| 25 December 2004 | Saturday | 12 Ziqa'ad 1425 |
Anti-India bias in Bangladesh
Blunkett's resignation and our society
Over the years, so much antagonism, mistrust and suspicion have crept into India-Pakistan relations that even the purchase of some defensive equipment by one side is considered a security threat by the other.
That is exactly what has characterized the reaction of New Delhi, notwithstanding its own massive weapons acquisition programme, to the proposed sale of military hardware by Washington to Islamabad. Last week, US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld visited New Delhi where he was warned that providing military equipment to Pakistan, particularly F-16s, would sour India-US relations.
The US view on the resumption of military supplies to Pakistan was that the equipment being supplied was defensive in nature and, in any case, would not alter the military balance in the region.
However, Foreign Minister Natwar Singh told the Indian parliament that India would use all its resources to oppose the sale, and consequently alerted its lobby on Capitol Hill to prevent it. The latest reports say that New Delhi has sacked its high-profile US lobbying firm, Akin Gump-Strauss Hauer and Field, for failing to lobby effectively against the deal.
Despite the opposing efforts of the congressional caucus of India, the US Congress endorsed on December 16, a $1.2 billion arms package for Pakistan. The package includes eight P-3C Orion planes, 2000 Tow anti-tank guided missiles and six Phalanx close-in weapons systems for the Pakistan navy.
The costliest items in the package are the P-3 surveillance aircraft, with an estimated value of $970 million if all options are exercised. They will not only provide Pakistan with search, surveillance and control capability in support of maritime interdiction operations but also enable the navy to hunt ships and submarines.
India is also unhappy with the supply to Pakistan of Tow anti-armour guided missiles because they pose a threat to its T-90 tanks. According to Indian press reports, Pakistan has also asked for E-2C early warning planes which can track IAF planes from the moment they take off from bases and monitor air space for gaps.
Though India claims that the US arms sales to Pakistan will unleash "a dangerous arms race" in South Asia, New Delhi has its own list of weapons it wants from Washington.
India is already in talks with Israel for its Arrow missile defence system which is a joint US-Israel effort. India has already purchased the Green Pine radar system and the Phalcon early warning aircraft from Israel.
India's expectations from Bush's second term have two important components: winning a new place in the "international security architecture" and deepening business relations with the United States.
New Delhi seems to be keen on playing the reciprocity game and the first signal is likely to be Air India's decision on the purchase of 50 new aircraft, a decision that is being watched with great interest in the Boeing headquarters in Seattle.
The US has offered to sell to India P-3C Orion naval reconnaissance aircraft. What is even more important, according to a report in the Times of India Washington has offered to New Delhi the P-3C plus which is equipped with the latest avionics and equipment systems to render it far ahead of the aircraft being sold to Pakistan.
The US has also offered to India Perry class frigates and Sea Hawk helicopters, while special operations forces will be looking at chemical and biological protection equipment. Also, the United States is offering India radars and a host of infantry weapons.
But what is being hailed as a foreign policy breakthrough in New Delhi is Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's offer to sell the Patriot anti-missile system to India. The offer carries important strategic implications because the American administration has at last put on the table for India a weapon which will be the main protector of its own army in the future.
This shows the Americans are fully satisfied with India's ability to protect US technology from third countries. If the Patriot deal goes through, any comparison of India's military acquisition with Pakistan's will be redundant because it will add several strategic miles to India's defence arsenal, making it qualitatively different from that of both China and Pakistan.
As a matter of fact, if the India-US "strategic partnership" continues to make headway, it may turn into another version of the US-Japan relationship in Asia. In view of India's massive weapon-acquisition programme, its opposition to Pakistan's purchase of some military hardware is incomprehensible.
While it is actively engaged in lobbying against the supply of 25 F-16s to Pakistan, it plans to acquire 125 supersonic fighter aircraft to replace the aging MiG-21s.
