’s fighters have overcome the fear of death and have willingly surrendered their lives to the group leader, and their individual powers to reason and decide.

As troubling as the murders is the response of Pakistanis. While the murder of innocents by the MQ-1B has rightly led to condemnation in Pakistan, the even greater carnage by suicide bombers has provoked less criticism. Some editorials, mostly in English language newspapers, have been forthright. But there are few full-throated denunciations to be found in Urdu newspapers.

Why do so many Pakistanis who should know better suddenly lose their voice when it comes to condemning suicide bombings? Is it because the bomber kills in the name of Islam? Are people muted in their criticism lest they be regarded as irreligious or even blasphemous? Or is the silence political?

On the other hand, implicit justifications abound. In January 2008, 30 leading Deobandi religious scholars, while declaring suicide attacks ‘haram’, rationalised these as a reaction to the government’s misguided polices in the tribal areas. They concluded that "a peaceful demand for implementing Shariah was not only rejected but the government was also not willing to give ear to any reasoning based on the Koran and Sunnah in support of the Shariah demand. Apparently, these circumstances led some minds to the frustration that manifested itself in suicide attacks."

What are these ulema telling us? That we should adopt the Shariah to avoid being attacked? This amounts to encouragement and incitement, not condemnation of the suicide bombers’ actions. But even civil society activists, who have bravely protested against the dismissal of the chief justice by General Musharraf, have not held any street protests against these ghastly crimes.

Why do so many Pakistanis who should know better suddenly lose their voice when it comes to condemning suicide bombings? Is it because the bomber kills in the name of Islam? Are people muted in their criticism lest they be regarded as irreligious or even blasphemous?

Or is the silence political? Many choose to believe that the suicide bomber is a consequence of Pakistan’s acquiescence to being America’s junior partner in its war against terror. Conversely, there is a widespread opinion that suicide attacks will disappear if Pakistan dissociates itself from this war. But few admit the brutal fact that even if America retreats or an elected government calls off the army, the
terror of jihadism will remain.

It is true that suicide bombings were a rarity in Pakistan until the army acted against Islamic militants in the tribal areas on US prodding. Army action against the Lal Masjid militants was another turning point. But the majority of today’s dead and wounded are perfectly ordinary people. Many were pious Muslims and some were killed in the act of prayer. They had absolutely nothing to do with American or Pakistani forces.

Even with evidence staring them in the face, most Pakistanis seem locked into a state of denial. They refuse to accept the obvious fact that more and more mullahs have created cults around themselves and exercise control over the lives of worshippers. An enabling environment of poverty, deprivation, lack of justice and extreme differences of wealth is perfect for demagogues.

As the mullah’s indoctrination gains strength, the power to reason weakens. The world of the follower becomes increasingly divided into absolute good and absolute evil. Doubt is replaced by certainty, moral sensibilities are blunted. Reduced to a mere instrument for murder, the bomber-to-be is left with no room for useless things such as judgement, doubt or conscience. As other human beings become mere objects rather than people deserving of love and compassion, the metamorphosis from human to drone becomes complete.

The last thoughts of a suicide bomber cannot be known but remorse or doubt is unlikely. There is no lower depth to which humans can fall to.

Except, perhaps, those who control them – and towards whom we still dare not point a finger at.

Courtesy: Dawn; www.dawn.com
 

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“India and Pakistan will play the war game indefinitely” https://sabrangindia.in/india-and-pakistan-will-play-war-game-indefinitely/ Mon, 31 May 1999 18:30:00 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/1999/05/31/india-and-pakistan-will-play-war-game-indefinitely/ India and Pakistan will play the war game indefinitely — Pervez Hoodbhoy  (Professor of physics at Quaid–e–Azam University, Islamabad) There are many Kargils to come, I fear. Nuclear weapons have made brinksmanship possible, meaning that one hopes to get as close to war as possible without actually having war. India and Pakistan shall keep playing […]

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India and Pakistan will play the war game indefinitely

— Pervez Hoodbhoy 
(Professor of physics at Quaid–e–Azam University, Islamabad)

There are many Kargils to come, I fear. Nuclear weapons have made brinksmanship possible, meaning that one hopes to get as close to war as possible without actually having war. India and Pakistan shall keep playing this game indefinitely until such time as a tragic error or miscalculation rules out further play. Pakistan is totally serious about Kashmir. Call it an obsession if you will, but facts are facts, and all indications are that its support for the militants will increase in times to come. This was the essential content of the speech by the chief of army staff, General Pervez Musharraf, in Karachi on April 10 this year. 

Presently there is much jubilation here in Pakistan about Indian planes and helicopters being downed. Sadly, most people don’t realise how close this pushes us to the brink, and have no idea of how total and final a fall would be. They also do not understand the immense cost which Pakistani civil society has paid for supporting insurgency in Kashmir. 

One should never have had illusions about the Lahore Declaration; it was a mere consequence of international pressure, particularly from the US, for the two prime ministers to look as if they are serious about peace. Even so, it was a good thing and every attempt to reduce enmity and tensions is to be welcomed. The bus service is still doing well, after all. I feel that we must welcome negotiations at all levels even if the results are marginal.

