India-Pakistan relations.

[shekhar_nehra]

Recently there has been so called peace initiative between India and Pakistan.This is the latest in thread related to this issue.

http://www.thehindu.com/stories/2003081209471200.htm

After reading this , I felt how mad Pakistani's are about Kashmir. If they can not take it by war[ including proxy] then they have started begging for it. There is much more to their hostility towards India , which runs in their blood, which will not end even if they get Kasmir(Let them day-dream about this possibility if there is any at all)
Any compromise on Kashmir will only open the doors for Pakistan to start a similar thing in any other states , justifying on the basis of freedom struggle or extending moral support to the cause of people in that state. Pakistan just can not be trusted. Pakistan just does not take responsibility for what all it does( controlling, funding and supporting the jehadi elements)
What is the point negotiating with such a weak government which has no credibility, any change in the power and gone are all the agreements.

"laaton ke bhoot batoon se nahi maante"

A war between India and Pakistan is inevitable, it is bound to happen some time in future. In that case the only option left with India is to prepare for the war, and ensure that Pakistan becomes a weak and poor country.

On lighter note let Laalo and all be in Pakistan forever so that we may progress fast , and this would help the cause of making Pakistan poor and backward :)

[abhishek]

If only we could do away with self aclaimed lovers of peace aka secularists we can do something about it.Unfortunately indian media is infected with a disease called leftism and what we get is marxist trash.Reading editorials of some of biggest newspapers can be best described as sickening.
On top of that our ruling elite we have got a great recipe for banana state!!!!!!
Without sounding utterly pessimistic I dont see anything else happening other than poor indian jawans being killed by islamists and innocent hindus burnt alive in riots engineered by "brothers" across the border and indian population getting islamized.

[parul]

I would suggest before using such strong words get your definations right.
-parul

Abhishek Dhama (Aug 12, 2003 04:01 p.m.):
If only we could do away with self aclaimed lovers of peace aka secularists we can do something about it.Unfortunately indian media is infected with a disease called leftism and what we get is marxist trash.Reading editorials of some of biggest newspapers can be best described as sickening.
On top of that our ruling elite we have got a great recipe for banana state!!!!!!
Without sounding utterly pessimistic I dont see anything else happening other than poor indian jawans being killed by islamists and innocent hindus burnt alive in riots engineered by "brothers" across the border and indian population getting islamized.

[amar0974]

On lighter note let Laalo and all be in Pakistan forever so that we may progress fast , and this would help the cause of making Pakistan poor and backward

hahhaaaa Sahi Baat sa un bemaaria na uda a rehan do.

[itsnavin]

I am sure that Pakistan will again try to take advantage of these peace talks by building his grip on Kashmir behind the scenes. And our great politicians/ministers let this happen as always. This is a well known fact and observed many times in the past as well. Everytime a plan for peace talks is initiated, in the end its always India who suffers. I'll attribute this failure to our PM/President and other responsible ministers. They want the PoK area back and they want to have it peacefully without fighting a war. Do you guys think its possible to get it without a war? Can you think of a country donating you a part of his occupied territory just in talks? No way! On one hand Pakistan makes claims of whole of Kashmir, and on the other we think of getting PoK without war. I understand that a war dumps the country's economy/life and other progress but today in Kashmir we are daily fighting a war. Why not end this from roots? In long terms its good for people of Kashmir and India.
A war is inevitable if and only if our politicians(not us..nobody asks us our wish) want PoK back otherwise peace talks will do.

Open for comments!

[shekhar_nehra]

Thanks Abhishek, Parul, Amardeep and Navin for your inputs.

We all have read in literature how the map of India is compared with that of bharat maa.
Head being compared to Jammu and Kashmir, heart to Delhi, Feet to Tamil Nadu and Kerala which are washed by Indian ocean ....

Take a look :http://www.dadayama.com/puja/bharatma.htm

Now if your heart is filled with pride and full of patriotism. Then think where is Pakistan....Right there sitting on the right shoulder of your mother India like a monkey!!!

Now what to do...Change the map. Yes please If you can.