Disclosing this recently, India's Vice Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal S.K. Malik said: "We have not short-listed any aircraft yet. We will go global and perhaps F-16s, Mirage 2000 and MiG-29 and others will be in the race."
The US has already supplied about $20 million worth of radars to the Indian Air Force, while its military manufacturing giant, Raytheon, is supplying Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment to the Indian armed forces.
GPS locators are fitted on India's Mirage 2000, SU 30, Jaguar and IL 78 tanker aircraft, while the Indian army has equipped its special forces with them. Of course, the Indian navy is also using these helpful devices.
Also, the US has sold the much-needed 12 Raytheon AN-TPO/37 artillery fire (weapon locating) radars and the Indian army, navy and air force have conducted exercises with their American counterparts. The frantic Indian efforts to subvert even a modicum of the US arms supply to Pakistan shows there has been no change in New Delhi's attitude towards its smaller neighbours.
While it has arrogated to itself the right to acquire any weaponry it deems necessary for its security, it continues to deny the same privilege to its neighbours, particularly Pakistan, which practically means it wants to keep them defenceless and at its mercy. This is a most ill-advised and counter-productive policy being pursued by New Delhi.
It is ironic that the only time during the past 57 years when Indo-Pakistan relations were tension-free was the two-year period when a non-Congress government was, for the first time, in power in New Delhi.
It was the golden period - 1977-79 - of Indo-Pakistan relations. It was under the Janata government, led by Morarji Desai, when India stopped flexing its muscles and behaving like the Big Brother towards its smaller neighbours. The foreign minister of that government was no other person than Atal Behari Vajpayee.
Prime Minister Morarji Desai went out of his way to create a climate of peace and understanding in the region. He backed Pakistan on the Afghanistan issue, denounced Soviet interference in Afghan affairs and supported Pakistan's bid to join the Non-Aligned Movement.
And most important of all, Morarji Desai also shared the view that Pakistan had a right to acquire sophisticated weapons for its defence. He even conceded Pakistan's right to carry out nuclear research.
For the first time since independence a genuine effort was made by India under Morarji Desai to improve relations with its neighbours, including Pakistan. The result was the emergence of a tension-free, even friendly, relationship between the two countries, despite the fact that Kashmir remained an unresolved issue and New Delhi continued to acquire military hardware.
But unfortunately, the Janata interlude was too short to leave any lasting impact on the Indian frame of mind. However, it did show beyond any shadow of doubt that India and Pakistan were not condemned by a cruel destiny to live in perpetual conflict and confrontation.
Can the Manmohan Singh government revive the Morarji Desai's legacy and stop behaving like Big Brother towards smaller neighbours? A happy beginning has already been made by New Delhi and Islamabad with the resumption of the composite dialogue which must continue despite the occasional hiccups.
The leadership on both sides must ensure that they do not lose the opportunity that has come their way to usher in at least some measure of stability and understanding in India-Pakistan relations, leading eventually to the solution of all their bilateral problems and the normalization of relations between them.
The writer is a former ambassador.
Anti-India bias in Bangladesh
People associate the end of December with the arrival of New Year. This is natural. But December is also associated with the birth of Bangladesh that has attained the age of 32. It was heavenly to watch the exploited people wresting freedom from a far-off acquisitive, domineering society.
The liberation movement rose above religion and falsified the two-nation theory that had given birth to East Pakistan 25 years earlier. Yet, over the past several months I have seen the fire of idealism cooling and the quality of liberalism jading.
The minorities are feeling more insecure than ever before. They are losing their land and possessions to fundamentalists who feel emboldened because of the authorities' connivance.
An anti-India sentiment is spreading furiously. The ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) seems happy about it since Dhaka sees in it a reply to New Delhi's charges that Bangladesh is sheltering elements indulging in cross-border terrorism.
Yet, the same India lost some 1,500 officers and soldiers, fighting side by side with the Mukti Bahini to help it overcome the Pakistani forces. There was not even a brick raised in memory of the dead Indians until a few years ago when the then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of the Awami League built a memorial to pay homage. She honoured Lt Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora who had accepted the surrender of Lt Gen A.A.K. Niazi leading the Pakistani forces.
