Will Modi and Sharif revive Lahore?

Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif was one of the first leaders to congratulate Narendra Modi when his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won the elections in May 2014. Modi invited Sharif to attend the swearing in ceremony at the forecourt of Indian Presidential palace in New Delhi on 26 May 2014. The national and international media widely covered the interactions between the two prime ministers.

Fifteen years ago, in 1999, Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had visited Lahore, the cultural capital of Pakistan, on the invitation of Prime Minister Sharif. During the visit both the leaders had signed the Lahore Declaration to promote bilateral relations. Sharif and Vajpayee shared a vision of peaceful and stable South Asia, only to be scuttled few months later due to the Kargil war and the military coup in Pakistan.

Will Modi and Sharif revive the spirit of Lahore?

Modi and Sharif share many common traits. Sharif is a businessman turned politician and Modi is known for his pro-business policies during his twelve year-old rule in the Western India state of Gujarat. Sharif returned to power after a gap of 14 years in 2013. Modi’s political party, BJP will be in power after a gap of 10 years. Both Sharif and Modi are in their early 60s. They are young, dynamic and perceived effective. Their support base differs from their previous regimes – the rule of Pakistan People’s Party suffered from bickering and opacity and the rule of Indian National Congress led United Progressive Alliance suffered from lethargy. Modi and Sharif enjoy a strong support base with an absolute majority in their legislatures and are capable of taking strong decisions.

But Modi is not Vajpayee. While Vajpayee was popular in Pakistan for his peace overtures, Modi is known for the communal riots that took place in Gujarat in 2002 during his rule. The riots killed more Muslims than Hindus. Though Indian courts have not found any evidence to convict him, he continues to be perceived anti-Muslim by sections of people. Modi throughout his electoral campaign stayed away from invoking religion and mainly won on a plank of development. His party gained 282 seats in 543-member lower house, a feat no party achieved since 1984. If his electoral utterances are taken seriously, Modi as Prime Minister of India will take an inclusive approach towards development and towards developing relations with Pakistan.

During an interview early this month to an Indian TV channel Modi argued that Pakistan must rein in extremist networks to revive the peace process. The hardliners in Pakistan dislike Modi and will use every opportunity to create havoc in Indo-Pak relations. It will be no surprise if the extremists in Pakistan repeat a 2008 Mumbai style attack to invoke a hard line response from the new government. Unlike his mentor, Vajpayee, who during the Kargil War of 1999, ordered the troops not to cross the Line of Control (the de facto border between India and Pakistan in Kashmir), Modi may react differently. Any hijacking of foreign policy by the hardliners in India and Pakistan brings to mind the horrors of war between the two nuclear weapon powered nations.

Modi and Sharif will prefer to cooperate than to conflict as the initial exchange between the two leaders indicates. In his reply to Sharif’s wishes, Modi talked about poverty, a common problem in the region, and his resolve to fight it. Both are known for pro-business and pro-development policies and this can be a common ground for developing bilateral relations. Modi during his rule in Gujarat made high profile invitations to business houses for investment. Some of the top Indian business houses invested in Gujarat during his rule. When Tata’s famous low cost car Nano’s proposed factory was stalled in the eastern state of West Bengal, Modi invited the industrial unit to Gujarat.

The businessman turned politician Sharif will be interested to cultivate the shared interest in bilateral trade. Pakistan in December 2013 postponed the granting of most favored nation status to India. Sharif may now consider the time ripe for granting the status. This can be a welcome gesture to start with. Before India’s elections, Sharif in February had made the case for flexible cross-border trade. Hence, it is likely that economics will dominate the relations between the two neighbors with eventual easing of tensions in areas of conflict such as Kashmir.

The lack of bilateral trust is a major roadblock against peace. Modi and Sharif can address the deficit. It is generally during election times that politicians ratchet up religious and nationalistic passions to win the electorate. As both the leaders are well ensconced in power, they can use the opportunity to nurture close relations.

Barring the 2002 scar, Modi’s image in India is that of a transparent and strong leader. Similarly, Sharif’s image in Pakistan is not sullied as that of some of his predecessors. Though adorned the post of prime minister for a decade, Modi’s predecessor Singh did not possess the actual power of the office as it was concentrated outside. Modi will not suffer from that handicap. He will be able to take decisions and implement them. During his election campaigns Modi harped on his vision of taking along all Indians to build a strong and developed India. If Modi is guided by this inclusive vision, it will be on expected lines that India-Pakistan relations will gain meat, and Modi will follow in footsteps of his mentor. But, if Modi cavorts to hard line tunes of sections of his party, the bilateral relations may plunge further low. The new mandate provides Modi the opportunity to bring on track the derailed relations between India and Pakistan. In this peace tango, Sharif can be his matching partner.

(Published in eposweb.org) 

Two Cities, Shared History

I just finished reading and relishing the book Tales of Two Cities (2008, edited by David Page, published by Roli Books under the series Cross Border Talks).

The book is about the journey of two prominent South Asians – Kuldip Nayar from India and Asif Noorani from Pakistan. Theirs are not simply stories of travel but voyages – physical, emotional and spiritual – deeply embedded in the history of partition of the British India. This book, hence, is a narrative of history of India and Pakistan – the birth pangs of the two nations, the role of religion in history making and also about an integrated identity and onslaughts on it. Equally importantly, this book is not only about tragedies of Nayar and Noorani but also about tragedies of millions of Indians and Pakistanis, who crossed the abruptly created border, suffered and died.

