ISLAMABAD, Jan 27: Dr Subramanium Swamy, President of India’s opposition Janata Party, has expressed the hope that President Pervez Musharraf would take some “reconciliatory” initiatives during what the Indian politician described as his “mission of peace” to Pakistan.

A critic of the BJP government as well as of the opposition Congress but known to be sympathetic to Pakistan, Dr Swamy told Dawn on Sunday in an exclusive interview that such a gesture on the part of Pakistan would help him immensely in removing the misunderstanding the BJP government was creating in the minds of the Indian masses about Pakistan.

Dr Swamy, who is here on a four-day visit at the invitation of the Pakistan Government, is due to meet President Musharraf and foreign secretary Riaz Khokar. Since both the prime minister and the foreign ministers are out of the country, he does not know if a meeting with them would be possible in the course of his sojourn. He will also deliver a lecture on Indo-Pakistan relations at the Institute of Strategic Studies(ISS) on Tuesday.

Referring to the decision already reached on the issue of imprisoned Indian fishermen, numbering over 250, he said the president could announce their immediate release as part of a package of reconciliatory measures.

He said it would also help if the hurdles in the way of the formalization of the framework of the South Asia Free Trade Agreement (Safta), which was finalized in the year 2000, could be immediately removed.

He maintained that the most convincing gesture would be a relaxation of Pakistan’s rigid position on bilateral trade with India. “There is an immediate mutual benefit for the two in this, and I do not see its relevance to non-economic conflicts that beset our relations.”

Another gesture by Pakistan which he thought could make his job easier was a positive response from Pakistan to India’s removal of restrictions on the use of India’s air space by Pakistan.

“There is a lot of passive support for Pakistan in India, but the BJP has very cleverly kept it suppressed by blaming Pakistan for all terrorist activities that take place inside the country,” Dr Swamy said.

And when even long-standing friends like the US accuse Pakistan of providing a “platform” for terrorist activities in other countries, “my task in India of defending Pakistan becomes much more difficult.”

“I would not put it past the Indian government to stage-manage stray terrorist incidents and then blame them on Pakistan like it happened in the case of temple massacre in Gujarat some time back about which no evidence of Pakistan’s involvement was ever produced. But then these incidents feed the perception against Pakistan among the Indian masses.

Dr Swamy said the BJP was planning to use Pakistan as the bogey over the next 20 months to ensure victory in state elections as well as the next general elections.

Since their performance otherwise in certain crucial sectors like the economy has been very disappointing, the BJP, he said would continue to cash in on the political advantage they had gained by raising the bogey of Pakistan.

The only way to preempt the BJP’s successes in the forthcoming elections was to take away from it this advantage and that, Dr Swamy said, could be achieved only if Pakistan were to undertake some concrete measures aimed at neutralizing the BJP’s efforts to blame Pakistan for every bad thing that happened in India.

He said the Congress, particularly its leader Sonia Gandhi, was in no position to challenge the BJP’s popularity. “They failed miserably in Gujarat,” he continued, “because they had given tickets to known BJP stalwarts who had recently joined Congress. One of them told an election rally that BJP would never be able to build a Mandir at the site of the demolished Babri mosque, but that he would accomplish this feat!”

Dr Swamy said in the past, too, he had tried to bring the two countries to the negotiating table, but then Kargil happened and all his efforts were nullified. “This time too I thought things were taking a turn for the better when in June/July last, militancy in Kashmir had come down sharply. But something seems to have gone wrong after that.”

In a statement issued by him in New Delhi on the eve of his departure to Pakistan, Dr Swamy said he had accepted Pakistan’s invitation because “it is time to explore alternative policies for better relations with this neighbour.”

He said he had already briefly mentioned his proposed visit to Deputy Prime Minister L.K Advani and Defence Minister George Fernandes. “Mr Advani was good enough at my request to have the home ministry send me a note on internal security aspects of our bilateral relations.”

According to Dr Swamy, the present Vajpayee government’s Pakistan policy was a massive failure and completely sterile because India had got the worst of both worlds. “We have neither been able to end cross-border terrorism nor have we won international sympathy for being victims.”

Instead, he said, it had exposed India to international ridicule because the country was made to look like an impotent wailing destitute.

He said there was no doubt that India was facing a severe threat from “cross-border terrorism,” but this terrorist infiltration was not confined to elements coming across the LoC in Kashmir.

Trained terrorists, he said, had infiltrated India from Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Burma and Sri Lanka and were engaged in acts of terrorism. “Yet the Vajpayee government has focused solely on Pakistan and worse, without taking any corrective actions.”

Dr Swamy further said that despite India’s grievance about Pakistan, President Gen Musharraf deserved some admiration for his courageous support to the US-led decimation of the Taliban in Afghanistan. “We have to recognize that he has had a difficult balancing act to perform within his country. He has also demonstrated a much greater capacity to stand up to obscurantist forces than his predecessors.

“Both the mother of the Taliban movement, Ms Benazir Bhutto, and the Vajpayee-like jelly fish, Nawaz Sharif, had never challenged the obscurantism of the Madaris in Pakistan. Gen Musharraf has, although, so far unsuccessfully, but he has the capacity,” Dr Swamy added. Demonizing President Musharraf and weakening him without analysing alternatives, and with frequent but unexecuted threats of war by India, only strengthens the terrorists and fundamentalists forces in Pakistan.

India’s Pakistan policy, he said must, therefore, include restoring normal diplomatic interaction. “We must reinstate the high commissioners, resume air flights, and re-open the borders to road and rail traffic. At the same time, we should not hesitate to retaliate against acts of terrorism within India, be it from across LoC or Bangladesh, Burma or Sir Lanka. It is stupid to ask Pakistan to stop cross-border terrorism when the government there denies supporting it.”

He said it was India’s responsibility to end it. India refused to believe Pakistan’s denial but was ever ready to believe Sri Lanka when the government there stated that the proclaimed offender, LTTE supremo Prabhakaran wanted in Rajiv Gandhi murder case, could not be apprehended despite

Sri Lanka Minister’s meeting him and holding parleys! Why this double standard?

He said communal polarization in India helped create anti- India hysteria in Pakistan. Hindutva and Talibanism were two sides of the same coin, and fed on each other.

Hence, Dr Swamy said, secular and patriotic opposition parties should stop being defensive about Hindutva, which includes Pakistan-baiting. “The Congress leader, Ms Sonia Gandhi, has betrayed secularism by her silly gimmicks of “soft Hindutva,” including performing “rudra abhishek.”