Basit’s diary on ‘hostility’: A counter-narrative to Pakistan’s policies towards India

Abdul Basit is without doubt the most negative and undiplomatic Pakistan High Commissioner to India that I can recall in my Foreign Service career. He acknowledges in the introduction that ‘Hostility’ is not a memoir but an account of Indo-Pakistan relations during his tenure. In fact, ‘Hostility’ is an acknowledgment of his deep-rooted angst against India and his frustration with an alarmed Pakistani establishment that wished to rein him in.

This results in ironically into an indictment of Pakistan’s policies towards India and a vindication of PM Modi’s Pakistan policy. This is clear throughout the book. It begins from Basit’s time as Spokesperson and the inclusion of Baluchistan in the Joint Statement in Sharm el Shaikh in 2009. Basit states that since India never acknowledged that it was interfering in Baluchistan, there was no victory for Pakistan.

In fact since J&K was not mentioned it was a setback for Pakistan. (Pg 44-45). Given the flak faced by then PM and then NSA for accepting reference to Baluchistan, Basit’s position endorses official statements by the then Government on this issue!

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On Page 46, Basit goes further stating: “India was playing deftly. It could show to the world that, despite Bombay, it was still talking to Pakistan behind the scenes and that it was Pakistan that was culpable of procrastination”.

On the same page, Basit regrets that even on the ‘back channel’ “Pakistan could not negotiate anything worthwhile” He concludes that India was “leading Pakistan up the garden path”.

In the earliest phase of his tenure as HC, on the eve of General Elections in India, Basit states on Page 50 that: I could not help but worry about the BJP’s future plans (on Kashmir) under Modi. But Islamabad seemed to be in total denial...”

On the eve of the elections (Pg 55-56) Basit, who was on a press offensive with Indian media on India’s future policy on Kashmir in the event of a BJP victory was, rightly in my view, pulled up by the Pakistan Foreign Secretary. Aizaz Ahmad Choudhary, my counterpart from Pakistan when I was Ambassador to The Netherlands, soft spoken and discreet, told Basit to “scale down his media engagement”.

From then onwards, according to Basit’s own words, it was clear that PM Modi set the policy on Pakistan and that India controlled the narrative. On Page 58, Basit refers to his lunch meeting with the key industrialist, Sajjan Jindal, a close friend of PM Modi. Later, on Pg 60 he admits that he positively recommended PM Nawaz Sharif attending PM Modi’s swearing in.

However, clearly the Pakistani establishment did not trust Basit who would be informed, Pg 61, by Mr. Sajjan Jindal that Pakistan PM had accepted the invitation!

On the first one-to-one with PM Modi, Basit was very critical of Pakistan PM’s soft approach in not responding to our PM raising the issue of terrorism. Basit accused Nawaz Sharif of being “too soft and unnecessarily accommodative”. (Pg 67)

Later, on Pg 70, Basit laments that the Pakistani establishment had an “apologetic mind-set” and accepted PM Modis’s contentions readily and worked quickly “to assuage his concerns”. He again on Pg 81 states “Islamabad had the masochistic ability to be delusional”.

When Basit made the cardinal error of meeting Hurriyat leaders just two days before the Foreign Secretary-level talks in Islamabad, it was once again India drawing a redline for Pakistan on Kashmir. As Basit notes it was no business as usual with Modi at the helm.

On taking over as Foreign Secretary on 30th January 2015, Dr Jaishankar, in his first meeting with Basit, made it clear to him that separatists were not to be accommodated in any progress in the bilateral dialogue to take place. In his first meeting with National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval, Pg 82-83, Basit was given the same message.

By now, it was clear that Pakistan was on the back-foot. On Pg 86, Basit recounts his embarrassment when Sartaz Aziz in an interview to NDTV in New York acknowledged that Basit’s decision to meet Hurriyat leaders just before Foreign Secretary-level talks “was perhaps not totally right”.

Later, Basit notes that the Imran Khan Government was unprepared when the Modi Government abrogated Article 370 and abolished Jammu and Kashmir’s special status on 5th August 2019. Pakistan’s diplomacy failed completely. It could not convene a special session of the Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC) on Kashmir. Nor could it succeed in holding a special session of the UNHRC in Geneva. At the UN Security Council in New York, China was able to obtain ‘informal consultation’ under the agenda item “any other business”. At the UN General Assembly session, only Turkey, Malaysia, and Iran mentioned this issue.

As a seasoned Pakistani diplomat with implacable hostility to India, Basit’s diary on ‘Hostility’ demonstrates to what extent Pakistan has lost the plot in dealing with the Indian Government under PM Modi. At one point he states that even with Jadhav, Pakistan can neither free Jadhav nor hang him. Pg 291. It was an extraordinary admission confirming once again that Pakistan has no coherent policy on India, after PM Modi came to power.

If one is to accept that Basit’s narrative is an accurate depiction of how Pakistan and its establishment including its ‘Deep State’ sees PM Modi’s policy on Kashmir and Pakistan, then continuing ‘tough love’ to Pakistan would appear to be the only option for India at present.

(Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.)

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