But one thing is clear we have given enough free ride to the monkey. Now lets get rid of him. But how? That remains to be seen , one way is to thrash him. Is there any other way?


What else can you think of.

Please do contribute your valuable suggestions.

[parul]

whatever the map of india is being compared to,is a totally futile thing to think about.
lets think like this, i belong to rajasthan, we share a long border with pakistan.its a common knowledge that border areas of pakisatn have a huge population of muslim jats.i think jats are pretty secular people, we have our own set of customs, which are pretty much similar to those people.
i think its easy for me to identify with these people than with someone in kerla, with whom i have nothing in common.
offcourse no denying the fact that kashmir has a very stratgeic importance for india, we loose kashmir, we loose the safety cover we have.but the question i show do we ensure that. so far all the methods have been total failure, fine..lets innovate soemthing new.
....
Now what to do...Change the map. Yes please If you can.
what do you gain by changing the map?
-parul

[parul]

Without sounding utterly pessimistic I dont see anything else happening other than poor indian jawans being killed by islamists and innocent hindus burnt alive in riots engineered by "brothers" across the border and indian population getting islamized.


let me add something to your GK, India has the second largest population of muslims.
did you feel threatend by them?
do you think a few 100, 1000..people crossing the border will islamise you?
i am certainly not trying to support infiltration across the border, but you are changing the issue.
-parul

[abhishek]

The greatest irony is the fact that we have second largest concentration of muslims in our country.And yes danger is real , and it is not as much as islamization of rest of non-muslim population as the radicalization of otherwise passive population.And regarding islamization take look at border with nepal and bangladesh these areas have seen exponential rise in percentage of muslim in population.Areas which were otherwise hindu dominated areas now have muslim and they didnt come from Afghanistan or Saudia Arabia they are hindus converted. They do pose threat to our national integrity , difficult as it seem now but in near future their designs will become clear. And last thing india can do is caught unaware.
Another thought regarding muslim numbers in india ,when partition was done on basis of religion and western punjab was evacuated of hindus which were good 40% of population why did we allow muslims to stay back. Now what we have is 250 million ppl which are nothing but a national liability look at their literacy rate , look at infant mortality rate it is abysmmally low and for god sake dont blame indian government for it. They arent ready to send their kids to school and they would rather get them indoctrinated at madarsas.They wont send them to indian army but they would be rather happy to see them going all the way to afghanistan or iraq in the way of "allah".They wont yearn for a developed india they would rather seek their dreams in pan-islamic nationalism trash.
And regarding relating to muslim with similar area, I have seeen indian muslims (frm bengal) living with pakistanis from karachi( i am struggling to find cultural similarity between these two ppl , may be pan islamic brotherhood) It is chic to be pro -peace and tolerant but is it really sensible when the other side is hell bent in removing your existence from face from earth. Atleast my values says pay them in their currency.And that´s what I stand for may be we cant drive all 250 millions out or declare all out war but we can use covert means to bleed them and to make them realize it is nt all that easy and tell those inside to behave. I think nation should be paramount.

[rkumar]

Very interesting ....This how I have analysed the whole issue step wise;

1. I agree, a section of muslims will be anti India to the core..the reason is simple. These muslims had their forefathers who got converted from hinduism as they were not treated well by upper cast hindus. So the hate runs deep into centuaries.

2. I totally agree that pakistaan will never sit quite even if we hand over them the Kasmir. Muslims ruled India and they think that they should have got the India back when British left it in 1947.

3. Only way to quite pakistaan is to finish it to the core. Its very creation was wrong. All problems will end if two countries join.

4. Bad governance leads to fanatism. This is what is happening at all the places where we have extremists of any type, be it VHP or Islamists.

5. In Islam Allah is suprememe and He never takes the form of Earthly human beings.Where as in other religions God menifests itself into everything. With this basic difference, a Muslim finds it very easy to kill a man as Allah can never be in man.

There is only one and one solution to this problem as far as I can see. Attack the root of all problems....Saudi Arabia where from all trouble flows to entire world....Whole world will have to unite on this issue. No single country, however powerful it might be, can solve this problem.

