Ordinary people in both Pakistan and India pay a heavy price for the games that our leaders play. For those who would like to see our countries face off against each other, we suggest some alternative competitions
By Samir Gupta and Saeed Ahmed Rid
A barrage of provocative statements emanates from ministers, generals and journalists in Pakistan and India. The high commissions of both countries put visa issuance on hold. The tensions and restriction on cross-border visits cause anguish to millions of sensible, peace loving people and communities on both sides.
This script regularly repeats itself like a bad dream. Only it’s not a dream. This is a regular, tragically all-too-real feature of a bilateral relationship that affects real people.
Concerned by this sudden surge in hostilities once more, the two of us, peace activists on either side of the border, decided to try and find a rhyme or a reason behind the current sabre rattling and suggest a way forward.
Pakistanis are aggrieved by the constant stream of provocative statements by Indian politicians over the last few months, by India cancelling the secretary level talks, by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar’s statement on using “terrorists to neutralise terrorists”, and the “pigeon saga“.
Indians are aggrieved about the Pakistanis organising a meeting with the Hurriyat leaders prior to the secretary level talks, a Pakistani court granting bail to Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi on bail, and the recent incidents of violence in Kashmir.
We can of course go back further and further and find a zillion provocations from both sides. It is like a dog chasing its own tail.
The heat has been rising between the two nuclear-armed neighbours for the last few months, a clear indication that bad times in India Pakistan relations are here again. Since 1965 India-Pakistan war both governments tend to try and freeze relations once they plunge into this downward spiral. No peace talks, no people-to-people contacts and little communication.
This happened after the 1971 war, the Kargil war of 1999, the attack on the Indian parliament in 2001, and the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. Regretfully we appear to be moving in the same direction once again. The deserted look at the visa sections at their respective consulates in New Delhi and Islamabad bear testimony to the recent cap on visa issuance and corresponding rise in visa refusals.
While the governments and militaries play their games, let’s look at the human cost of this madness.
For one thing, millions of people with families in both countries cannot navigate the restrictive visa policies to meet their loved ones, even in cases of bereavement.
Take Fatima Harris, born and brought up in India, married to a Pakistani and living in Pakistan for over three decades. During this time she tried to travel back to India on several occasions, including when her parents were very unwell and about to die. For years, she has cried her eyes out to meet her family members but she committed a cardinal sin. She never got a visa to return to the land she was born and where her parents died without seeing her one last time, just because she married a Pakistani Army officer.
Over the last three years, dozens of innocent civilians have been killed and hundreds injured in cross border firing in both countries. Earlier this year, Toshi Rani, a forty-five year old woman, died in village Mangu Chak in District Samba when there was an exchange of mortar shells between Indian and Pakistani forces at the international border. The shell that killed her allegedly came from the Pakistani side. Her fourteen-year old son Rahul may never know who started the firing but he will miss his mother for the rest of his life.
A thousand miles south of Kashmir, dozens of Indian and Pakistani fishermen are arrested every year for maritime trespassing. In the absence of a visually discernible nautical boundary, they can’t tell when they have crossed the border. Security agencies on either side treat them as criminals and they often languish in prisons in the other country for years, despite the best efforts of a few brave human rights activists in both countries. It is not uncommon for a fisherman to die in custody and for massive delays in the return of their mortal remains to their relatives on the other side.
India, with a population of 1.2 billion, spends about $40 billion on defence each year – $33 per capita. Meanwhile 192 million of Indians (15% of the total population) sleep hungry.
Pakistan, with a total population of 180 million, spends $7 billion on defence – $35 per capita. Meanwhile some 41 million Pakistanis (22% of the total population) sleep hungry.
India has a maternal mortality rate of 190 out of every 100,000 live births compared to Pakistan’s maternal mortality rate of 170.
India ranks 135 out of 167 countries globally on the human development index with Pakistan at 146 is a few notches lower on the same grid.