Nayar recounts his days in Sialkot and how he was active in friend circles, leading a peace committee to fight communal hatred that was gaining momentum in the wake of the partition. He talks about his Muslim friends and how at the wish of his best friend, Shafquat, he tattooed the Islamic insignia – the crescent and star – on his right arm. His father was a dentist in the town and popular among the local populace. The fever of partition was going high and along with the hatred among the Hindus and the Muslims. Nayar argues that the partition of the subcontinent on religious basis fostered the hatred and provided much of its rationale. He raises this issue before the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who visited Lahore College before three years of the partition. Nayar that time was a Law student in the college. To his question, how would he ensure that the Muslims and the Hindus live together once Pakistan is created, Jinnah replied that once the states are created Pakistan and India would remain as friends as France and Britain after many years of war.

“The few weeks of madness (during the partition) on both sides of the border embittered relations between the two countries for generations to come…Fear and mistrust of each other made even trivial matters major issues”, Nayar writes.

He remains nostalgic about his native place. He describes in detail the surrounding of his house and the town. Though a Hindu, Nayar describes how his family was worshipping a Pir (a Muslim Saint) in the backyard of his house and how the Hindus and the Muslims were sharing each others’ joy and sorrow, only to be sullied by the communal hatred and violence. He tells how his father, then 65, was hurled a brick by a Muslim boy (whom he had cured from typhoid few weeks back) while returning back from office on a tonga. The boy named Bashir, accompanied by his parents, came to Nayar’s house next day to seek forgiveness for his act. Nayar argues that the arrival of the Muslim refugees from India who had tragic experiences at the hands of the Hindus and the Sikhs further spurred the communal violence. Those refugees encouraged and actively engaged in violence.

Nayar is also critical about the Indian leadership during partition. He believes that some Indian leaders were apathetic towards the conditions of the Muslims as they believed that the Muslims got a separate state as they wanted. He also mentions India not transferring the agreed upon assets to Pakistan, which furthered the bitterness. Nayar, however, speaks highly of India’s Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and argues he was a thorough secularist. Nehru went to the streets of Delhi with kurta and pajama with a stick in hand to stop communal violence. He points out as most of the Muslim leadership shifted to Pakistan the remaining Muslims in India looked to Maulana Abul Kalam Azad for leadership. Azad in one of his speeches at Lahore College had argued that the partition would not serve the cause of peace in the subcontinent.

Though the wounds of the partition are deep, Nayar believes, they can be healed through friendship and cooperation. He is active in promoting peace between the two countries. He is also an advocate of friendly relationship between the two Punjabs in India and Pakistan.

Asif Noorani – a journalist, film critic, columnist, is adept in combining humor and hard fact with subtle messages. Like Nayar, he was born in an affluent family in Bombay and went to school and befriended kids from different religions. As a child he believed all are Muslims and a Hindu must be a Shia or Sunni! This is pure simplicity which we also experience in different ways in childhood. Noorani describes his childhood in a multicultural and multiethnic setting in Bombay, and remembers some of the gory scenes of communal violence. One needs to remember that Bombay was not as affected by partition-related violence as Punjab.

His family travelled to Karachi in 1950, three years after the partition. It was more an economic factor than political and communal that pushed his family to leave Bombay. His father had suffered losses in Bombay as his partner in the medical store had shifted to Pakistan and the new partner was not cooperative. Noorani’s description of Lahore, particularly the model town locality where his family initially settled, is vivid. This locality was mostly developed by the Hindus and Sikhs before the partition, and Noorani tells us how some of the houses have Hindu names engraved in the marble plaques.

Later his family migrated to Karachi. He describes how families migrating from different parts of India had settled in the city. These refugees had not forgotten their native places in India. They named their new habitations as per their old places in India. So there were Benaras colony, Kokan society, Bihar colony and Dilli colony in Karachi! Here, it is important to observe how the identity of the people remained with them despite their dislocation. Not only that, the migrant people, particularly the women preferred to call each other in the name of the locality they belonged to in India. So, his mother was Bumbai wali behan. There was also a Jhansi ki Rani, the lady who migrated from the Indian town Jhansi!

Noorani’s narration of the 1965 war and his confinement to Bombay is heartrending. Though he was worried about possible internment or possibility of being a prisoner of war, he remained composed throughout. During his Bombay days he had a brief interaction with the noted Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar. His encounters with the Indian officials including one Takle were a mixture of tribulation and humor. It shows how the officials despite the conflict between the two countries were not in the same mold. While some preferred to be rigid like the official who did not send his passport to Delhi for the stamp, others like Takle showed the humane side and offered Noorani tea and biscuits and shared jokes.

Noorani tells us the multiethnic and pluralistic culture of Karachi. It is the city in Pakistan which has the maximum number of minorities. He tells how on one occasion when communal frenzy was at high, Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan rushed to the Burnes Road with kurta and pajama to stop the violence.

Noorani and Nayar also recount the story of their respective cities which they called their homes after the partition. They cast a balanced picture of the cities of Karachi and Delhi. Though these cities have grown manifold and become cosmopolitan, they have increasingly encountered problems such as environment pollution, overcrowding, unemployment, etc. Both Noorani and Nayar are optimists. That optimism has motivated them to pursue their life-long goal – peace between India and Pakistan. Theirs is a shared story, shared history, identity and culture, which the border created in 1947 could not rupture.

(Published in Transcend Media Weekly, 12-18 May 2014)