We must, however, also recognise that the basics have not changed, and probably will not change unless something very major happens. If that “something” is less than war, we shall be very fortunate. India and Pakistan are likely to make it past Kargil this time, and to the end of this millenium, with high probability. But unless there is a radical departure from past behaviour, I doubt that we will make it past the next few decades ahead. 

Adopt a dual strategy
— Praful Bidwai 
(A senior journalist and founder member of Movement in India  on Nuclear Disarmament)

The peace movement in both countries should not assume it knows the answer.  Rather, it should adopt a dual strategy: advocate normalisation and progress in all areas,  independently of Kashmir; and call for a  modest beginning at coming to  grips with the Kashmir issue while the general relationship improves.

The first strategy is minimalist and worth pursuing regardless of the second. There is simply no reason why the grotesque conflict at Siachen, which has killed 10,000 and costs Rs. 3 crores a day, should  not be resolved or the Wular, Sir Creek and  trade  issues should remain undecided even though Kashmir is not settled. But this needs a much deeper commitment than was shown at Lahore. “Bus diplomacy” was symbolically welcome, but substantively very thin. The Lahore accords were not even about arms control, only about limited transparency.  India and Pakistan didn’t even agree to slow down  nuclear and missile development or to  stop  testing. Lahore didn’t mark a real breakthrough. We still need one.

As for Kashmir, it is vitally important that a process of discussion begins. But this must be defined and enunciated, first and foremost, by the Kashmiri people themselves.

Fortunately, a beginning seems to have been made. At the Hague Appeal for Peace conference last month, a cross–border dialogue took place among Kashmiris from different political tendencies, from the JKLF and the Hurriyat to Pannun Kashmir. This needs to be built upon.

Durable peace requires Kashmir solution and more
— Zia Mian
(Scientist of Pakistani origin teaching at MIT, USA)

There can be no doubt that both Indians and Pakistanis, must talk about Kashmir, with the Kashmiris, and find a solution. Unless there is a settlement over Kashmir, that the Kashmiris feel reflects their aspirations, any peace between India and Pakistan may not thrive or survive. Until it is erased from the maps and from people’s minds, the Line of Control will always be a place for Lack of Control, especially for demagogues and would be heroes. 
At the same time, it may be un–reasonable to assume that a settlement of the Kashmir issue would in itself create lasting peace. One of the lessons of the end of the Cold War was that even though the Soviet Union is no more, its nuclear weapons remain (about 10,000 are operational), as do those of the United States (about 8,000 are operational). Both are still prepared to fight a thermonuclear war against each other, and in the process obliterate themselves and the rest of us. The Cold War has led to a bitter, resentful, grudging, nuclear armed Cold Peace. At times it is hard to tell the difference between the two. 

Both these aspects must be kept in mind. A durable peace in the region needs a solution to Kashmir, but it requires far more. This requires that we rid ourselves of nuclear weapons. We must overcome nationalism as an ideology, transform the state as a political institution, and bring justice within society. 

In the situation we are now in, with fighting along the Line of Control and nuclear weapons casting their terrible shadow over the region, there has to be movement towards peace no matter what. If nothing else, it can be narrow and focussed on tiny steps forward, for example restraining nuclear weapons development and deployment, loosening the restrictions on people’s travel across the border, increasing trade and so on. But unless Kashmir is addressed there is always the danger that it will be the kind of movement where for every one step forward there shall be two steps backward. 

This is what seems to have happened with the Lahore Declaration. 
There should however not be too many illusions about the Lahore Declaration. It was the same two leaders who talked peace in Lahore who earlier had ordered the nuclear weapons tests. It was expedient, given international opinion, for them to stop fighting (at least for a while) and make up. Once the world moved on to other issues,  the battle was resumed. 
 

Track two has a limited objective
— J.N. Dixit
(Former Indian foreign secretary)

The thing to remember is that track–two diplomacy has been going on, through various initiatives, for the last ten years. What has been most significantly observed about such intiatives is that they have no impact on government policy at all. On either side, in Pakistan or in India, the power structures of the two governments do not take into account either what is discussed at these fora or the recommendations made. So while track–two diplomacy may be broadly useful, the immediate impact is not noticeable.

What happens at a time when we are faced with a situation like we presently are in at Kargil? Even those individuals who are committed to peace and rational thinking on such issues get disappointed and wonder how to carry on because, when a territorial dispute arises, popular resentment and national feelings are aroused. Even the people who are committed to the improvement of relations between the two neighbours are faced with a wider public opinion that becomes antagonistic. 

In Pakistan, newspapers, television and radio report news of the bombing of “our schools and the killing of our children”. In India, the heavy casualties, the violation of the sanctity of an international agreement — the incursion beyond the LOC seven–ten miles into our territory — all in the face of Pakistan claiming not to have made any mistake raises temperatures.

