Recent events in Bangladesh indicate that a favourable political dispensation in Dhaka isn’t enough to insulate India from jihadi terror. India is now wedged between a toxic ideological Pakistan and an increasingly subversive Bangladesh
The ‘green crescent’ on the map of Asia, which begins directly from under the Black Sea and till recently ended in the Kashmir valley, poses the single greatest threat to the Indian deep state. Recent happenings in Bangladesh and the rise of ultra Islamic fundamentalism have convinced the deep state that despite a favourable political dispensation in our eastern neighbour, the rampant spread of the Green Crescent in Bangladesh’s fast coalescing socio-political-religious sub-consciousness has far wider dispersal, courtesy the cold pipes that control the worldwide web. So, India is now suddenly wedged between a toxic ideological state — Pakistan — and an increasingly subversive Bangladesh.
Throw in the current ferment in Pakistan which in the normal course begins to display a strange political and strategic morality on Kashmir the moment the cauldron boils over internally, and you have an incendiary mix. Add an absent Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who has had a successful open heart surgery in london which entailed four bypasses, and an increasingly active Army chief Raheel Sharif powered by the return of the immensely popular Army-backed stalking horse, Pakistan Awami Tehreek chair Tahir-ul-Qadri, and you know that things don’t augur well for India. Nature, they say abhors a vacuum, ergo Gen Sharif has stepped into that vacuum created by the Prime Minister’s absence. Kashmir, unfortunately, has become sui generis to Pakistan’s brutalised psyche since the vivisection of East Pakistan in 1971.
This game of thrones in Pakistan has multiple agendas and is split into varied targets. Almost in parallel, a clarion call has been given in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir — “Modi ka jo yaar hai, gaddar hai, gaddar hai (whoever is Modi’s friend is a traitor)”. Nawaz Sharif will return to Pakistan amidst this bedlam. The July 21 election in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir is one of the immediate challenges he faces. While the disputed territory has traditionally voted for federal governing parties, the Prime Minister’s Pakistan Muslim league-Nawaz is facing intense competition from the Bhutto family front, Pakistan People’s Party and Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf.
The scenario gets more complicated with alleged non-state actors under the aegis of Difa-e-Pakistan Council (Defence of Pakistan) pumping up the volume at a recent rally in Faisalabad spewed quintessential venom against India. Maulana Samiul Haq along with Jamaat-e-Islami ameer Sirajul Haq, Anas Noorani, Jamaat-ud Dawa’h boss Hafiz Saeed spoke of the Indian-American hegemony to weaken and undermine Pakistan and wanted Panama leaks named Nawaz Sharif to leave Pakistan.
Almost concurrently Hafiz Saeed has been targeting Indian paramilitary and Army convoys in Kashmir using signature fidayeen attacks trying as always to divert the attention of Pakistan’s populace to the ‘jugular vein’ rhetoric. And if all this wasn’t enough, in the complex and convoluted military-political relationship akin to a hall of mirrors, a new Army chief is to be selected later this year. The deep-rooted distrust between the two Sharifs is like a maze or series of passageways lined with mirrors, especially curved mirrors giving distorted reflections. A confusing or disorienting situation in which it is difficult to distinguish between truth and illusion or between competing versions of reality.
While it was extensively reported in January this year that General Sharif nixed growing speculation about an extension in his tenure through a brief, but a sudden statement that paved the way for the Government to start considering his successor who will take up the job from him in late November, there is still no clarity in this regard, given the Prime Minister’s heart problems and ill health.
Gen Sharif’s said, through a military spokesman in a terse 43 letter tweet — “I don’t believe in extension and will retire on the due date.” Incidentally, this statement came even as a petition was filed in the Supreme Court’s lahore registry seeking an extension for him. If he does retire, he would be the first Army chief to retire on time in two decades. His predecessors Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and Gen Pervez Musharraf got extensions, while Gen Jehangir Karamat was packed off prematurely. Over the last two-and-a-half years, Gen Sharif has proved that he is a wily and consummate actor in Pakistan’s fragile democratic set up. Most analysts reckon that he calls the shots in today’s Pakistan and for someone who superseded two other generals to replace the powerful Kayani, he has done extremely well for himself and the Fauj that he heads, keeping it in complete control of Pakistan. His lack of intelligence and operations background not proving a drawback.
The Dawn, writing about him says, “The high point in his tenure was the start of Operation Zarb-e-Azb in North Waziristan against the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan in June 2014, something from which his predecessor shied away fearing blowback. The operation is now in its last stages. He is also credited for action against militancy in Karachi and partially restoring calm in the city. Gen Sharif has all along been supportive of the Government, except for a statement at the corps commanders’ conference last November when he expressed reservations over civilian administration’s governance. The comment presented the spectacle of a row between the civilian and military leadership. He has, nevertheless, maintained strong influence over the government’s foreign and national security policies. Gen Sharif was also the architect of the reconciliation between the Taliban and the Afghan Government, which was suspended after it became public that Taliban chief Mullah Omar had died more than two years ago, but efforts are again under way to revive the process.”
In the eventuality that he does go, ‘who next’ is another burning issue for the Indian deep state. The next four in line are: lt Gen Maqsood Ahmed (currently on deputation with the UN), lt Gen Zubair Mehmood Hayat (Chief of General Staff), lt Gen Syed Wajid Hussain (HIT Taxila) and lt Gen Ishfaq Nadeem (Corps Commander Multan). Gen Sharif has been proactive in dealing with local and global issues. Pakistan media reported that in a high-level briefing at the Rangers Headquarters in Karachi soon after the killing of eminent Qawwal Amjad Sabri, he directed all the commanders to leave ‘no stone unturned’ in finding the perpetrators. The Army chief’s visit to Karachi came days after the high-profile kidnapping of the Sindh High Court Chief Justice’s son Awais Shah and the assassination of Sabri, who was gunned down in liaquatabad by unidentified motorcyclists in an attack claimed by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.
Janus-faced Toxicistan remains a dreaded adversary for India. Despite $33 billion in American aid and repeated attempts to reset relations, the US remains distrustful of its duplicitous and dangerous ways. Imagine an Islamophobe like Donald Trump walking into the White House later this year, and how frail and perilous South Asia appears from that prism.