Leaders of nations? Leaders of two of the world's most enlightened civilizations? One leader talks of clouds and skies and lightning. The other leader talks of resisting the thunder and lightning with military might.

Where were they both in 1946, when Albert Einstein watched a film recording the destruction and death caused in Hiroshima and Nagasaki by atomic bombs, and holding his head in his hand and weeping he said: "Had I known what I helped make could destroy, I would have chosen to have remained a shoemaker."

On May 24, researchers at Princeton University, where Einstein once worked, came out with statistics on the deaths and injuries that would ensue were India and Pakistan to unleash their nuclear weapons upon each other. The scenario visualized was that were India to bomb Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi- Islamabad, and Faisalabad, and in turn Pakistan were to bomb Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Chennai, the estimated number of deaths in India would be 1.7 million with 900,000 wounded, and in Pakistan 1.2 million deaths and 600,000 injured.

These figures are grossly underestimated as they only represent immediate casualties from blasts, fire and radiation. An unknown number of deaths would occur over the future years from cancer. Those immediately killed would be blessed, for the injured and affected would linger on in pain and suffer horribly.

Lions and tigers from both sides of the divide have roared and bragged of the damage each is able to inflict upon the other. These fierce and ferocious beasts have no thought, though, for what each of their countries and their peoples have lost through the years of acrimony and rancour and the constant readiness of each to take on the 'traditional enemy' at any moment and vanquish it. India, the larger, the more powerful, the better off, can perhaps stand and exist on its own, but Pakistan, down and out, almost on its knees, with its fickle and feckless allies has little chance of going it alone.

Take our great patriot and two-times failed prime minister, once the toast of the towns around the world, who is now writing in the Indian press, drawing parallels, and inciting the Pakistan army to rid itself of General Pervez Musharraf, in the same manner as the Pakistan army, at the closing of 1971, rid itself of General Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan, thus enabling her illustrious father, democrat and patriot Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, to take over the reins of government, save what was left of the country, and lead it on to glory. Daughter Benazir is now ready, more than ready, to do for and unto us as did her father upon whose name she continues to trade.

What does go in Pakistan's favour is that our President General is willing to talk and talk, and go on talking, whereas the man on the other side, without making any allowances for the constraints and restraints our general faces, wishes no more talking and demands only action in the form of the delivery of promises made.

At this stage it may be a bit late to say so, but the sane can only repeat and repeat that the Kashmir issue, as far as this broken country is concerned, must be put on the backburner. The leaders, political and military, surely realize (though they dare not publicly and openly admit it) that Pakistan is not capable of fighting a war and winning both it and Kashmir. Before more harm comes upon us, this issue must be relegated to its rightful place in the Pakistani scheme of things. Let it simmer, let it not boil. Let it wait for circumstances to change and perhaps one day improve in our favour.

Long, long ago the subcontinent had other types of men such as Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who, after the immediate horrors of partition, were able to impose some sort of sanity upon the relationship between the two new-born countries. We who were in Karachi in 1948, whilst Jinnah was still with us, well remember the incident concerning the large bronze statue of Gandhi which since 1931 had stood on the roundabout in front of the High Court of Sindh.

In January of that year, Karachi, unusually, experienced a round of Hindu-Muslim riots resulting in a heavy exodus of Hindus from the city and much grabbing of abandoned properties. One day, during the course of the riots, whilst Jinnah was driving by the High Court, he noticed Gandhi's statue and fearing for its safety asked his secretary, S.M. Yusuf, to see to it that the statue was removed to some safe place until the situation reverted to normal.

Yusuf, in the inflamed situation, thought it best to bring in a neutral and contacted Jamshed Nusserwanjee, a Parsi, and sought his help. Jamshed rounded up and organized the old boys of the BVS Parsi school, and provided them with tools and a lorry. In the hours of darkness, we went off and removed Gandhi from his plinth and took him to my father's house on Belgrave Terrace and installed him temporarily in one of the garages whilst we contacted the Indian high commissioner to ask him to come to Gandhi's rescue. Discretion being his better part of valour in those disturbed days, he would have nothing to do with it all. The statue was then taken to the BVS and hidden behind a heap of logs in the carpentry class.

Much later, after things had calmed down and the Indians had built their high commission on Bonus Road (renamed Fatima Jinnah Road), the then Indian high commissioner gladly took the statue and Gandhi was installed in the foyer of his chancery. Gandhi remained in the building when it was converted into a consulate, the high commission having moved to Islamabad, and he was finally taken to the capital in 1988 where he now stands in the foyer of the Indian high commission, designed to accommodate the bronzed MKG.

This present madness cannot continue for ever. Neighbours we are and neighbours we will remain. We have to learn somehow to coexist. The French and the Germans, diverse as they are, traditional enemies as they were, since 1945 have decided to march together after having fought each other for well over half a century.

Are we two nations not civilized enough to follow suit? Must both sides behave as if the leaders and the led have just slid down from their respective trees?