What happened to a brave new India promised by PM Narendra Modi & BJP?

By Ajai Sahni

88 persons have already been killed in Pakistan-backed Islamist terrorist violence in Jammu & Kashmir in 2015, adding to the 193 killed in 2014. There have been at least 71 ceasefire violations along the International Border and Line of Control, and over 23 infiltration bids, supported by artillery and small arms fire by the Pakistan Rangers and Army, in 2015.

The fact that the attack in Dinanagar, Gurdaspur, occurred across a state border, in Punjab, is merely a reminder of the continued Pakistani provocation and mischief in India. It is a reminder, moreover, that these borders have administrative relevance for us, but have no significance for the jihadis and their state sponsors, who have dedicated themselves to the ghazwa-ehind (the war to bring India under the sway of Islam, part of the apocalyptic confrontation between belief and unbelief that the jihadis think they are currently engaged in).

The attack in Dinanagar is also a reminder that Pakistan's long investment in the "tattered rump" of Khalistani terrorism, to borrow KPS Gill's words, the leaders and cadres of the defeated groups that continue to be hosted and funded by the ISI, has been a big waste, and these groups have little will or desire to engage with the Punjab Police. This is despite the fact that there are continuous reports that the ISI has been pressuring Khalistani leaders based in Pakistan to 'do something' in return for the substantial resources that are expended on them.

The attack in Dinanagar, however, is a reminder that India has no strategy to deal with Pakistan, and continues to wilfully ignore mounting evidence of malice and enmity, even as successive governments chase the mirage of 'solving' enduring problems through 'talks', occasionally interrupted by petulant sulks. Home Minister Rajnath Singh has now, astonishingly, confessed, "I can't understand why time and again cross-border terror incidents are taking place when we want good relations with our neighbour."

This is a prominent leader of a party that has long spoken of a 'clear strategy on terrorism' and of how previous governments have ignored evidence of Pakistani malfeasance to pursue a craven policy of 'appeasement'; a party that has also harvested significant political capital by making a joke of Jawaharlal Nehru's inability to understand Chinese intentions in the run up to the 1962 war. Pakistan's strategies, ideology and orientation should have been visible even to the blind.

Much gratuitous advice is given to the government in the wake of each terrorist incident; and most of it is studiously ignored. It is unnecessary, consequently, to add to this redundant load. But it is right, at least, to demand that a government implement the policies it has articulated; that a political party fulfil the promises that it made.

PM Modi and BJP promised a brave new India, one that would give a "befitting reply" to continuing Pakistani terrorism, one that would be strong and secure. Executing dubious operations against uncertain 'insurgent camps' in Myanmar, claiming to "send a message" to Pakistan, and simultaneously and importunately approaching Pakistan for talks, hardly qualifies as a policy to secure these ends.

(The writer is Executive Director, Institute for Conflict Management & South Asia Terrorism Portal)