Peshawar, Pakistan and Kashmir - AHT, Dateline Srinagar, Greater Kashmir, 24 Dec, 2014 The heartbreaking massacre of children in Peshawar has shaken the humanity. It has put we Muslims in a dual situation of personal shock and acute embarrassment. It has traumatised children across the world. It has made us feel badly sick. Nothing could justify this act of barbarity. However, our anger and revulsion must manifest in a purposeful response. It is the moment of truth - for the world community as a key stakeholder, for Pakistan as a nation, for India and Afghanistan as responsible neighbors and for Kashmir as a cause and as an actor of possible positive change. It is true that this massacre is not guided by a misunderstood religious thought alone. At its root lies a complex web of political, cultural and religious motivations. But that the perpetrators of this act - the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) - has sought to justify this act by invoking certain historical religious events cannot be ignored. Those who understand Islam know it well that this act has no place - not to mention sanction - in this religion. However, many others - I came across many of such people this week - see it as an act of the very faith. Those people tend to see this massacre not from the prism of its complex cultural, historical and political underpinnings. For them it is just another act of acute religious brutality - similar to what is reflected from the images of Iraq, Syria and Nigeria these days. This is a very critical situation and necessitates a very sophisticated response at multiple levels. At one level it needs a global response by supporting the government in Pakistan in creating conditions of stabilisation and conflict resolution in Afghanistan and Pakhtoon inhabited territories within Pakistan. However those conditions are hard to be achieved by force or military measures alone. The Pakhtoon history doesnt support that approach. An ideal solution will be political - involving international community, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and the aggrieved Pakhtoon populations. This situation also necessitates a regional response, which should ideally bring Pakistan, Afghanistan and India in a new relationship of mutual interest and a departure from the traditional tit-for-tat narrow geopolitics. Within Pakistan itself it requires a paradigm shift - a shift that doesnt bank on knee-jerk short term solutions. Pakistan will now have to embrace a bold strategy - a strategy that goes beyond tactical military measures and basically embrace a long-term integrated strategy. And that would require compromises and flexibility. Importantly, this also necessitates a major rethinking in Pakistans approach towards Kashmir. Equally important will be a new thinking from within Kashmir towards the new realities of a changed Pakistan. That idea will have to be based on empathy for Pakistan and a greater appreciation for the countys unique challenges. That would even demand reshaping the architecture of its political engagement with Pakistan - one that will be more sensitive to the well-being and welfare of that country. In practice that would also mean doing away with the paradigm of perpetual victim-hood and one-sided and insensitive expectations. The people of Kashmir in that paradigm will have to side with the Pakistani state in achieving a long-term and durable solution to the challenges Pakistan faces today. The trouble is that the Peshawar massacre is not only the manifestation of an extreme religious thinking. It is underpinned by certain Pakhtoon cultural characteristics that go beyond the troubled history of Pakistans involvement with the Afghan jihad and the recent war on terror. A global response to this challenge will have to include a strategy for massive social and educational modernization in that part of Pakistan. A lot of investment would have to be made in developing mediation and conflict resolution resources both at individual and institutional levels. Global experience shows that painstaking investment in conflict resolution and mediation in such complex situations offers a strong alternative to counter productive military measures. No global response will be helpful if it doesnt recognise the historical factors that aggravate this situation. We cannot forget that even today there are about three million Afghan refugees residing in Pakistan. An international response will be crassly inadequate if it doesnt devise a mechanism for ensuring a dignified and meaningful return of these refugees back to their country. That situation could be possible only if the international community help Afghanistan and Pakistan in creating an inclusive and participative political system in Afghanistan. And that is the situation where Pakistan would need to make sacrifices, and India would need to exhibit maturity and support. Within Pakistan as much as the Pakistani state, it is the countys civil society that has to make a clear choice today. It has to define a national political agenda and draw the line on engaging with non state actors in that pursuit. Going by the Pakhtoon history, their pride and their world view, the Pakistani states response will have to be psychologically many step ahead. For Kashmir’s political project, especially for those who bank on this strand of political spectrum in Pakistan as moral supporters, this approach would require to revisit their engagement and expectations from this strand. That would not only be in the interests of Kashmir but for the well-being of Pakistan itself. At Pakistan-Afghanistan level the leadership of the two countries will have to embrace a futuristic vision rather than remaining embroiled in a relationship of perpetual mistrust and juvenile retribution. None of all this, however, could work unless India and Pakistan will truly begin the process of building a new relationship. That relationship will have to begin by acknowledging the past irritants that continue to shadow their present and the future. India inflicted pain on Pakistan by abetting the creation of Bangladesh. But then Bangladesh didnt come into being for that abetment alone. The events of 1971 had also underlined a countrys inability in creating an inclusive and democratic political system that underpins the success of modern federal states. Subsequently, Pakistan inflicted pain on India in Punjab and also in Kashmir to some extent. The war of influence and control being fought by the two countries in the valleys of Kashmir, Afghanistan, FATA, Khyber Pakhtoonkha and Baluchistan will have to end. For the success of this approach, India will have to respond by creating the kind of conditions in Kashmir that would be acceptable to its aggrieved and hurt people. None of this would work if India wouldnt truly don the mantle of a big brother ready to show accommodation and flexibility both in Kashmir and the wide range of its bilateral interface with Pakistan, including its showdown in Afghanistan. This situation would require the Hindu right in India to end its expansionist ambitions in Kashmir. It will have to show greater understanding and empathy for Pakistans sensitivities. At the theological level, this massacre must bring the thought leaders of Barelvi, Deobandi and Salafi schools of thought together and take a common stand. The TTP in one of its statements seems to have invoked the Banu Qurayza event of Islamic history. It is very important for the Islamic scholars to clearly restate the circumstances of that event to the common people. They must also state the questionable historical accounts - flowing from unauthenticated and unclear sources - that seem some people take extreme actions. It is important to do so because the conclusions being drawn from that event by the TTP seem to grossly contradict the values of forgiveness, compassion for the weak and non coercion that the final Prophet of Islam - Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) - brought to this world at the peak of the Dark Age. Such an unambiguous stand is also necessary because the Peshawar massacre also has the potential of creating further doubts among those millions around the world seeking answers to the baffling questions of life, the profound challenges to a meaningful individual and family life amidst the challenges and contradictions of modern life. This incident has the potential of deepening what is described as Islamophobia and put away many people who approach Islam with a positive curiosity. The reason that the Peshawar massacre has to be taken extremely seriously is because it has the potential of igniting a diabolical wave of dehumanisation that could mark the beginning of a chain of ugly actions and retribution. That situation could even go beyond the borders of Pakistan and Afghanistan. And no one could afford that - neither Pakistanis themselves, nor the Afghans or the Kashmiris. (The columnist works on international development, and is based overseas. Thoughts expressed are personal)
Posted on: Wed, 24 Dec 2014 11:30:17 +0000