There are times when India’s foreign policy can be baffling. Bizarre as it may sound, there are reports that India is likely to participate in an anti-terrorism exercise at Pabbi in Pakistan along with Pakistan and China later this year, under the aegis of the China-led Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). Yes, you read it right—an exercise with Pakistan on Pakistani soil on how to counter terrorism. Pakistan, a state sponsor of terrorism, a country that has been the single biggest exporter of terrorism to India and the rest of the world, a terrorist state that has been trying to bleed India with a thousand cuts, a country that is trying to send its pet terrorists across the border into India even as you read these lines, will host an anti-terrorism exercise and India is expected to participate in it. And instead of outright rejection, the proposal is apparently under the consideration of India’s National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS). Can it get more surreal than this?
According to China’s Xinhua news agency, the decision to hold “Pabbi-Antiterror-2021” was taken at a meeting last week in Uzbekistan’s Tashkent of the SCO countries, of which India is a part. India too attended that meeting. Indian media reports say that even though India is yet to decide about its participation in Pabbi, it will participate in a military exercise in Russia later this year with China and Pakistan. This military exercise too is part of the SCO platform and India did not participate in last year’s exercise in Russia because of the Galwan clashes and the standoff with China in Ladakh.
Isn’t this a case of taking things to the extreme in the name of practising multilateralism? Surely reaching out to four Central Asian Republics (CARs) is not “excuse” enough for participating in military exercises with one’s sworn enemies? Unless of course we have decided that Pakistan is no longer an enemy because Pakistan army chief General Qamar Bajwa said “it is time to bury the past and move forward”. Lest we forget, the so-called peace overture by Bajwa was made conditional to India’s handling of Kashmir—“our neighbour will have to create conducive environment” in Kashmir, he said. So no change towards India is manifest in Bajwa’s words. And how can we trust Pakistan, given that every gesture of peace by India has been met with a stab in India’s back? It was magnanimous on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s part to write to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on the occasion of Pakistan Day, but as PM Modi rightly pointed out in his letter, cordial relations with Pakistan are conditional to an “an environment of trust, devoid of terror and hostility”. And such an environment does not exist.
A question that must be asked here is: what will India gain by participating in an anti-terror exercise on Pakistani soil? Nothing. In fact, it is more than likely that this exercise will be used by Pakistan to familiarise itself with India’s anti terror tactics and devise counters. In fact, the Prime Minister is requested to step in and ask all concerned to stop even considering participating in such an exercise.
Also, there is a need to take a hard look at the level of India’s involvement in the SCO. It is a grouping comprising the four CARs of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, apart from Pakistan, Russia, China and India. Even if India justifies its presence in SCO by saying it’s a platform where it can reach out to the four CARs, surely there is no justification of continuing with military exercises with Pakistan and China.
A legitimate question in this context is: will India now also be a part of the regional security bloc that Russia and China are proposing to form? China and Russia have rejected the US call for a “rules-based international order” while proposing the security bloc. Significantly, at the core of the Quad is the principle of following a “rules-based international order”, which India too has been endorsing. India is an important member of the Quad. Hence, it is hoped that in the name of multilateralism India will not agree to be a part of the China-Russia security forum as well, if it is invited to be so—and it will possibly be, for that will be one way of destroying the Quad from within. India cannot be everything to everybody. The time for fence-sitting is over.
A question that must be asked here is: what will India gain by participating in an anti-terror exercise on Pakistani soil? Nothing. In fact, it is more than likely that this exercise will be used by Pakistan to familiarise itself with India’s anti terror tactics and devise counters.