Author: Editorial
Publication: The Free Press Journal
Date: May 20, 2003
URL: http://www.samachar.com/features/200503-editorial.html
Every gesture towards normalcy brings
a little more sunshine to the dark and murky world of Indo-Pak relations.
We still dare not say a little more light at the end of the tunnel. One
does not know how long is the tunnel. In any case,as this Journal has been
pointing out, it is better to proceed with caution,if this country has
learnt anything from the last two encounters at Prime Minister Vajpayee's
initiative. As 20 Indian prisoners crossed the Wagah border to India on
Sunday, it is a decisive step that begins a long journey, as the saying
goes. It is a first step but decisive. These 14 sailors,whose cargo vessel
met with an accident and went down, sailed blindly in lifeboats and reached
the Pakistan coast. In normal circumstances, their identities would be
checked and repatriated to India, as is the practice with sailors who are
ship-wrecked. Not in the case of Pakistan. Instead they were taken prisoner
and thrown into jails. In the case of the other six, although some of them
were sentenced only to three months for crossing the border by mistake,
they languished in jail for more than two years without any hope of getting
back to their native land. Where are all the Pakistan human rights stalwarts
who argue so vehemently when they come to India?
Be that as it may,the question that
haunts India and human rights organisations everywhere is the condition
of more than a hundred Indians who are rotting in Pak jails. Some who arrived
yesterday think that many of them have lost their sanity as a result of
continuous harassment, torture, brainwashing (these hapless people should
spy for Pakistan), lack of proper food and and long years of incarceration
in dark dungeons. In some cases their families (Jawans and officers of
the Indian army) do not know if they are alive or not. Since Pakistan does
not provide any information about these prisoners, their families hope
against hope that one day they too may cross the Wagha border to be welcomed
by dear ones. Pakistan has always denied the existence of such prisoners.
Now that eye-witness accounts are available,Islamabad should release them
as part of an overall settlement which is expected to usher in a new era
of good neighbourly relations between the two countries.
Pakistan has now accepted the Indian
agenda of step-bystep progress on all issues affecting the two countries,Kashmir
being only one of them. If two-way trade develops to its full potential,
and violence and war are excluded as a solution to any Indo-Pak issue,
including Kashmir, the economic progress that the two countries make would
bring the two people closer. An Indian Parliamentary delegation is likely
to travel to Pakistan which should pave the way for delegations of artistes
and musicians, scholars and intellectuals from the two countries. For any
of these developments, the two countries do not need the good offices of
a third country, as Pakistan foreign minister got himself trapped by loose
and immature pronouncements in Washington. The foreign minister's declaration
does not make for transparency when crucial normalcy restoring talks are
about to begin between the two countries. It militates against bilateralism.
It detracts the effectiveness of confidence-building measures.
