Good news for South Asia
It is not without reason that a considerable degree of
South Asia's progress, in particularly the socio-economic and
security spheres, has been habitually seen as hinging on the
normalization of Indo-Pakistani ties. These are the pivotal
states of this region and the most powerful from several points
of view and to cap it all, they are now nuclear armed.
Unfortunately, their relations have been more strained rather
than cordial in the decades past, and South Asia has not been in
a position to savour the full range of dividends that could flow
to it as a result of a full normalization of Indo-Pakistani
ties.
We now learn, however, that Pakistan has granted India Most
Favoured Nation trade status and this news is bound to be warmly
welcomed by progressive opinion in this region as marking a
drastic improvement in Indo-Pakistani ties. We too add our
voices to this welcoming chorus and wish these our illustrious
neighbours all the very best in their future relations.
It is bound to be the wish of all right-thinking persons and
groups in South Asia that from now on India and Pakistan would
forge ahead towards forming the most cordial of ties. Part of
the foundation has been laid for this through the Most Favoured
Nation trade status provision and it is now most noticeable in
any part of the world that economics are driving politics.
Accordingly, improved trade relations between India and Pakistan
could be expected to go some distance in bettering the
countries' bilateral ties in numerous areas and our hope is that
relations between the countries would be on a steady mend from
now on.
Besides the countries concerned reaping huge benefits from
improved ties, the South Asian region as a whole could enjoy
improved material and economic prospects, on account of the fact
that less strains in Indo-Pakistani relations would enable the
region to get on with the task of ushering constructive
collaborative ties in a number of spheres. That is, the SAARC
enterprise would see better times.
We do not intend to imply by all this that all these years
have been absolutely lean ones from the viewpoint of
constructive Indo-Pakistani ties. This is certainly not the
case. India and Pakistan, perhaps unknown to some sections of
world opinion, conduct mutually beneficial ties in a number of
areas, including people-to-people ties, and it is not our
intention to project the relations between these major South
Asia states as having been continually dismal down the decades.
But some important issue areas have been having the effect of
straining the bilateral relations between the countries and one
would be naive in the extreme to downplay these aspects of the
relationship.
However, the time could not be riper to mend fences and to
place the relationship on an entirely new footing. For instance,
the growth centres of the globe have now shifted from Europe to
East Asia and India is featuring as one of the foremost among
economically up and coming countries, along with Brazil, Russia
and China. The opportunities are plentiful in East Asia in
particular, for mutually-beneficial economic ties among
countries of the Eastern hemisphere, and our hope is that not
only India and Pakistan but other countries too in the Asian
region would grab these emerging opportunities to forge ahead
towards economic prosperity.
In the years ahead, economics could, indeed, be expected to
be in the driving seat of International Relations. India has
already come to grips with this issue. On numerous occasions it
has expressed the view that it wants its neighbours to be
stakeholders in its economic buoyancy. Thus, an entirely new
regional economic environment is in the process of emerging and
all countries of this region should see it as being in their
interests to facilitate the arrival of this environment of
economic cooperation and collaboration.
Therefore, the prospects of SAARC thriving are brighter than
ever before. If the regional heavyweights, India and Pakistan,
increasingly opt for pragmatism in the conduct of their ties,
SAARC would finally be free of the constraints of the past and
zoom into a future of collective prosperity and togetherness. |