According to the official data shared with Parliament in February this year, 2020 saw 5133 ceasefire violations, up from 3479 in 2019 and 2140 in 2018. There were 591 ceasefire violations during January and February this year before the announcement by the two countries.
Barring two minor incidents of gunfire, on June 2 and May 2, the situation at the border continues to remain peaceful since February 25 when the Directors General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of India and Pakistan released a joint statement announcing a ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC).
Northern Army Commander Lieutenant General YK Joshi on June 1 said that ceasefire understanding (CFU) between India and Pakistan reached on 25 February 2021 has sustained since then, and both sides are abiding by the arrangement in letter and spirit. Lt Gen Joshi also said that the Pakistan army at present seems to be committed to ensuring peace and tranquillity along the LoC.
He went on to add that the direct beneficiaries of the fresh ceasefire understanding between the two countries have been the people residing along the Line of Control. “The most direct dividend of this CFU has been for the people residing along the LoC, who have reaped the benefits of peace and tranquility for last three months and have been able to go about their daily lives without the fear of imminent peril and danger,” the Army Commander said in an interview with PTI.
The background to the present ceasefire agreement and what could spoil matters.
The two countries had signed a ceasefire agreement in 2003 but it was repeatedly violated, almost on a daily basis. In the aftermath of August 5, 2019 (and in fact even before that too), perhaps not a single day passed without India and Pakistan border troops raining bullets and shells at each-other’s positions, and civilian areas. Obviously, besides the soldiers, it is the border residents who were always at the receiving end of these hostilities. They couldn’t go about their routine life with the proverbial Damocles’ sword always hanging over their heads. Losing home and hearth, and/or life and limb to the bullets or mortars from across the border is the unfortunate reality they had to live with, day and night — 24x7x365.
Unfortunate but true, that the Indo-Pak relational context is a veritable desert when it comes to encouraging and heart-warming developments. For the most part of their post-partition history, the two countries have been engaged in open hostilities, verbal and otherwise. And both sides have over the years perfected the war rhetoric (and even fought actual wars) against each other in order to placate their domestic audiences and electorate. So every time political leadership in either country is faced with some crises internally, they turn the focus on the “hostile neighbor”, and so very conveniently the popular attention is shifted and deviated away from the more pressing concerns at home to the machinations and ill-will and threats emanating from the enemy next-door. This trick has worked, not once or twice, but almost always. Even today it remains a sure-shot ploy and trick with the political executive!
Taking a cue from their governments, the respective media in both countries have also made war a staple. Completely unmindful of how the toxic broadcasts in former Yugoslavia created a situation which finally tore apart and wiped out the former Communist state from the world’s political map, or how similarly vitriolic provocations aired by the Radio Rwanda led to the killing of over 800,000 people in just 100 day period, making it one of the worst genocides in history, some major television channels in India and Pakistan have created virtual war rooms in their studios from where they fight war every evening without fail.
In a bid to grab a larger share of the advertising plum (TRPs), news anchors, with such great ease, vent out their worst racial paranoia, personal and popular political prejudices, and uncivil slurs, while retired military-men are seen bombarding the enemy with sophisticated missiles in their verbal arsenal – choicest invectives and platitudes — every evening during the prime time shows. And all this madness is packaged and sold as an expression and proof of patriotism not only by the news channels and their so-called defence, security and strategic experts and analysts who engage in this idiotic verbal jujitsu but still worse is that it is also taken as such by their naïve and gullible audiences, who also seem like and enjoy the kick of rising adrenaline while watching such shows.
Notwithstanding the changed situation on the ground, this mud-slinging, though primarily designed to grab more and more advertising revenues, is actually doing some really great damage to the possibilities of further calm and peace between the countries.
For the most part of their post-partition history, India and Pakistan have remained at loggerheads. They have fought wars, most of them about Kashmir. Kashmir is once again at the heart, luckily this time around, of the renewed ceasefire understanding (and reported back channel engagements) between them.
Given the stockpile of weapons possessed by two neighbours, it goes without saying that any escalation in tensions between them is fraught with dangers of unimaginable magnitude. This is something that those indulging in war mongering inside the TV studios and elsewhere must understand. And history certainly provides a rich repository of important lessons in this regard.
For instance, the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was a direct and dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was the moment when the two superpowers came closest to a nuclear conflict. The crisis was unique in a number of ways, featuring calculations and miscalculations as well as direct and secret communications and miscommunications between the two sides. The dramatic crisis was also characterized by the fact that it was primarily played out at the White House and the Kremlin level with relatively little input from the respective bureaucracies typically involved in the foreign policy process.
This is exactly how it is for India and Pakistan. With an eye on their respective domestic audiences and politics, both governments and their media have become habitual of continuing on a dangerous course wherein even a small miscalculation or miscommunication may well put the entire subcontinent in the midst of a possible thermonuclear war.
History has informed us that it is not only what governments think and do that inform their choices of war or peace, sometimes a foolish action or even mischief by certain individuals too is enough to trigger war.
For instance, a US fighter plane downed during a reconnaissance flight over Cuba, it turned out decades later, was not targeted at the behest of the Kremlin but because of a snap decision taken by a Russian general in, maybe a fit of personal rage. Even in the face of this grave provocation, US President John F. Kennedy, who had earlier warned of the attack in case any US plane was hit, waited while insisting on giving diplomatic channels some more time. This paid off and thus averted what would have been World War III, which might even have seen the end of the world.
What is being said here is that while it seems cool and fashionable to go for chest-thumping exercises to please domestic audiences, it actually does not help either country’s cause. Reaching peace and understanding is a time consuming and nerve testing process; it doesn’t happen overnight. It needs commitment and demands patience.
What are the expectations?
In the latest ceasefire understanding along the Line of Control, at least a new beginning (read fresh opening between the countries) has been made; it needs to be built upon. With a strong government led by a strong leader like Narendra Modi at the Centre, India has never really been in such an ideal position to mediate and negotiate even the most complex of issues and problems confronting it.
The government has already indicated that it has the will and courage to take tough decisions as it did by revoking the special constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 (merits and demerits of the decision are beyond the scope of discussion in this write-up), there is no reason why it should not leverage its power to engage more meaningfully with Pakistan over other contentious issues and resolve them once for all.
Sir Creek, Siachin, sharing of waters, access to Central Asia (and resources there), bilateral trade… and countless other issues could easily provide the basis for sustained and meaningful engagement between the two sides. Sustained, and shielded against the possibilities of derailment, the process may well throw up and create a template for resolving more serious and contentious problems and disputes between them.
“If there is no intention,” Khrushchev’s message to Kennedy said, “to doom the world to the catastrophe of thermonuclear war, then let us not only relax the forces pulling on the ends of the rope, let us take measures to untie that knot. We are ready for this.” Cuban war was thus averted – thanks to both Kennedy and Khrushchev and their statesmanship.
Hope the leaders of India and Pakistan also show similar courage and foresight!
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of JKPI
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