ISAS Insights

August 2013 was a bad month for India-Pakistan amity. Sixty-six years ago that month British India was bifurcated into two independent and sovereign countries: India and Pakistan. That partition was accompanied by unspeakable violence. As the writer Sadat Hasan Manto poignantly describes in his remarkable short story, ‘Toba Tek Singh’, also utter and inhuman mindlessness. The feelings that occasion generated were bred of deep-seated distrust. Thereafter, it led to several bloody wars between the two nations. To this day the strength and power of those negative sentiments have not fully abated. However, from time to time silver linings do appear amidst the dark clouds. One such example lay in the immediate aftermath of Nawaz Sharif’s assumption of office as Prime Minister of Pakistan in June this year. But, sadly, like others before it, it was soon to be engulfed in the gathering storm. To the olive branch that Nawaz Sharif then held out, the reaction of his Indian counterpart, Manmohan Singh, was positive. For a brief shining moment, hope appeared to have surfaced, but only to be submerged once again in a sea of mutual recrimination.