Certain advantages from the national security point of view, which the Rajiv Gandhi
Government had secured for India in the Siachen sector, have been allowed to be
neutralised, partly if not fully, by the ISI-supported intrusion of around 300 to 400
mercenaries into Indian territory in the Kargil sector and the ISI's apparent creation of
a special sanctuary for the mercenaries on the ridges from which they could, by their
potential ability to disrupt traffic on the Srinagar-Leh road, keep large numbers of
Indian troops bottled up in this area to protect the road.
That seems to be the ominous significance of the developments in
Kargil since the beginning of this month. The Government's embarrassed silence on this
subject has been projected as calculated silence to avoid raising the temperature and
falling into any Pakistani trap to create an international alarm over a possible new
conflict between India and Pakistan on the Kashmir issue.
That is a very valid reason. At the same time, the silence is
also possibly motivated by concerns over the electoral consequences of the Kargil
developments.
The BJP had always been projecting itself as having a better
understanding of national security issues than any other party and the Government led by
it had been bragging about its success in restoring normalcy in Kashmir, despite the fact
that the credit for effectively dealing with Pakistan's proxy war in Kashmir should go to
the Narasimha Rao Government. It had also been boasting about its initiative in giving a
new direction to Indo-Pakistan relations.
If the intrusion in the Kargil sector is not effectively
eliminated in the coming weeks, it could seriously hurt the credibility of the Government
and the BJP. Consequent popular perceptions that the Government, in its naivete, had let
itself be taken for a ride by the Nawaz Sharif Government, and had, despite all its
bombasts, failed to protect our territorial integrity, could turn the tide of electoral
opinion against the party.
Analysts in New Delhi, official as well as non-official, have
given various reasons, all plausible, for the Pakistani action in helping the mercenaries
intrude into Indian territory and entrench themselves on the ridges:
- To revive the insurgency in Kashmir.
- To force the Indian army to divert troops from the Valley to
protect the road to Leh.
- To divert attention from the Valley to help the infiltration of
fresh mercenaries into the Valley.
- To bring the issue back on the international agenda by creating
fears of a fresh Kosovo.
There is another plausible reason, which needs careful
examination, though, at present, there is no concrete evidence in support of this. The ISI
has possibly helped Osama bin Laden and his Arab and Afghan supporters escape action
against them by the US by creating a sanctuary for them in Indian territory, by taking
advantage of the absence of the Indian army from this territory during winter.
Faced with the threat of fresh bombings by the US on their
sanctuaries in Afghanistan, bin Laden and his followers had disappeared from the Kandahar
area of Afghanistan in February. Since then, there had been speculation regarding their
present whereabouts.
While the US had been insisting that they were still hiding in
Afghan territory, unofficial reports had been speculating that they had either escaped to
Iraq or Chechnya or were hiding in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of
Pakistan.
The Nawaz Sharif Government had been under tremendous pressure
from the US to help it in having bin Laden captured and taken to the US for interrogation
and prosecution. The Government was reluctant to co-operate with the US lest there be
adverse impact on its relations with the Taliban leadership and on the Pashtoons for whom
bin Laden is a hero figure.
It is likely that the ISI found a convenient way out of this
dilemma by helping bin Laden and his followers escape from FATA to the Kargil area through
the Northern Areas (Gilgit and Baltistan) and set up a fresh sanctuary in Indian
territory, with the logistic and firepower backing of the Pakistani army.
Plausibly, it was the calculation of the ISI that this action
would provide a double advantage to Pakistan---escape pressure from the US for action
against bin Laden and add to the difficulties of the Indian army in dealing with the
insurgency in Kashmir.
In an interview last year, bin Laden had said that while he was
keen to go to Kashmir and join in the "jihad" against the Indian authorities,
the Pakistani authorities would not permit him to do so. It is likely that the Pakistani
authorities have now decided to help him take sanctuary in Indian territory and use his
mercenaries against the Indian army.
B.RAMAN
(25-5-99)
(The writer is Additional Secretary (Retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India,
and presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail address :
corde@vsnl .com )
