After being in the works for some time, India and Pakistan have signed the liberalized visa regime. And considering the invariably unproductive nature of the dialogue between the two so far, this is a major breakthrough. In fact, this has been the only significant achievement of the ongoing phase of engagement. The pact will go a long way to ease the travel between the two countries. The new visa regime is not only geared to boost the economic cooperation between the neighbours but also facilitate the people-to-people contact.  The pact basically builds on a series of steps the two countries have taken to promote trade over the past two years. Pakistan has already announced its decision to grant Most Favoured Nation status to India. And India has unilaterally cleared the decks for the Pakistani businesses to invest in the country. There has been a distinct partiality towards normalization of the trade relations in the ongoing dialogue and as the new visa pact would have us believe the two countries have covered a lot of ground. The effort has been to get on with the trade and commerce while sticking to their positions on the political issues. The thinking is that the economic cooperation would pave the way for good neighbourly relations and in time create a positive atmosphere for the settlement of political disputes. According to Pakistan foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar, this is the new approach to bilateral relations with India, “the mantra of future”. True, the enhanced trade and the people to people contact has the potential to profoundly alter India, Pakistan relations and make it increasingly difficult for the two countries to return to their old acrimonious ways.  But a relationship built alone on economy while leaving the historical disputes festering is unlikely to hold in the long-term. Only guarantee of a durable peace in the region is for the two countries to not only do business but also work towards settling the issues that are fundamentally responsible for poisoning their relationship after partition. One can only hope that the future rounds of dialogue take care of the urgent need to move forward on the long-running political feuds.

Lastupdate on : Sun, 9 Sep 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Sun, 9 Sep 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Mon, 10 Sep 2012 00:00:00 IST