For India, it should be yet another reason why any future policy on Pakistan has to be totally ‘Indian’, free of influence or pressures by ‘outside’ powers— the United States of America in particular. India does not have to share the American perception that Pakistan deserves a ‘blank cheque’ to fight the scourge of terror—something that is its own creation.

The release of Hafeez Saeed should remove the illusion in the minds of those in India who keep harping on the need to engage Pakistan in a dialogue. That would have been a sensible policy for India to adopt had Pakistan shown at any level at any time that it is genuinely interested in being a friendly, reasonable and ‘normal’ neighbour. Such neighbours do not adopt terror as a state policy.

Any notions that Pakistan may, just may, be willing to tread a different path with India were quashed within minutes of the release of Hafeez Saeed when it played the old Kashmir song. There is no change whatsoever in the Pakistani policy that India will continue to be seen as ‘enemy’ as long as the Kashmir ‘dispute’ is not resolved to ‘mutual’ satisfaction. That, of course, is a humbug because (a) Pakistan will not consider the ‘dispute’ resolved unless and until India hands over Kashmir to it and (b) the moment Kashmir is ‘resolved’ Pakistan will come up with some other ‘unresolved’ issue—if not issues.

Islamabad has already thrown enough hints that it will rake up the Indus River Water Treaty issue in a big way. It has not been deterred by the snub it has received at international forums for bringing up frivolous charges against India. In keeping with its belief in the two-nation theory even after it was torn to bits in 1971 when Muslim Bangladesh seceded from it, Pakistan can be expected to pump up several other religion-related issues against India, such as the status of Muslims in India, the demographic changes in some of the borders states in eastern India. Pakistan sees them as an ‘opportunity’ to keep its anti-India flames burning eternally.

Pakistan gets and will continue to get away with its irresponsible acts because it has never really been punished for its roguish activities even after tons and tons of proof have been collected. The proliferation record of Pakistan actually should be seen as a slap on the consenting Western, especially American, powers and the Chinese, the 24x7 friend of Pakistan. Despite being the sole super power the US really does not stand up to Pakistan.

So, why should India listen to the Americans when they talk to us about Pakistan? If there was a phase when the US had ‘de-hyphenated’ relations with India from that with Pakistan, it is over. The Obama administration has some well-known India baiters in top jobs.

And don’t make any mistake. Hillary Clinton may have charmed some in India as did her husband but she is not going to do anything in the sub-continent that displeases Pakistan. UPA-2 would do well to erase the widely held belief that Indians can be easily fooled with an ego message. A right time to demonstrate that will be when Hillary Clinton comes to India in July. .

The meddling Americans have only one concern: to see that India does not do anything that ‘distracts’ Pakistan from its current engagement with the ‘bad’ Taliban, the ones who hate the US as much as they and the ‘good’ ones hate India. The US is generous in offering all kinds of gratuitous advice to India on how to improve relations with Pakistan, but is not willing to concede that India cannot restart the so-called dialogue process as long Pakistan uses terror against India as a state policy.

The release of Hafeez Saeed was on the cards right from the beginning because the Pakistani government had no effort to make out any case against him even though the man heads a terrorist organisation that is now said to be more potent that Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda. Why the Pakistani government fails to build up a case against him when many of its own commentators and analysts and those in the United States, currently the biggest alms giver to Pakistan, not to speak of the United Nations, have held unequivocally that Hafeez Saeed has been heading a terrorist organisation that operates out of Pakistan? .

There appears to be no pressure from the US on Pakistan to show some ‘seriousness’ in tackling India-specific terror from its soil. Not that there really was any ‘seriousness’ in the US either to persuade the Pakistanis to at least honour the words given to India on curbing export to terror from its soil.

The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, when she visits the sub-continent, will undoubtedly come with a lot of ‘advice’ for India on how to deal with a problematic and rogue neighbour. So India needs to do some what may be called pre-emptive diplomacy before she arrives. A message loud and clear must go out from New Delhi without any delay that even at the risk of lowering its ties with the US, India would deal with Pakistan the way it deems fit and the busybodies in the US would do well to ask the Pakistanis why they are not willing to give up their aggressive designs on India.

In the few months that it has been in office, the Obama administration has made it amply clear that it looks at the sub-continent from the Pakistani prism -showing concern about its so-called security concerns which are mostly mythical as none of its neighbours poses any threat to its sovereignty.

It is a different matter that at this very moment, Pakistan’s ties with three countries with which it shares borders, India, Afghanistan and Iran, are under strain.

While there is no need to explain the state of Pakistan’s relations with India and Pakistan, the ‘brotherly’ nation of Iran is furious, as Sunni militants from Pakistan have been attacking Shias inside Iran. Just after the latest attacks late in May, Tehran hanged three of these militants and then sealed its borders with Pakistan.

Of course, the charade of signing a gas deal between Iran and Pakistan has been gone through. But that may just be one of the ploys used to get India on board for the sake of attracting the much-needed capital for the multi-billion dollar project. Taking that bait will be foolhardy.

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