Krishna arrives in Pakistan, set to sign visa pact today

Eight categories on the cards air links, land routes might be revived

“Inshallah”. This was Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s response to a question on whether a new and more open visa regime would be signed during External Affairs Minister S M Krishna’s three-day visit.

She said she was hopeful Krishna would achieve in Islamabad what she couldn’t in Delhi last year. Eventually, however, it won’t be Khar, but Rehman Malik, special advisor to the prime minister on internal security, who would sign the agreement with Krishna here tomorrow.

In fact, the Islamabad visit could turn into a touchstone for the improving relationship between India and Pakistan, which could, may be credited to the growing role of trade and economic interaction.

This afternoon, in talks with Pakistan’s political leadership, Krishna said India was considering reviving air links. It also planned to resume the land routes discontinued after the Mumbai attacks in 2008, including direct flights between Delhi and Islamabad. On Friday, Krishna’s special Air India flight took just 70 minutes to reach Islamabad from New Delhi.

Pakistani sources said they would again push for the revival of consulates in Mumbai and Karachi. The matter has been hanging fire for several years, lost in the bureaucratic maze and political apathy of both officialdoms.

Pakistani newspapers reported eight categories of visas would be signed between Krishna and Malik tomorrow, including one on more relaxed travel for journalists.

Business Standard had already reported two categories of business visas, one that requiring police reporting and one that doesn’t, as well as a group tourism category and a visa on arrival category for elderly citizens at the Wagah border would be part of the agreement.

It is apparent both governments are banking on the rising interaction between people, as well as growing prosperity (the outcome of greater trade and economic links), to neutralise the overwhelming influence of their intelligence agencies.

In Pakistan’s case, where the army wields immense power over the elected government, a combination of factors, including a depressed economy, engagement in the war on its western border with Afghanistan and rising ethnic conflict, are believed to have persuaded army headquarters that relaxing the tough regime that has governed ordinary lives would not be detrimental to its position.

For India, the role of trade and economic interaction in consolidating political links cannot be overestimated, and must be given its due. Indian journalists have tended to focus almost exclusively on Pakistan’s progress in bringing to book the perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which did not happen, without realising the Pakistani establishment has been forced to relent on the growing role of trade.

Pakistani journalists tend to talk only about the Samjhauta train terror attacks in 2008. The mutual, perfectly coordinated acrimony, almost clouds movement in other spheres.

In fact, the Pakistani establishment is in serious talks with the World Bank to help it build a grid connector between Amritsar and Lahore, so that private and public parties in Pakistan can buy up to 500 Mw of electricity from India. In Pakistan, the talks are said to be in fairly advanced stages, even as India’s Power Grid Corporation has already committed funding. The whole exercise is expected to cost $600 million, primarily because the converter requires circuit walls which would keep both grids isolated from each other. This means the AC-DC current from both countries would not be synchronous, but isolated. This would ensure power failure in one country is not passed on to the other.

On petroleum products, two rounds of talks have already been held, with the result that private parties in Pakistan would soon be allowed to place orders from India. Hindustan Petroleum’s joint venture with ArcelorMittal in Bathinda means a possible pipeline to the border would result in huge savings for Pakistan, and profits for the joint venture.

Banks from both sides have been coordinating since before the Mumbai attacks. This June, the Reserve Bank of India told the State Bank of Pakistan applications to open branches would be cleared quickly. As for outward investment, Commerce Minister Anand Sharma has clarified to a group of Pakistani parliamentarians visiting New Delhi that India has decided to allow this.

India is keen that Pakistan responds to these initiatives by dropping restrictions to trade on the land route at Wagah-Attari (137 tariff lines only so far), and brings it on par with trade by the sea route. India now hopes Pakistan would move towards abolishing its negative list by the end of the year, giving India the status of most favoured nation and setting the stage for another reduction in the sensitive lists on both sides.

As for the ‘Inshallah’ factor, it can never be underestimated in India-Pakistan relations, even when the glamorous Khar or her stately colleague, Rehman Malik, is not involved.