6. Friendship with Pakistan: This will never work even if we hand over whole India to them.

7. Jats being in pakistan and some of us identifying ourselves with them does not mean anything. Jats are Jats only if religion and other issues are not there. Jats will otherwise divide at the slightest pretext. I need not quote examples to justify my statement.

In Summary I will say that we have no option and we have to keep pakistan under control at any price. It will be foolish to expect that they will ever be our friends.

Rajendra

[sanjayrathee]

Abhishek I agree to u fully we are not M.K Gandhi & will thrash every power which threatens our Natinal security be it Country, Religeon, Groups or Individuals.

[shekhar_nehra]

Namaskar Rajendra Uncle,

I respect you a lot and your views. All the points in your post are hard facts in their own right.
The first two point of your post explains why some Muslims are anti-India and it must have required a lot of courage on your part to spell out this assessment of yours.

But third and sixth point seam to be incoherent with each other if seen together.



3. Only way to quite Pakistan is to finish it to the core. Its very creation was wrong. All problems will end if two countries join.


Point 3: What if two countries join i.e. merge together. It is an innovative idea. Why can't we unite if West Germany and East Germany could do it. After all we have same DNA, we all are Aryans. Then we will have the best Cricket and Hockey teams in the whole world. But do the people on both sides here feel the same way as people in Berlin felt just before they brought down the Berlin wall. Probably the answer is big 'No' , at least for the present .



6. Friendship with Pakistan: This will never work even if we hand over whole India to them.


Point 6:This shows that you too are a bit suspicious whether merger will work? Will it end Pakistan's hostility? And when you say it won't . This rules out the suggestion in point 3 at present.

Now Dear Parul,
No matter with whom you can identify yourself with .It does not mean anything, if there is no warmth in relationship with them. Its useless! . It is the "Bhartiyata" (not Hindutav ;) as it is still controversial to use this term ) in Keralite that will make me identify myself with him.
We know we are right, do we look at any territory of Pakistan with greed. But he does.

Probably it is for the people of Pakistan to show their sincerity in being a part of India, for merger to take place or else they will have to perish.
Till today Pakistan keeps blaming India for all its internal problems. Now its time for India to really start the problems for Pakistan. India needs to tame Pakistan.
And when I say change the map, I do not mean create a sea where Pakistan is situated and throw all Pakistanis in Arabian sea. Change can be to include Pakistan into India, as suggested by Rajendra uncle [only if Pakistani masses really wants to] so the next time Pakistan talks of a referendum in Kashmir, India should seek for a similar referendum in Pakistan as to how many people want merger with India .Another way to change the map: break Pakistan into infinitesimally small countries that they keep fighting amongst themselves, and India keeps a control over them economically, just as US controls the economies of South American countries.
If India has the second largest population of Muslims, then which one has the largest. As far as my GK goes I know India has more Muslims than Pakistan the most populous Muslim state. I might me wrong!

Still open to more views.

P.S : We have missed the golden chance , Laaloo and all are back in India. :) :)

[rsdalal]

Shekhar Nehra (Aug 15, 2003 02:47 p.m.):
If India has the second largest population of Muslims, then which one has the largest. As far as my GK goes I know India has more Muslims than Pakistan the most populous Muslim state. I might me wrong!


Indonesia has largest Muslim population...

[rkumar]

Dear Shekhar,

Making and breaking of nations has been an ongoing process. Social and economic forces lead to political forces. Let us try to analyse what holds the muslims together ? To my belief they are not held together by national boundaries. They are rather held together by the inward thinking of Islam. Nation is a much smaller entity in islam than the religion or faith in Allah. Sense of brotherhood among muslims is very high as compared to others. Muslims inherently think us hindus lower because of our rituals. When some community looks down at the other one, joining hands with it is not possible. Only way is to prove that we are superior in every possible way. To convey that;

1. We must be good to our own people.
2. We must loosen the evil forces which bind muslims.
3. Muslims must be made to see light outside islam to change their views.
4. I see nothing wrong if we Hindus and others can take some good points from Islam and make them part of our rituals or practices.