I do believe that for at least one year, even government–level talks are not going to make serious headway. The foreign ministers may meet several times over — so that the world cannot tell us that we are being unreasonable — but the inner impulses on either side will not contribute to coming to any reasonable compromises on either side.

Track one diplomacy gets vitiated by such developments such as the current situation in Kargil. And track two efforts serve a limited objective: they keep alive trends in public opinion and are important at that level but are limited in their impact and reach. Unfortunately, what is a forgone conclusion today is that even if there was earlier some possibility of imminent solutions, these have been irretrievably delayed further. 
 

The situation will defuse soon
— Dr. Mubashir Hasan
 (Former finance minister, Pakistan)

The process started by both the prime ministers, Nawaz Sharif and Atal Behari Vajpayee envisaged clearly talking on all issues including Kashmir. Unfortunately this unique intitiative, the first of its kind in fifty years, was first put off, or delayed by the dissolution of the Indian Lok Sabha and has now been stalled by the recent operations in Kargil. I foresee that grim though the situation in Kargil today seems, it will defuse within ten–fifteen days time. 

We must also remember that whenever the two governments come close to resolving issues or making a beginning even, something occurs to put a spoke in the wheel. It could be much–publicised news of USA supplying F16s to Pakistan that makes the Indians angry or it could be the news of a big explosion on Pakistani soil that makes the Pakistanis angry! These are the considered machinations of those international powers who do not want regional peace in South Asia. The Sharif–Vajpayee governments were for the first time in the process of co–relating their nuclear policies. An identical nuclear policy is in the interest of both Pakistan and India. This is not what vested international powers want.
 

Await more stable governments
— Nirmal Mukherjee 
(Former Indian cabinet secretary and governor, Punjab)

I don’t believe that the doings of peace groups are undone. I believe the urge for peace remains unchanged. The current situation in Kargil is illustrative of the games regimes play. My own view is that India is going through a situation of political flux (as our former prime minister, V.P. Singh has been saying) except that I feel that the results of the next election will be another pre–final. Until the voice of the oppressed, the vast majority, gets finally heard. In the midst of this flux, with weak governments at the helm, peace activists cannot do too much. They must hold their fire, conserve their energy, remain in touch, gather as many facts, and as much information about each other, as possible. And await a political climax over the next decade when the moves for peace find receptive listeners in government.
 

Peace pressure must continue
— B.M. Kutty
(Convenor, Pakistan Peace Coalition; also secretary, Sind province committee of Pak–India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy)

It is true that the situation  presently looks very bleak and  frustrating. Something like the recent developments in Kargil appear to undermine by months and years the efforts put in by pro–peace organisations and individuals on both sides. But peace groups cannot afford to give up in either country. The argument for people to people contact, the need for increased interaction, remains as valid today as it was before. So, irrespective of what happens at the government level, we should go on pressing for further contacts.

Also peace groups cannot close their eyes to the fact that Kashmir remains a very sensitive issue between the two countries and a resolution of this issue is essential for durable peace. It has acquired a hydra–headed character that cannot be pushed under the carpet. We, therefore, will have to evolve perspectives for a resolution of the problem and thereafter mount pressure on the government on both sides to act on them. 

To begin with, a few things are very clear. The Kashmir problem cannot be solved militarily — neither by India’s military action nor by Pakistan’s intervention through support to this or that group. Both the governments have to agree that the people of Kashmir also count — no agreement will work unless it enjoys the confidence of the Kashmiri people. 

I personally believe that unless people of Kashmir on both sides are given an absolutely free choice, with no Indian troops present and without any Pakistani involvement, there will be no solution possible.
 

Kashmir’s accession to India is final
— Vishnu Bhagwat
(Former Chief of the Indian Navy)

In my mind, there can be no question of any moves towards lasting peace within the region being at all feasible with Pakistan insisting on intervention in Kashmir. This is true not only in the context of the recent infiltration in Kargil but in the context of Jammu and Kashmir as a whole. For India and for me, the question of Kashmir and its accession are final through the instrument of accession and no Indian government has any right to indulge in any kind of bargaining so far as the question of the status of Jammu and Kashmir within the Indian union is concerned. This is because, in more ways than one, Kashmir is not only the symbol of Indian secularism but the sine qua non of both the secular Indian constitution and the secular India state. It is literally the head of the body that is India. The will of the people of Kashmir was behind the accession of Kashmir to India as opposed to the rulers of not just Kashmir but Hyderabad, Junagadh and Jaipur who wanted independent status, their treaties with the British having lapsed. Under no circumstances can any state of the Indian union, be it Punjab, Kashmir or a government at the centre be encouraged or permitted to take on a non–secular, theocratic garb. 

On all other issues like trade and business, people–to–people links, cultural exchanges these are welcome since we are basically the same people. But I strongly feel that Kashmir cannot be a part of these levels of exchanges. Here I would like to quote the example of Abraham Lincoln who held the American union together at the cost of a civil war knowing full well the implications of such a war. Secession was something that was never entertained as a possibility let alone an eventuality. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, June 1999, Year 6  No. 54, Cover Story 2

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