PUNJAB is up in flames in the wake of the court decision that the Sharif brothers were not eligible to contest elections or hold public office. This is not surprising.

The PML-N had won a popular mandate in the province and there was a general view that Shahbaz Sharif had provided good governance in his year-long rule. What is incomprehensible is why the PPP decision-makers failed to realise that a strong public reaction is to be expected if an elected, popular government is removed and governor’s rule is imposed in its place. This is a major development that threatens to derail democracy in this country.

The other decision which threatens democracy is the peace the ANP has made with Sufi Mohammad in Swat. In principle, of course, negotiation and peace are always better than the use of military force. Unfortunately, whenever attempts at making peace were initiated earlier, they made the Taliban stronger and the common people suffered from their domination and barbaric practices. Even this time, according to newspaper reports, military vehicles will move in Swat with the prior permission of the Taliban.

If this is true — and I hope it is not — the common people would be left to the mercy of the Taliban. This is not peace; it is the death of democracy in Swat. It is, indeed, the extinction of the hope of democracy and human rights in that unfortunate piece of land. But going back to the derailment of democracy in the whole country, let us consider the fallout of the imposition of governor’s rule in Punjab and the ouster of the Sharif brothers.

Three scenarios come to the mind. First, the people will be cowed after a few days of anger and an uneasy peace will prevail. The PML-Q and the PPP will form a government in Punjab and the PPP will complete its tenure. However, when elections are held and these are fair it will be voted out and will no longer remain a strong national party.

This will be very unfortunate since the PPP is still seen as the best choice for liberals and religious minorities in this country. Other parties, including the PML-N, tend to encourage jingoistic nationalism and also pander to religious prejudices. Both attitudes, if taken to extremes, are inimical to peace, human rights and the spirit of democracy.

The second scenario is that the agitation will continue. The lawyers’ movement will also strengthen it and, after much police brutality and bloodshed, the PPP government will have to agree to hold mid-term elections. In this case even if the PPP loses votes the process of democracy will be strengthened and the PPP will gain some credit for having allowed elections.

However, the longer the period of agitation the fewer the PPP’s chances of winning elections in Punjab. Moreover, the economy will suffer and the enemies of democracy will get a chance to point out that democracy does not work in the country.

The third scenario is that the agitation will be so strong or so lengthy that the army will step in. If this happens the process of democracy will be disrupted once again. That would be the worst possible thing to happen and will weaken liberal and democratic forces in the country more than anything else. In short, we will be back to square one as we have been several times in the past.

Besides, there are other possibilities also. For instance, there may be a revolt within the PPP resulting in pro- and anti-Zardari factions, new combinations of political actors may emerge, and so on.

However, the chances of all this happening are few, But they could also lead to the weakening of the PPP, mid-term elections or even a new dictatorship.

In short, what we are witnessing is a shattering of our dreams of only one year ago. What we had expected was that the judges would be restored with Iftikhar Chaudhry as the chief justice of the Supreme Court, the PML-N and PPP would rule the country jointly for five years and people would truly start believing that democracy can function in the country.

The sceptics assure us that if Iftikhar Chaudhry had been restored he would have abolished the NRO and that would have meant the end of Mr Zardari’s career. First, this is by no means certain. It is possible that he would not have touched Mr Zardari in any way. Secondly, if he had been restored after Mr Zardari became the president there would be no problem as Mr Zardari would have enjoyed presidential immunity. And, above all, if Mr Zardari had done all the right things he would have been so popular that he would have had an assured future in any future political set-up even if he had to leave this one.

As it is, Mr Zardari seems to have taken steps which will prob

ably harm him in the long run. Moreover, he is seen as the architect of a script which has caused widespread disappointment in the new dispensation. The judges illegally removed by Musharraf still remain where they have been for so many months. The functionaries appointed by Musharraf are still functioning. The off-and-on relationship with the Taliban still remains. People still tell us that the armed forces either cannot or will not destroy the Taliban. Investment is still down and young people have little hope of finding good jobs. Bombs still explode in our midst. The system remains the same; only the faces have changed. Democracy has been derailed — but was it even on the rails?



SOME Indians and Pakistanis behave like stragglers running around in the forests as if the Second World War had not ended.

Indians foam at the mouth if “the UN resolutions” are mentioned or if any one uses the D-word for the Kashmir dispute. Pakistanis harp on those resolutions, clamour for settlement of the dispute, and seek foreign mediation. Both are pitiably outdated.