Pakistaan and India can certainly unite if both see advantage and the ruling class in both the countries is made to see this reason. People have to make this movement. If 10 million people from each side just walk across the dividing line, no force in this world will be able to stop them. Let us remember that countries are all man made and not by God. One man has no business to restrict the movements of another by artificial means of VISA and passports. Humanity has to get rid of this VISA and Passport regime. Sooner they do, better it will be for mankind. VISA and passportless world will be the true free world. Till then we are all slaves to some one, be it our own countryman or ssome one from outside. High time we break these shekles of universal slavery.

Rajendra

[abhishek]

There has been some talk about unification and things on similar lines.But to me it is not feasible.Assume a situation that we have unified india, that means we have like 250+150+100=500 million muslims in india and total population of india (in that scenario) will be 1150 million what we have is around 50% population. Now what comes with those muslims is lack of education,radical ideas ,no respect for women rights and plethora of other ailments. And this doesnt sound all that appealing to me.And with 50% population being muslim we can assume who will rule us , I wonder it wont be long before "Jazia" is introduced.Because inspite of all that moontalk about "moderate" muslim at the heart they dream for "daar-ul-islam".
What we need is a liberal forward moving hindu majority democratic bharat.I think this is best combination so that we have an environment conducive for future generations.
As always seen monoatheist nations are the one which are most stable.
Comments are welcome.

[shekhar_nehra]

Respected Rajendra uncle,
I agree with you to a certain extent that Muslims all over world try to associate themselves with those in Arabia world (middle east). Their affinity towards Arabia can be understood as their emotional attachment to the place of origin of their religion. Just because of this they try to undermine their nation as an identity cannot be accepted. There are very many educated Muslims in India who have contributed immensely for the cause of their nation. It is this "Indian Muslim" identity that we have to promote, unfortunately very less has been done in this direction. The absence of quality Muslim leaders, who have a global vision and could motivate Indian muslims on a path of progress and prosperity, has been responsible for the plight of Indian Muslims. Muslims won't accept a not Muslim as their leader so it is up to educated muslims to take up this job. This has been the story about Indian Muslims but we were talking about ways of tackling with a hostile neighbor who happens to be a Muslim majority state. One point that comes out of this discussion is that we have to set our own home right and assure that Pakistan can not play this religion card.

As far as the question of merger remains: We Indian are very happy the way we are and progress we are making, we would like to solve our internal problems first and do not want any area or people of Pakistan. But as long as all Pakistanis think they are superior to India on the basis of religion and keep on denying rights to their own people (Muhajirs as they call them) from where will those 10 million people come who would like to cross the border.
I appreciate your views that there borders are all man made and should be done away with. But again that will be possible only when whole world is developed and people are happy and contended where they live. Otherwise if you open up the borders before that you will find all people in US or Europe!!

Dalal uncle thanks for the information about Indonesia as being the country with largest muslim population.

Its turning out to be a very good discussion. Others please join in.

[rkumar]

Today's Hindustan Times has a very good article by Vir Sanghvi on the same topic. Its not the politicians who will solve the problems, but the people. Let people to people contact be there first. Politicians survive on people's misries and rarely solve them completely.

Islam does not permit any muslim to be a world leader or for that matter even a muslim leader. Islam did not accept even other prophets and Husain's followers ( Shias) are killed day in and day out in Pakistan and even in Iraq they were killed in lacs...Mullahs won't let any one become a Muslim leader big enough to challenge their authority as they live at the ignorance of its people... May be some surgical approach only will solve the problem as no medicine seems to be strong enough to each the disease sites..