There was an anti-India feeling even soon after Dhaka became sovereign. I sensed it the first time while talking to journalists at the press club. Even some cabinet ministers complained about it. When I drew the attention of Shaikh Mujibur Rahman, founder of Bangladesh, to it, he said: "I know some elements assisted by international interests are indulging in a whispering campaign against India.
But they cannot sabotage the relationship between your great country and Bangladesh. A Bengali does not forget even those who give him only a glass of water. Here your soldiers laid down their lives for my people.
How can they ever forget your sacrifice? I can assure you that my people are not ungrateful. Therefore, those who are trying to foment trouble will not succeed in their designs." The average man was troubled by scarcities and high prices, an after-effect of any war.
He tended to believe in the propaganda that his difficulties were because "everything was going to India." I was told again and again that rice in Bangladesh was costly because it was being bartered for luxury goods smuggled from West Bengal.
A few Bangladesh leaders, like Maulana Bhashani, exploited the people's hardships for their political ends. He would say that things were bad because "our neighbours are making the best of our miseries." His target was Mujib but then picked on India and maligned it in the hope that some of the mud would stick on him as well.
Despite the anti-India feeling, there was no challenge to pluralism which the liberation brought in its wake. Even the BNP in its earlier stints of governance kept itself distant from fundamentalists.
During its current tenure it has joined hands with the Jamaat-i-Islami and included it in the government even though the BNP has a majority of its own in parliament. The ruling party has come to believe that fundamentalism can help it muster votes to come to power again two years hence.
The country is, therefore, slipping into the quagmire of religious extremism, negating the ethos of liberation. Still worse is the Talibanization of the country. Some fanatics from Afghanistan have taken shelter in Bangladesh after the 9/11 attacks.
The extremists are having a field day because they have official patronage. Liberals are afraid to even raise their voice against them lest they should get hurt. The Awami League members are the real targets.
Shaikh Hasina escaped a murderous attack only a few months ago. None has been brought to book so far. Strangely, a balanced Pakistan's columnist has advised his country to follow the example of Bangladesh to deal with India.
I suggest he read a new book from Bangladesh, Hindu Sampraday Keno Bangladesh Tyag Korcche (Why the Hindu community is leaving Bangladesh.). Its author Salam Azad, like Taslima Nasrin, had to run from the country for his life.
Azad has said in his book: "In Bangladesh, Hindus form the largest chunk of minority population and they face the brunt of Islamic fundamentalist attacks. However, the Christians escape because Bangladesh survives on Christian non-governmental aid. The government organizes the attacks on the Hindus in a pre-planned manner by using the grassroots network of fundamentalist organizations."
Islamabad has the fiendish satisfaction of the yawning distance between New Delhi and Dhaka. After the emergence of Bangladesh, people in Pakistan would tell the Indians: "We tried our best to please the Bengalis but failed; you can try but your experience will be no happier."
Islamabad's official reaction to the breakaway of East Pakistan was to cut off diplomatic relations with the nations that recognized Bangladesh. When the Soviet Union extended recognition, Islamabad said it could not break off diplomatic relations with Moscow.
However, it "punished" Britain for the same action by quitting the Commonwealth. While trying to establish contact with Mujib, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, then heading Pakistan, did forget his priorities.
For him, a meeting with Mrs Indira Gandhi came first. Even in March, three months after coming to power, he told me: "We have more immediate problems between you and us because today East Pakistan is figuratively also 1,000 miles away and there is not a possibility of Pakistan and East Pakistan going to war. But our armies are confronting each other. We do not want to go to war."
The countries that stood by Bhutto en bloc were those of West Asia. The Arab nations, which had received unstinted support from India, told New Delhi plainly that they would not recognize Bangladesh before Pakistan did. Mujib's personal letter to them was of no avail.
