Opportunities for Pakistan and India.

At a time when the world is fast headed for a bipolar world overshadowed by the US and China competition, India and Pakistan seem oblivious to the myriad challenges they face because of internecine disputes. Since both are not on talking terms, they cannot adopt a common position bilaterally despite displaying common positions on many issues, including abstention at the UN General Assembly on the Ukrainian issue and non-proliferation matters. Such a callous mindset is ominous and may push them to either of the camps with grave consequences.

One is reminded of Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee's famous remark that 'you can change friends, not neighbours '. These pearls of wisdom reverberate whenever a situation crops up between the two belligerent neighbours. The present situation is not different from what the two countries faced after the attack on the Indian parliament in December 2001.

Fast forward, the Balakot incident of 27th February 2019 was one such occasion when India created a new normal in Pakistan-India relations by attacking Balakot and that too under the nuclear overhang. Pakistan's tit-for-tat response must have registered well with the Indian political and military leadership that a military solution will have no winners. But what next? Well, India tried to muzzle Kashmiris and declared victory-a victory in which the victor is scared of visiting the vanquished. The question is: Indian justification of its occupation has not won laurels amongst the Kashmiris during the past 76 years; how will it happen in the coming 75 years?

It will be four years since Pakistan downgraded its relations with India by withdrawing its High Commissioner; bilateral trade has virtually come to nought while diplomatic interaction has been minimal except for summoning each other's charge d'Affaires to hand over demarches. The freeze in the relationship is occasionally broken at the regional or international forums when the two sides exchange barbs for inviting the world's attention that two neighbours cannot resolve their disputes decently and maturely. (The latest barbs exchanged between Jaishankar and Bilawal at the UN in New York in December 2022).

One is reminded of Mr Vajpayee's remarks after 9/11, in which he warned of regional tensions in a unipolar world. It was the time in late April 2003 that he extended the hand of friendship towards Pakistan. The latter grabbed the opportunity, and a new era of detente started between the two countries. But that...