It can be said with slight exaggeration that Kashmir is all but settled. Were it not for the blasts in Mumbai’s trains in 2006, the prime minister of India, Dr Manmohan Singh, might have arrived in Islamabad to give a fillip to the process, if not, indeed, tie up the loose ends with President Pervez Musharraf. He might have come to Pakistan in mid-2007 were it not for the crisis in Pakistan’s judiciary that erupted in March that year.

President Musharraf uttered a crie de coeur in an interview to Aaj on May 18, 2007. “First, let us resolve the situation here, the internal issue, so that we can focus on Kashmir properly.” He revealed that it was a “fairly fair” assumption that the broad outlines of a solution to the Kashmir issue had been worked out between the two countries. “We have made progress on the Kashmir dispute, but we have yet to reach a conclusion.” His foreign minister Mr Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri confirmed this in New Delhi.

A settlement requires concessions on both sides the president said: “And when both give up, then in both countries there is opposition and a hue and cry. Every body says develop a consensus. Arrey bhai, how to develop a consensus?” He further revealed that the solution was “moving forward on the same lines that I’ve proposed — along the lines of demilitarisation, self-governance and joint mechanism”. That is the status of the Kashmir dispute today.

The formulations and slogans of old have become irrelevant. The president and the prime minister’s public pronouncements converged. The back-channel, comprising Messrs Tariq Aziz and Satindra Lambah, filled in the details. We should be proud of this achievement. We owe nothing at all to the reports produced in the United States; though some of their authors, endowed more with vanity than competence would detect the stamp of their genius on any accord.

On Dec 25, 2003, President Musharraf “left that [UN Resolutions] aside”. In New Delhi on April 18, 2005, he said “the LoC cannot be permanent. Borders must be made irrelevant and boundaries cannot be altered. Take the three together and now discuss the solution”. On May 20, 2005: “Self-government must be allowed to the people of Kashmir” and “we do understand India’s sensitivity over their secular credentials”. So, “it cannot be, may be, on a religious basis”. On June 14, 2005: “Autonomous Kashmir is my earnest desire, but its complete independence will not be acceptable to both India and Pakistan.”

Thus, both, plebiscite and independence are ruled out. What of the LoC? On Oct 21, 2005, he suggested: “Let’s make the LoC irrelevant. Let’s open it out.” On Jan 8, 2006 he amplified that the quantum of self-governance will be defined by both sides. He stipulated demilitarisation of Kashmir. Lastly, he said: “Joint management would be a solution which we need to go into. There have to be subjects which are devolved, there have to be some subjects retained for the joint management.”

On Dec 4, 2006, he indicated clearly that it was not territory that Pakistan was after; Pakistan was “prepared to give up its claim” to Kashmir provided the four-point formula he set out precisely in his memoir Line of Fire was accepted — define the regions; demilitarise them; introduce “self-governance or self-rule”, and “a joint management mechanism” comprising Indians, Pakistanis and Kashmiris.

On March 24, 2006, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said “borders cannot be redrawn but we can work towards making them irrelevant — towards making them just lines on a map”. He was prepared for “institutional arrangements” between both parts of Kashmir. It would be foolish and wantonly destructive to throw out the baby of this achievement with the bath-water of partisanship. Fifty years ago, on Feb 10, 1958, Prime Minister Firoz Khan Noon met the US envoy to the UN, Henry Cabot Lodge, in Karachi. Ambassador James M. Langley recorded: “Noon made no mention of a plebiscite and it seemed to me that he was clearly thinking of a compromise which would provide for a territorial division between India and Pakistan.”

By then plebiscite was dead. Nehru offered an accord on the basis of the ceasefire line to Liaquat Ali Khan in London on Oct 27, 1948; to Ghulam Mohammed on Feb 27, 1955; to Mohammed Ali Bogra at the Delhi summit on May 14, 1955; at a public meeting in New Delhi on April 13, 1956; and to Ayub Khan at Murree on Sept 21, 1960. In 1963, Z.A. Bhutto and Swaran Singh parleyed on various partition lines.

President Ayub Khan was prepared to drop plebiscite if India offered a good alternative. In a speech at Lahore on March 23, 1962, he said that if plebiscite “was not the best solution” for Kashmir “then let us have another solution satisfactory to all”. This is what the four-point formula accomplishes. It assures Kashmir’s de facto reunification and self-rule to both its parts. It gives Pakistan a say in the state through the joint mechanism while ruling out a plebiscite. Both countries will make significant concessions. Never before had the Kashmir dispute reached so closely the outskirts of an accord as it has now.

What is required of all is a constructive critique of the details to improve the scheme. This is an accord which India’s leader can sell to the people from the Red Fort in Delhi; Pakistan’s leader from the Mochi Gate in Lahore; and Kashmir’s leader from the Lal Chowk in Srinagar.