I am a patriot, but I am forced to ask this ‘burning question’: Will banning Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, which stars Pakistani actor Fawad Khan, restore peace between India and Pakistan? Will it shame the terrorists who attacked our soldiers in Uri? When Mayo College called off the games and cultural exchange programme and sent back 38 school children from Aitchison College, Lahore, did it have any effect on the gunmen waiting to crawl across the border? I will answer my own question by stating that these actions are quite pointless.
The truth is Pakistani artistes and musicians are soft targets, distractions if you will. In this climate, it is so disheartening to see certain politicians supporting misplaced acts of ‘patriotism’. For a second, let’s put aside the WhatsApp messages to ban Chinese crackers this Diwali or to ban Pakistani actors. Let’s concentrate on the real issues at hand.
Do we really want to go to war with Pakistan? Our current political stance indicates that certain fingers are definitely moving towards the trigger. In today’s economic state, can we afford a war? What about collateral damage? It’s easy to sit in drawing rooms and shout for war.
In the summer of 2016, India and Pakistan made over $26 billion in trade. A war would not just affect our trade relations and the livelihood of thousands on this side of the border, but also push the country into an economic downslide.
It is one thing to be outraged with the Uri attacks and quite another to provoke a rogue elephant into reacting to such pokes. The only way forward of this logjam is to engage in dialogue. To echo Pakistan’s High Commissioner to India Abdul Basit’s words, “Yes, Jammu & Kashmir is a core issue. But the only way to resolve it is by achieving trust and moving forward towards the goal of regional progress through SAARC.”
If we love our soldiers as so many are suddenly professing to do, would we send them to their deaths? We have to love the soldier not when he is draped in the Tricolour, but when he is alive. That is when we have to show our solidarity towards them. Listening to Pakistan over the Kashmir issue is out of question—can we ever cede a part of our country to them? War is a terrible thing to happen to any nation.
Then what is the option? The moderate way, wherein dialogue and public opinion is formed and influenced by the powers that be and in the correct way. Moderation means dialogue, cultural exchange, trade and humanity. It means allowing students to visit our schools and universities and go back agog at what a great democracy can accomplish. It means the people of Pakistan relying more and more on the spending prowess of the Indians to run their homes, and realising how the monetary power came to us—not by propagating terrorism and dictatorship, but by being what we are. A land of diversity and unity, both in the same breath. By being a gigantic democracy where the voice of the people matters. A burgeoning economy built on the foundations laid by our forefathers. And all in the same time as Pakistan had. Show them how else it can be done. And show them well.
God forbid the country goes to war, then pull out all stops to support the armed forces. Don’t buy, watch, talk anything even remotely Pakistani. But, till then, be big and be great. And don’t let anyone cloud our vision.archanadalmia@gmail.com archana dalmia Chairperson of Grievance Cell, All India Congress Committee