India-Pakistan Polemics

The prime ministers of India and Pakistan agreed in Thimphu, Bhutan, recently that the two countries should have foreign minister-level talks, the dates of which are to be worked out through diplomatic channels. India is wary of talks with Pakistan for fear of getting into another Sharm al Sheikh-style trap. New Delhi, meanwhile, doesn’t see any utility in carrying on with the so-called composite dialogue process under which the two sides have been holding talks on eight specific issues for well over a decade. Islamabad, on the other hand, wants business as usual.
Pakistan made known its penchant for the composite dialogue process when Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi addressed the National Assembly on May 4. He said Pakistan had returned to its ‘historical’ stand on Kashmir and that the dialogue with India will not be referred to as a ‘composite dialogue’ but will henceforth be a ‘comprehensive dialogue’ as Pakistan had originally wanted it to be called. Though he said one should not worry too much about changes in nomenclature as long as such changes don’t indicate a turnaround in Pakistan’s foreign policy, he hastened to add that the eight points specified in the previous format would continue to be addressed as before. He also once again referred to Kashmir as the core issue that needs to be addressed in such a way that the people of the state are included in the peace process, whatever the mutually agreed format.
To those that don’t follow India-Pakistan relations on a day-to-day basis, this all just means that the two sides are continuing to put their shoes on the wrong foot. India has never agreed to a tripartite format of talks (India, Pakistan and the people of Kashmir). India’s consistent stand—and a government in New Delhi reverses this trend at its own peril—has been that Kashmir is a bilateral dispute and so there’s no scope for a third party’s involvement.