The New Indian Express
First Published : 24 Apr 2011 11:22:00 PM IST
Last Updated : 24 Apr 2011 11:38:52 PM IST
The Prime Minister’s Office has now denied news reports saying that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had held secret talks with Pakistan Army Chief Ashfaq Kayani through an official channel 10 months ago to prepare ground for the cricket diplomacy that opened up between the two countries during the recently concluded cricket World Cup. The denial came a day after a leading British newspaper had published the report on Saturday and other newspapers and TV channels picked it up to spread it the world over. A cryptic statement issued by the PMO simply said, “The report is false”. Whatever the truth, the sequence of events that led to the prime minister inviting his Pakistan counterpart to witness the India-Pakistan cricket match at Mohali and subsequent developments reflect his obsession with Pakistan. Singh’s move had invited flak from within the country because it represented a major shift from his government’s principled stand that there would be no resumption of dialogue till Pakistan took credible action against the plotters of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack. The PMO’s bland denial does not clear the air.
The post-Mohali noises made by the Indian establishment add to the suspicions about Manmohan Singh’s obsessive zeal to mend fences with Pakistan. Playing to the tune set by the prime minister, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna has indicated the government’s in-principle approval for a bilateral cricket series with Pakistan. And India’s security agencies have followed it up by saying that there are no problems about Indian cricketers visiting Pakistan. This at a time when no other cricketing nation is prepared to do so.
It seems that the government of India has not learnt any lesson from the past. Our previous trysts with cricket diplomacy have led to disappointments. Pakistani leaders were invited to India to watch their side play the game with India — Zia-ul-Haq in 1987 and Pervez Musharraf in 2005 — but nothing came out of these bat-and-ball summits. While initiatives to improve relations between the two nations in sports and culture should be welcomed, this cannot deflect attention from the hard fact that rogue elements triggering terror attacks against India are deeply entrenched within Pakistan’s ruling establishment.
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