Both countries sit on a significant pile of nuclear weapons. Both are also developing rapidly advancing capability to hide and use their nuclear weapons in a variety of ways. As tactical nuclear weapons make their entry into the South Asian arsenal, the risk of an accidental or unauthorised exchange becomes ever more likely. By some estimates, about two billion people will die worldwide in case of a nuclear war in South Asia.
None of this means that we should be sceptical about peace or feel dejected and hopeless about our dream of a peaceful and prosperous South Asia. We, the peace mongers have survived far worse times than this in past. We kept the peace narrative alive even after Kargil and Mumbai in the face of all the negativity and venom spread by war-mongers. By doing this we helped our two countries to come back to the path of peace, which is the only road to progress and prosperity. The bad times we are undergoing now will also pass. The peace process is destined to come back on track.
Workers, labourers, artists, human rights activists, women activists, teachers, scholars, journalists, writers and thinkers of India and Pakistan later joined hands to launch Pakistan India Peoples Forum for Peace and Democracy (PIPFPD) in 1994as the largest people-to-people forum. From this point onwards, peace mongers have never looked back and they have forged ahead despite all the hiccups, trials and troubles placed in their path.
Solid waste adds to water pollution in both countries. Photo: India, 2005, by Meg and Rahul, Flickr
Today, while the two governments remain stuck in an outdated cold war mentality, there is silent revolution occurring in people-to-people contact between the two countries, enabled by the Internet. Millions of Indians and Pakistanis are interacting with each other on social media. There are of course many trolls who want to abuse the other country and its people – many of them carry out their agenda of hate using multiple fake accounts.
But people are increasingly discovering what binds us together. Our common ancestry, culture and even the biased national narratives are a mirror image of each other. Indians and Pakistanis meeting in neutral venues are forming fast, long-lasting friendships. There are even a few romantic cross-border relationships budding in the winter of frosty bilateral relations.
Over the last three and half decades the people of India and Pakistan have come a long way, having established multiple forums and networks to engage with each other and build peace together. The top leadership and the security establishments of the two states are no longer in complete control of the narrative. In this globalized world of social media and swift communications, Indians and Pakistanis are finding new ways of communicating and keeping engaged with each other.
It is time the two governments realise the futility of using the draconian visa regime to freeze contacts. The ball is out of their hands now and they can never get it back. It is time for our politicians, our bureaucrats and our generals to catch up with the rest of us.
For those who would like to see India and Pakistan face off against each other, here are three competitions we could engage in, to start with:
1. Who can get the most children fastest out of factories and workshops, off the streets, and into schools.
Over a million children in India (1.2% of the population) of primary school age are out of school while 4.35 million children (over 1.5 % of the total) in the age group of 5–14 work. Pakistan has over 5 million primary school age children (25% of the total) out of school and 4.6 million children (13% of the population) between age 10–14 years at work.
2. Compete in producing renewable energy.
India produces 12% of its total power from renewable sources like wind, solar and bio-mass. Pakistan has practically negligible power production using renewables.
3. Who can give better clean water and sanitation access to the people.
A new index developed by The Water Institute, Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA, ranks Pakistan at number five in the world in terms of improving water and sanitation access for its citizens. India occupies the 92nd position (the ranking predates the recent launch of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “Clean India Mission”). The report says that a country’s gross domestic product does not determine performance in improving water and sanitation access for its citizens. “Even countries with limited resources can make great strides if they have the right programmes in place,” says Jamie Bartram, director of The Water Institute at UNC who co-authored the report.
Clearly, both countries need to re-align their priorities. They need to end hostilities, and end them now. They need to end the paranoia and propaganda, and replace tantrums with maturity and a willingness to listen. They need to immediately end the visa restrictions. Neither Pakistan nor India benefit from the status quo. This must give way to common sense and dialogue. Milne Do!
Samir Gupta is an IT professional and peace activist based in Ghaziabad, India. Email: [email protected]. Dr. Saeed Ahmed Rid, a researcher and academician, teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University Islamabad, Pakistan. E-mail: [email protected]
i suggest, u should do ur research well……Pakistan is doing really well in producing renewable energy