A peep into the Indian Congress mind

By INAYATULLAH

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Bhadrakumar has pinpointed the need for a satisfactory compliance on Pakistan’s part as in case India fails to achieve its objective, Congress may lose the coming elections. If the US wants a friendly dispensation to continue even after the elections, “Washington could do a lot by influencing the denouement of the present crisis in India’s relations with Pakistan in a way that modulates the popular mood in India.”

He refers to a growing public perception in India that government is merely indulging in hollow rhetoric and “is actually helpless in tackling Islamabad’s obduracy with regard to cracking down on terrorist groups operating against India. This, he thinks, “hangs like a Sword of Damocles over the ruling Congress Party’s electoral prospects.”

Mark Bhadrakumar’s anxious articulation: “Washington needs to carefully weigh its options. The defeat of the Congress in the forthcoming elections will no doubt constitute a major setback to US regional strategies in South Asia. Indeed, if Washington could somehow persuade Islamabad to hand over to India even one or two of the 20 terrorist suspects New Delhi wants, Indian public opinion would see it as a huge success of the government, and the credit will go to the Congress Party - especially someone like Masood Azhar, whom the then Indian government surrendered under humiliating circumstances as ransom during the hijacking of an Indian aircraft eight years ago to Kandahar in Afghanistan.

“Holbrooke (who is reported to be appointed as US special envoy for India and Pakistan) will then have a historic opening as well to work on putting the India-Pakistan relations on a predictable footing. Never before has Washington found itself in such a conundrum.
It finds itself in the enviable position to swing the outcome of an Indian election and even decisively mould the future ruling dispensation in New Delhi, apart from holding a virtual carte blanche to work on the flawed India-Pakistan relationship from the angle of the US’s regional strategies.”

Now a look at Raja Mohan’s candid and forceful analysis: although India has not so far succeeded in making Pakistan buckle under its and western pressure, the desired objectives India will have to win by the dint of its diplomatic persuasion and the credibility of its threat to use force against Pakistan.

Apprehending that the international community may not do the job for India, Raja Mohan swerves to resorting to direct action by India: “In the world of sovereign states, the burdens of justice and retribution belong entirely to governments which must exercise the political will to use force against another with all the attendant risks.-