A Peshawar Journey for Peace and Democracy :
An overview of the Fourth-Joint Convention of Pakistan-IndiaPeoples' Forum for Peace
and Democracy
November 21-22, 1998
Peshawar, historically, is the gateway through which centuries of invaders from Central
Asia - Aryans, Greeks and Mongols -passed to conquer the Indian subcontinent. As
160 Indians crossed on foot the normally closed Wagha border and made their way up
by road to Peshawar to join Pakistani delegates in a people to people dialogue, Pakistani
Member of Parliament, Latif Afridi saw the promise of another conquest . Could the
meeting of these 300 Indian and Pakistani citizens in Peshawar pave the way for the
capture of the hearts and minds of the peoples of the two countries divided by fifty
years of hate?
It was appropriate that Afridi, who represents the Khyber Agency, a tribal constituency
which in the Punjab -Sind dominated politics of Pakistan rarely gets heard, should
welcome this minority of 300 people. They had come together to discuss a way out
of the political and military impasse created by the decision makers of India and
Pakistan at the Fourth Joint Convention of the Pak-India Forum for Peace and Democracy.
November 1998 Peshawar, like the December 1996 Calcutta Convention, showed up the
difference in perspective as you move away from Islamabad/Lahore and New Delhi. There,
decision makers on both sides foster homogenising nationalist orthordoxies which
antagonistically feed on each other. But in Peshawar, what came through was the assertion
of a separate identity - Pakhtunwah .
Nostalgia made Brij Mohan Toofan (78) rush to Kissa Kahani-the market place of story
tellers- and don a Pishori turban as he and his father had worn before partition,
before becoming refugees. But beyond nostalgia, there was the politics of the Pakistanis
and Indians, connecting with the common anti colonial legacy of Badshah Khan or as
he is known in India, the Frontier Gandhi. Many there, like Afridi had been followers
of Badshah Khans non violent and secular politics. Peshawar was a reminder that in
Pakistan, in the years before martial law, a secular tradition had existed.
A journey to the Peshawar valley for the two peoples, brought alive the shared heritage
of the Gandhara -Buddhist culture. The emphasis was on the common historical linkage
with Central Asia a political counter point to contemporary Pakistan forging an Arab
identity. Against the background of the busy rewriting of history texts in the service
of Hindutva or a political Islamist nationalist agenda, teachers on both sides with
one voice denounced the deliberate distortions which inculcated intolerance. A teacher
in Peshawar, a Pathan, expressed concern at the way misinformation about Hindus treating
Muslims as untouchables spread hate. A school teacher from Ahmedabad added that Gujarat
state schools had dropped the chapters on the Rise of Islam and Christianity from
World History. In Pakistan O level history texts begin with the Coming of Islam into
the subcontinent, denying a pre-Islamic heritage.
Earlier, at the Forums Delhi and Lahore Conventions, Indians and Pakistanis had shown
the courage to take a common position on Kashmir, to reject the stand that it was
a mere territorial dispute. In the NWFP, there was a strengthened appeal for a democratic
and non insurgent solution which is acceptable to peoples living on both sides of
the LOC. It was Ved Bhasin, editor of Kashmir Times from Jammu, whose impassioned
plea about the suffering of the people of Kashmir cut through the cliché of
a proxy war and of Kashmir being only a territorial dispute. As a result the Forum
demanded that the Indian government pull back its troops from civilian areas and
that Pakistan government make a determined effort to stop the armed activities of
the militants. This must be done to make third party mediation unnecessary.
The grim fall out from the May nuclear tests by India and then Pakistan spread over
the Peshawar Convention instilling a sense of urgency for the Forum to facilitate
a process for enabling India and Pakistan to break the logjam of no war-no peace.
The Forum urged the two governments to sign a peace treaty. Less than a fortnight
before the Convention, official level talks between India and Pakistan had once again
shown up the inability of the two sides to rise above competitive posturing on their
inflexible positions on Kashmir. It made it imperative for the Forum to take an initiative
and pave the way for Kashmiri leaders on both sides to talk to each other and to
Pakistanis and Indians. As Dr Mubashir Hasan, a former Pakistan Finance Minister,
said, "One reason we have not progressed is because we have not talked to the
Kashmiris."
Appeals for both governments to make a "dignified exit" from the nuclear
and missile race has a different resonance when it comes from a man who has been
in uniform for 45 years. Admiral R. Ramdas, former Indian naval chief, urged the
two governments to say no to nuclear weaponisation. Pakistan human rights activist,
I A Rehman, and co chair of the Forum emphasised the sheer lunacy of embarking upon
a nuclear arms race when 40 % of the people live in abject poverty. "Neither
of us can afford it. We in Pakistan certainly cant. It will bring democracy under
pressure, further," he said. The need for scientists and technologists on both
side to make common cause to wrest science away from works of destruction to serving
the needs of the majority of the peoples of the subcontinent was movingly expressed
by Prof Dinesh Mohan, an eminent scientist from India.
With barely seven minutes warning time for a missile, the risk of a miscalculation
or misperception leading to a nuclear holocaust haunted the Peshawar meet. And as
many of the Indian delegates took time off to visit the ruins of the 4000 BC Indus
valley civilisation at Harappa or the later ruins at Taxila 200BC-100AD, there were
few who were not touched by the grim prospect of a future, our leaders had blighted
by the May nuclear tests. "From ruins to future ruins" an Indian delegate
ruminated.
The mutually self destructive adversarial relationship between India and Pakistan
made even less sense as the President of the Sarhand Chamber of Commerce volubly
expanded on the mutual benefits in opening up bilateral trade. The challenge before
the two peoples was fighting an "economic war" together as partners in
SAARC, he said. Although studies commissioned by the Pakistan government have recommended
that the benefits of opening up trade far outweigh its disadvantages, Pakistan has
held back from granting India MFN status. Trade has become a hostage to progress
on the Kashmir issue.
In NWFP, businessmen were committed to opening up trade. With a treasure of gems
and precious stones, Indias Jaipur was a natural market. It was Senator Ilyas Bilour,
from NWFP, who last year had pushed through the opening up of the tyre imports directly
from India rather than via third countries. But no sooner had the concession been
made than the then Finance Minister warned that without progress on Kashmir how could
there be trade.
The irrationality of the adversarial relationship fanned by the jingoism of hate
and intolerance, was mirrored in the curious ritual at the Wagha :Attari border.
Indian delegates armed with a special clearance were waiting to cross the 30metres
of no mans land. Green and red uniformed Pakistani coolies with headloads of Afghan
dry fruit, were scurrying over to waiting blue uniformed Indian coolies at the dividing
line. Head loads were shifted across and the exercise repeated. Except for an agreement
for transit of Afghan dry fruit, there is no road trade or human traffic between
Indians and Pakistanis.
The Forums strength has been in providing citizens of India and Pakistan an opportunity
to meet and thereby pull down the walls which have divided them and worked to demonise
"the other". Since the idea of the Forum was first floated in 1994 in Lahore,
it has built a network of peoples and organisations - greens, womens groups, trade
unionists, human rights activists, peace activists, academics and professionals -
committed to building cross border peace and also democracy. For the politics of
intolerance and internal militarization is justified in the name of India Pakistan
tension. I A Rehman made clear that the task of the Pakistan chapter lies in Pakistan
and the task of the Indian chapter in India. But as the conservative and dogmatic
forces in both countries feed off each other, joint peoples initiatives like the
Forum have a vital role to play.
Read the Resolutions from the Peshawar Convetion of
the PIPFPD
|