Rajendra

[dineshm]

Respected people,
I wont comment much on our relations but i would like u to do an exercise coz i felt it that way. I understand most of us go to chat rooms.ever tried chatting to a pakistani?if not then do now, & discuss Kashmir problem with him,he will admit that he wants to solve it coz even they are fed up with it .he will not hesitate in admitting it that its the politicians who use it as a trump card to win elections ,& this is ironically true for indians,
now just take for instance ,what Modi govt. said after winning elections that we will repeat Godhara .I am not against someone but just think it other way how can they repeat if the train is not burnt with hindu devotees ,if they say that they will reapeat it ,it means they played a part in burning the train too. I just want to tell u that its the only bad politics which has worsened the condition .we have fought wars & won them still the problem remains there where it was .if we can solve the problem then the only solution is that more peple to people contacts be made & more confidence be built ,i dont think war will solve our problem ,earlier we could have afforded the war but now they have nuclear arms ,if u consider that even we have nukes then first see Hirosima & Nagasaki ,if u want them in india & pakistan then possibly we can afford a war.to solve militancy we should make our borders more secure, we should give more emphasis on this part not on destroying pakistan as this is an escapism attitude ,eliminating someone is not the solution but correcting him is.instead of sending Laloo Yadav and gang we should have sent a group who is a specialist in the bilateral talks ,so that we could have benefitted from these things.
now take for a note on kargil ,first of all we shouldnt blame it on pakistan entirely ,what were our vigilance teams doing when pakis were making bunkers & bringing all sorts of ammunition to that place,it takes atleast 6 months to build the bunkers as strong as they did ,so why didnt we check on this ,why didnt we go for routine check ups & spot their activities. ignorence is the biggest mistake.
now kargil is remembered so much coz of the media coverage but mind u there is now the same problem in the hills & pakis are back there with all the stuff they were in kargil & no media coverage is given to that.soldiers are dying there but no compensation is given to them as was given to kargil martyrs.
its very sad that our indian mental setup cannt handle 2 emergencies simultaneously.now the heat of Ayodhya & elections is on so we dont give a dman care to whats going on in kashmir ,then if it comes the chance of kashmir getting our attention we will forget the other one.
respected gentleman please think on better terms than a war.
Regards
Cadet Dinesh

[shekhar_nehra]

We are setting our home right:
http://www.thehindu.com/stories/2003082201061000.htm

[shekhar_nehra]

Dear Dinesh,

It is, but natural that whenever we talk of Pakistan we do talk about rising Hindu fundamentalism. But let me assure you they are two entirely different things. I do not support Hindu fundamentalist but let me tell you that they are very much under control , where any state government can put a ban on their entry.
Hindu fundamentalism is in response to the Muslim fundamentalism in Pakistan, of much higher degree.[so much so that they got introduced sahriyat law].Hindu fundamentalism is a simple tit for tat response for Pakistani hostility. Address the root cause for rising Hindu hard liners. It becomes all the more imperative for us to solve the external problem before your internal problems get out of hand.

As far as chatting with a Pakistani remains the question, I am yet to find a decent and sane Pakistani. They are just too much in chat rooms.

Kargil was a lapse on our part agree, but what was happening prior to kargil conflict. Each year at winter both army used to recede back and resumed their posts in summers when the snow melted. This is where there was a kind of understanding or unspoken trust. What went wrong was we trusted the un trustable and result was before us. As long as we keep ignoring Pakistan it will keep on doing such things. Both of us have nukes and that is the result of ignoring him for so long, we can not go on with our age old policy towards him. Should we wait till he gets more deadly weapons and beg or steal systems to deliver them to India.

[dineshm]

hi Mr. Shekhar,
i believe that all the things like rising hindu fundamentalism & all are due to pakistan .
but this is also true that a war cannt be afforded by India at this point of time. we should bleed them the way they are doing us.
we should form our own organisation who can spread terrorism.
Indira Gandhi was very good at it ,she helped in the making of LTTE & when she saw that if pakistan attacks us,we would be attacked from two sides ,so she helped in making bangladesh ,see we should follow the same things, & pakistan is by itself ready to be broken we only have to show the spark as in pakistan many groups are fighting among themselves.

[itsnavin]

Hello Dinesh
Wrong thoughts!
I don't agree with your points. Though I believe in 'Tit for Tat' principles but it depends on the situation and approach. Spreading terrorism is not at all the way to solve this issue. When we have the capability to fight and win the battle, why act as cowards? Ofcourse, I agree we can't afford a war at this time but wait for right time and in the mean time strengthen your defense. And 'jab Loha garam ho to hathoda maar do'.