“The dove doesn’t know it stand for peace It behaves as all birds do
Flame is energy set loose When carbon becomes CO2”
From Idle Thoughts in an Idle Season by Bachchoo

The rains have been merciless. The Indus is in spate spreading disease and displacing 14 million people. The land through which the Ganges flows, insulated from the floo

d this time round, has made no move to offer assistance to Pakistan in its hour of dire need. Why not? What can Soniaji be thinking of? And Rahul? And Manmohan Singhji? And is P. Chidambaram missing the greatest opportunity that events have ever presented for a quantum leap in the image of India?
There was once a song composed, I think by Shankar Jaikishen, which provided India with an image of itself. It went: “Jahan hoton pey sachchai rehti hein, Jahan dil mein safaai rehti hai, Hum us desh ke vasi hain… Jis desh main Ganga behti hai...” The second verse said, “Mehmaan jo hamaara hotha hai, wo jaan se pyara hotha hai...” etc.
By and large a significant section of our film industry has persevered in perpetrating this self-image of the nation, however false. Somewhere in the sub-conscious of a deeply corrupt, deeply competitive, deeply duplicitous, deeply uncaring nation is the idea that we are people with perpetual truth on our tongues and sun-bleached cleanliness in our hearts because we are the citizens of the land through which the Ganges flows. Fair enough, we wish it were true. Nations deceive themselves.
The British still think of themselves as the guardians of fair play and the French believe that they are philosophical and romantic (the experience of anyone who has had a French girl or boyfriend notwithstanding).
There is also the very pervasive, very successful Gandhian image of India (or “branding” as our uncaring and venal capitalist classes would say) as the non-violent nation that turns the other cheek. Two-faced nations have, on last count, three extra cheeks to turn. And if you are a Ravan of a nation with several heads, the opportunity to turn cheeks becomes endless. But now with monuments to the God of Greed everywhere, the Gandhian image wears thin, so when one asks the leaders of our country, elected and dynastic, to consider giving aid to Pakistan in this dreadful hour, one is not asking it through a Gandhian-Christian impulse.
If our politicians want to play politics, this one simple gesture of offering Pakistan immediate aid — by way of battalions of men to assist with movement, evacuation, rebuilding, engineering emergency measures, ensuring water supply; helicopters and transport to do the obvious; medicines; a volunteer corps of civilian and military corps of commandeered doctors; food, tents, blankets, fuel and a hundred other things — would be politics of the highest even Machiavellian sort.
Would it cost India great pain to give away some grain which by report is rotting in godowns to keep prices high? Would it cost the military to be deployed in providing the manpower that Pakistan desperately needs?
The reports in the UK say that the Taliban have moved in in force into the flooded regions and are assisting the people in their time of trouble. “Hearts and minds” we keep hearing from every battle front and in the absence of the Pakistani state which, to be fair, is faced with a bigger disaster than the Indian ocean tsunami and will inevitably find it difficult to cope, the hearts will be won by the Talibs and minds will be changed in ways detrimental to the future of this already tottering, unstable neighbour.
The Pakistani Army, the muscle and bone in the glove of its “democracy”, may refuse any such aid from India. They’ll take pure currency, which one can only hope won’t be swallowed by corruption, and perhaps accept medicines. They may attach conditions for their own propagandist reasons to even these. It is highly unlikely that they will see sense and work out a scheme whereby Indian transport, including helicopters and planes, can join the relief effort. It is even more unlikely that they will allow Indian troops, unarmed and subject to the sort of body searches one has at airports, to help the millions of flood victims who need a rapidly deployed disciplined force to ensure some degree of survival. It may be that the jealousies of politics prevail above the saving of lives.
That should not deter the Indian government from making the offer. Again, hearts and minds! Not of the nations of the world who may or may not take note, but of the Pakistani sufferers themselves who will appreciate assistance if it is freely and generously offered.
It would be an unusual role for a neighbour’s Army to play but they are certainly up to it. The role of an Army, it will be argued by opponents of such a policy, is to defend the sovereignty of a country. It is also constitutionally possible for the Army to be deployed as an aid to civil power and in times of emergency such as the genocidal Partition of India in 1947, the then British Indian Army was used in this way.
The Indian Army has been restricted by the ambitions and conduct of the Indian Constitution to just such roles.
The Pakistani Army on the other hand has for a majority of the years since Independence taken power in the country, suspended democracy and ruled by fiat. It may be argued that each of the four times they have seized power, they did so to replace corruption, chaos, the possible implosion of the country and to bring order. On the other, it could be argued that Pakistan was not so much a failing state on the occasions of these military coups, but one whose raison d’etre is incapable of generating stable democratic or progressive government. Stagnation, corruption and Army rule are built into the model.
For the Indian Army, to cross borders and aid a “foreign” civil power or even an Army whose one reason for existing is to fight Indians, may be constitutionally difficult. It would however be morally right and the Indian government could certainly find a way around the difficulty by putting the Army in blue UN uniforms or something. The will, on present evidence, is certainly lacking.
And our noble Opposition? No voices raised there? Will no one speak up on behalf of a policy that will radically alter sub-continental politics in India’s favour? One can’t call on the rabid Opposition voices, but surely there are sensible ones capable of appreciating this watershed in the communication between our nations? Jaswantji? Arun? Our Communist leaders? Koi hai?