False Claims by Indian High Commissioner

On January 8th The Times of India published a write-up based on the memoirs of Ajay Bisaria who was Indian ambassador to Pakistan at the time of Pulwama incident and the military confrontation be­tween India and Pakistan that nearly brought the two nu­clear states to the brink of a full-fledged war. Bisaria while describing the details of devel­opments in regards to the cap­ture of the Indian fighter pilot Abhi­nandon by Pakistan and his release in his upcoming book titled ‘Anger Man­agement: The Troubled Diplomatic Re­lations between India and Pakistan’ has made some absurd claims which belie not only logic but also the ground reali­ties that prevailed at that time.

He claims that Pakistan released the pilot after two days not on its own as a peace overture but his release was a result of coercive diplomacy by India. It was secured under a threat of esca­lating the war if any harm came to the captured pilot. India had deployed nine missiles aimed at Pakistan. According to him it was conveyed to the Pakistan government through ambassadors of UK and USA in India and Pakistan who impressed upon it how serious India was about the escalation. He maintains that Pakistan not only agreed to release Abhinandan but also promised action on Pulwama dossier prepared by In­dia and terrorism. According to him the envoys of US and UK said that Pakistan seemed genuinely spooked by the pros­pect of escalation.

Before dilating on authenticity of the claims or otherwise made by Bisaria I feel it would be pertinent to ascertain the reality of Pulwama incident conse­quent upon which India and Pakistan confronted each other.

It is pertinent to point out that even before the Pulwama attack Pakistan feared some sinister move by the Modi government in view of the ensuing Indi­an elections and had sounded a number of world capitals about it. Pakistan was vindicated when it happened. Pakistan’s claim gained strength from the state­ment of the chief of Indian extremist political party Maharashra Navnirman Sena Raj Thackery who called the Indian soldiers killed in the attack as ‘political victims’ maintaining that truth would be revealed if the country’s National Secu­rity Adviser Ajit Doval was probed. On top of that 21 political parties of India including Congress also held Modi re­sponsible for the situation alleging that he was using the Pulwama tragedy for political gains. It went beyond doubt to prove that Pulwama was stage-managed to reap political advantage.

The revelations that the alleged sui­cide bomber was in the custody of the Indian security forces since 2017 and the reports by the Indian media that Ghazi Abdul Rasheed was the master­mind behind the suicide attack, reduced Indian claims to a farce. Ghazi Abdul Ra­sheed was killed in an operation against the militants at the Lal Masjid Islam­abad nearly ten years ago. It was typi­cal of what India had been doing in the wake of similar incidents in the past. It even raised the hoax of surgical strike in the backdrop of the Uri incident.

Nevertheless Pakistan condemned the attack, rejected the insinuations re­garding her involvement and offered to cooperate in the investigation if India provided any credible evidence in sup­port of her claims but there was no let up in the tirade against her.

Since Modi government had created anti-Pakistan hysteria in the backdrop of Pulwama incident it sent planes to attack an imaginary terrorist training camp at Balakot to assuage the public sentiment. Modi government claimed that the first hit at Balakot had de­stroyed a training camp of Jaish-e-Mo­hammand and killed 350 terrorist. The India media also went berserk in toeing the lead given by the government and even used old videos to corroborate the Indian claims. But those claims were given a lie by the Pakistani as well as in­ternational media and the satellite im­ages of the place of incident where no traces of any camp were found and no casualty occurred except felling of some trees and the death of an unfortunate crow. Reuter, AP, BBC, New York Times and Washington Post also expressed doubts about Indian claims.

As is evident the entire Indian sto­ry was fictitious. India committed a blunder by sending its planes across the border not realizing that Pakistan would not take it lying down. While Indian planes came in the dark of the night, Pakistan retaliated in the broad-day light and in the ensuing dog-fight between the two air forces, Pakistan downed two Indian planes and also captured wing commander Abhinan­dan who ejected after his plane was hit. Pakistan sent a loud and clear mes­sage that it was capable to defend itself against any aggression and could give a matching response in any eventual­ity. Pakistan clearly had upper hand in the confrontation. The Indian mili­tary leadership was in a state of paral­ysis. In spite of having three times big­ger Army than Pakistan and terming the 27th events as declaration of war it never dared to attack Pakistan. The su­premacy of Pakistan was acknowledge by Modi who later told any audience that had India acquired French Rafa­el planes in time the situation would have been different.

Logic belies Bisaria’s claim that Pak­istan capitulated in face of the threat conveyed by India for escalating the war and released Abhinandan. Why a nuclear power having demonstrated capability to defend itself would suc­cumb to any threat? The fact is that Pak­istan being a responsible nuclear state was aware of the dangers of conflict be­tween the two nuclear states. It justifi­ably made a peace overture to defuse the situation by releasing Abhinandan. The involvement of US, UK and oth­er countries in preventing escalation stemmed from their realization how di­sastrous a clash between the two nucle­ar powers could be for both of them, the region and the world at large. The re­lease of Abhinandan was also a reitera­tion of Pakistan’s abiding commitment to the cause of peace and good relations with all neighbours as well as its obli­gations under international law. Pursu­ant to that Pakistan made several peace overtures to India without matching reciprocity prior to Pulwama.

The claim that Pakistan also agreed to take action on Pulwama dossier and terrorism also could only be the fig­ment of imagination of Bisaria. Paki­stan is against terrorism in all its man­ifestations of terrorism and has been in the forefront in the fight against ter­ror. It has always rejected Indian propa­ganda of Pakistan fomenting terrorism which India probably has been doing as a cover-up for its own state-terror­ism. It has been supporting insurgen­cy in Balochistan and acts of terrorism as revealed by Indian spy Kalbhushan Jhadav. Indian RAW in collaboration with Afghan intelligence agency DNS has been sponsoring terrorist attacks in Pakistan. It is pertinent to mention that Pakistan had handed over a dos­sier on Indian terrorism to the UN and other western powers including USA in the aftermath of these incidents. The murder of a Sikh leader in Canada for which the Canadian prime Minister ac­cused Indian government of its involve­ment and yet another murder plan of a Sikh leader in USA are a ranting testi­mony of Indian state terrorism.

The timing of appearance of this arti­cle is quite ominous as it has been pub­lished before the ensuring elections in India. It reflects typical Indian ploy to manipulate things and nothing else.

Malik Muhammad Ashraf
The writer is a freelance columnist. He can be reached at ashpak10@gmail.com