Peace Kebab: Pakistan, India and the politics of trade

By the end of my third day in Lahore, the burden of being an Indian “mehman” (guest) in Pakistan was beginning to weigh on me. Large-hearted Punjabi hospitality is agreeable in small doses, but when virtually every cabdriver or rickshaw-puller shanghais you to show you off to his friends and family – and, on occasion, drum up some business – it begins to tire on you, and plays havoc with your travel schedule. The ritualistic protocol of mehman-baazi also meant that it was impolite to turn down kindly offers of Lahori sweetmeats, with which the locals proved exceedingly generous. [caption id=“attachment_122656” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“For all the symbolic significance of India securing Most Favoured Nation status with Pakistan, there is a case for not  lowering our security guard until Pakistan irrevocably gives up trading in jihadi terror. AFP”]  [/caption] For the rest of my time in Lahore, therefore, I took to giving myself fictitious national identities whenever cabbies made solicitous enquiries about where I was from. Depending purely on whimsy, I would be an Egyptian one day, Turkish another, and so on. Once I even passed myself off as a non-resident Pakistani hailing from Karachi. My subterfuge worked wonderfully, and I was no longer showered with the excessively cloying hospitality that seemed reserved for Indians, who were clearly the flavour of the month. It was April 2004, and I was in Lahore ostensibly to watch the cricket match between the two countries, timed for one of those rare moments when bilateral relations had thawed, largely owing to former Prime Minister  AB Vajpayee’s exertions. Eight-day ‘cricket visas’ were being proffered to Indians, the high point of which was that you weren’t required to report to the local police station on a daily basis. Eager to make the most of this window of travel opportunity, I went over, inspired not so much by cricketing interest as by the kebab offerings on Lahore’s famed Food Street… The traders of Lahore were profiting from the “peace dividend” that made it possible for thousands of Indians to cross the border, and in turn were doing their damnedest to honour and humour the shopaholic visitors from Hindustan. If ever you needed validation of the theory that heightened trade relations spur entente between countries, you can find it in border-cities, which benefit every time the border opens. (When, some years later, Pakistanis came over to Mohali for another cricket carnival, they were welcomed just as effusively in Chandigarh.) Globalisation guru and flat-earth theorist Thomas Friedman once propounded the principle that no two countries with a McDonald’s franchise would ever go to war. That theory was proved wrong, in the India-Pakistan narrative, by the Kargil war of 1999. Friedman subsequently tweaked his theory a bit, and came up with the Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention, which argued that no two countries that were part of a global supply chain (like Dell’s) would wage war on each other. Wiser from his McExperience, however, he inserted some important caveats into his theory. After yesterday’s announcement by Pakistan that it would give Most Favoured Nation trade status to India, media commentary in general has tended to see this as offering the prospect for a diplomatic détente between the two countries. That argument is not without some merit. Enhanced trade relations do enhance the constituency of stakeholders in both countries who favour normal relations, since any strain – or a shuttering of the borders – directly impacts their bottomline. For the larger trading partner, such a relationship also opens up the possibility of making gains on the political plane. China’s experience of leveraging its enhanced trade relations with Taiwan, the de-facto independent country over which it claims territorial sovereignty, is particularly illustrative. There was once a time, not long ago, when China was committed to taking Taiwan by military force. In fact, to this day, an array of Chinese missiles are directed at Taiwan, signalling China’s readiness to claim territory by force if necessary. Yet, the more significant gains that China has made in bringing Taiwan into its orbit have been enabled by enhanced trade relations in recent years, after a pro-independence leader was voted out in Taiwan. Today, a more pragmatic Taiwan leadership, profiting from beneficial trade relationship with China, has indicated it would be willing to sign a peace agreement with China. Yet, for all the merits of enhanced trade relations with Pakistan, there is a risk in overstating the “peace dividend” that can be derived from such an initiative in the absence of a fundamental change in the mindset of the Pakistani military complex – which, truth to tell, is the real power centre in Islamabad. The Pakistani military-ISI strategic thinking vis-à-vis India is still characterised by a cussedness and an unwillingness to give up the use of jihadi terrorists as a “strategic asset” to advance its strategic objectives. True, in recent months, particularly since the killing of Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil, the ISI-military complex has been forced on the defensive by the diplomatic and military pressure brought on by the US. Realising the folly of opening two military flanks – on the western border with Afghanistan and on the eastern border with India – Pakistani generals have opted tactically to back away from their sponsorship of jihadi terror in India. But there’s nothing to indicate that mindset has metamorphosed in any meaningful way. For now, for all the symbolic significance of India securing Most Favoured Nation status with Pakistan, there is a case for not getting carried away with peacenik projections or lowering our security guard until Pakistan irrevocably gives up trading in jihadi terror. That day hasn’t yet come.