However intransigent Dhaka may be, New Delhi has to learn to live with its neighbour. There is no better way than to integrate the economy of Bangladesh with that of India.
Bangladesh should be allowed to send all that it manufactures without any duty. Even during Mujib's time, we were too squeamish over trade. For example, one agreement at that time said that exports from Bangladesh would include fish worth nine crore rupees.
Mujib's comment was: "How can there be trade between the two countries without an agreement on terms?" Trade did not really take off officially. It is the same story today, although the unofficial trade runs into two billion dollars.
India has an obligation towards Bangladesh to make it viable. It cannot run away from its responsibility. What the BNP, headed by Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, does not realize is that its anti-India stand may placate the anti-liberation forces, now in ascendancy, but will not bring investors from India. Tata's two billion can be followed by many trillions provided Bangladesh does not fall prey to Talibanization.
This danger can deter even donor countries whose money is keeping Bangladesh going. "I wish I could die now because relations between India and Bangladesh are so good today that I do not want to see them deteriorate, Tajuddin, number two to Mujib, told me long before his assassination in jail. I wish Khaleda Zia would, with the help of some introspection, realize the significance of Tajuddin's observations.
The writer is a leading columnist based in New Delhi.
Blunkett's resignation and our society
An important political development in Britain has gone virtually unnoticed in Pakistan. This was Mr David Blunkett's resignation as home secretary in Mr Tony Blair's government. Ignoring the sex scandal, there were two other charges against Mr Blunkett. One was the abuse of power; the other was what the British press began calling Nannygate.
For those in Pakistan who consider the West "materialist" and, thus, imply an absence of moral values, the events surrounding Mr Blunkett's exit from the Labour government should provide some food for thought.
Blind since birth, Mr Blunkett rose to become Britain's home secretary. This itself throws light on the humane values inherent in a society that lets a blind boy reared in absolute poverty steer his way through to the top of the political echelon.
As home secretary, he was in charge of the police and of Mr Blair's terrorism concerns. In that position, Mr Blunkett enjoyed powers far more sweeping than those of Pakistan's interior minister - for the simple reason that, unlike the latter, Mr Blunkett did not have any corps commander or ISI general to countermand his orders. The only man who could overrule him was Mr Blair, and Mr Blair had full confidence in his home secretary.
Of the two charges, let us first see his "abuse" of police powers. Some boys playing close to the home of the woman Mr Blunkett was in love with, Ms Kimberly Quinn, the 44-year-old American publisher of The Spectator - were raising quite a racket.
Mr Blunkett sent two policemen to stop them from playing. The bobbies did not beat up the boys with steel-tipped staffs, nor did they cart them off to some dungeon, and later plead ignorance about their whereabouts. All we know is that by their very appearance near Mrs Quinn's home, the two policemen managed to lower the level of the noise.
Mr Blunkett then indulged in yet another bit of abuse of power: there was a security alert at Newark airport, and, lo and behold, Mr Blunkett had the audacity to tip off Ms Quinn about it. These were two examples of "abuse", and his political enemies went after his blood.
Would these really constitute abuse of power in the Pakistani context? Or, ignoring such dictatorships as Syria, Iraq, Libya and Uzbekistan and a number of other Muslim countries, even in EU-hopeful Turkey?
Mr Blunkett was also involved in Nannygate and later confessed to his "crime". What was Nannygate? There was a Filipino woman who was Ms Quinn's nanny, and she needed an extension in her visa for staying on in Britain.
Normally, the visa processing should have taken a year, but Mr Blunkett used or "misused" his position as home secretary to expedite the visa extension within a short time. He had not violated any law, nor bent any rules, but the press reported the matter and an inquiry was ordered.
The inquiry found an incriminating e-mail. What did Mr Blunkett say in this e-mail? - "no favours but slightly quickly". Mr Blunkett expressed his "profound regrets" and resigned.
Would this, in our country, be seen as a violation of bureaucratic rules and procedures to an extent that it becomes a scandal - a "gate"? These points deserve to be noted by some of us who view the integrity of a man through the prism of sex.
If a man is sexually correct, this nation is prepared to accord him the status of a saint, even if he is otherwise a scoundrel of the highest order, violates the law of the land, and indulges in corruption left and right.
The "religious" Ziaul Haq institutionalized bribery by giving millions of rupees to legislators for "development" in their constituencies. He also let those on the right side of the military government sell newsprint on the black market. Among the takers were some "religious" people.
Mr Blunkett was, of course, involved in a deep sex scandal. He was in love with a married woman, whose baby he wanted to prove to be his own through a DNA test. The scam assumed the level of the Christine Keller scandal, because Ms Quinn, even though she had separated from her husband was, meanwhile, trying to effect a reconciliation.
But, the question arises: who would one choose as home minister - an adulterer who is a good and honest administrator and gives his citizens peace and security or a "virtuous" person in whose reign bandits roam the countryside, terrorists attack mosques, and citizens have sleepless nights?
Is Mr Blunkett's the sole case? There are other similar examples: earlier this month, President George Bush wanted New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik to be his homeland security secretary. It came to light, however, that he had employed as a domestic help someone whose visa status was in doubt. That ruled out Mr Kerik's appointment.
In January 1993, during his first term, President Clinton nominated Ms Zoe Baird for attorney general, and the Senate, which must approve all presidential nominations, began hearing. The press reported that Ms Baird had hired two illegal immigrants from Peru for her children as a babysitter and a driver and had not made social security payments.
The Senate could have rebuffed the president by rejecting the appointment. Instead, it conveyed to the White House unofficially that it would not accept her appointment. To spare the president the embarrassment of having to withdraw her nomination, Ms Baird herself requested Mr Clinton that her nomination be withdrawn.
As her replacement, Mr Clinton chose Ms Kimba Wood, a black. Again, unbelievable as it may sound, during Senate hearings it transpired that Ms Wood, too, had employed illegal immigrants for her children. This nomination also went up in smoke. Fed up, President Clinton then chose a woman who was unmarried - Ms Janet Reno.
The issue for the Senate and the US public was simple: how could a woman who had violated a law - howsoever minor - be trusted with the office of attorney-general? Those fond of West-bashing must ask themselves: are we anywhere near these standards of morality, our Islamic pretensions notwithstanding?
There was another case of corruption in America. A Clinton aide used a government helicopter to go to his golf course. The press reported the matter, and the man lost his job. The White House staff offered to pay collectively for the petrol consumed in the short flight to the golf course. But that was not accepted. The issue was: he had used a government facility for personal use.
This brings to our mind the use of government facilities by some "religious" generals for attending weekly tableeghi meetings. Since they were "otherwise" pious, this had to be ignored, even emulated.
During his second term, Mr Clinton came close to being impeached. Such were the feeling against him in Congress that some of his own party senators voted against him; only support from some Republican senators saved him. But what were the charges against him?
He had not siphoned off millions of dollars, nor had he had someone illegally arrested, much less murdered. There were two articles of impeachment - first on four counts, and the second on seven.
All points had one common theme: he was guilty of perjurious behaviour, he had lied under oath, tried to influence witnesses and thus obstructed the course of justice. Are these charges worth an impeachment by the standards of public morality prevailing in most Muslim countries today?
Our obsession with juvenile delinquency, so-called vulgarity, unwed mothers, broken homes, alcoholism and free love make us ignore the far more powerful reality about the West - democracy, rule of law, an independent judiciary, honesty in business and politics, dignity of labour, egalitarianism, absence of poverty, universities and research institutions, inter-galactic probes and that which many Muslims consider the ultimate in greatness - military power.
PS: Readers must be wondering how a blind home secretary worked for Britain. Mr Blunkett had major documents done into Braille, made extensive use of the tape recorder, and kept a guide dog.