WHERE IS THE "TASHKENT SPIRIT"? ©
[The following article has been taken from the May issue of Marxist Outlook, the monthly magazine of the Socialist Workers party of India. A one-year subscription to Marxist Outlook can be obtained Worli, Bombay 18, India. ]
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All talk of a "Tashkent Spirit". between India and Pakistan appears to have suddenly ended and a "new" atmosphere in favour of . military confrontation between the two countries is sought-to be —
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created in the entire subcontinent. No longer do the statesmen in New Delhi and Rawalpindi refer to the provision about renunciation of the use of force: and settlement of mutual disputes through nego~ tiations. The. bourgeois press both in India and. Pakistan is full of reports about border violations, etc., by either side. i
What has happened during the. last few months to bring about © such strained relations between the two countries? Perhaps the state. ©. visit of the Chinese President Liu Shao-chi to Pakistan. has. caused. ‘~ some alarm to the Indian ruling class about a possible Peking-—Pindi détente against New Delhi. The Chinese bureaucracy is playing an: opportunist game of wooing the Pakistani bourgeoisie against. the Indian bourgedOisie without the least consideration of the repercussions of its: move on the international working-class movement. °
Perhaps the Soviet bureaucracy: is trying unsuccessfully +0. woo the Indian and Pakistani rulers simultaneously.
But a possible Sino-Pak détente is not the only cause for the present belligerent utterances from New Delhi. For it is more than obvious: that Presidenit. Ayub Khan is. utilising his "friendship" with Peking to bargain’ for more ‘aid from U.S.- imperialists. The Indian bourgeoisie, ‘as much'as the ruling class in -Pakistan, would like to. keep the relations between the two coufitries strained as far as possible as a ‘safety valve to. channel out internal discontent into >. a jingoistic war'of attrition between the two countries im an emergency. If there are growing mass movements against the Congress government in India, President Ayub Khan is not having a cosy time with his people at the present moment. 7 ae
Kashmir “is indeed the real source ‘off trouble between India and Pakistan but the capitalist governments of both «the countries do not want to find a rational political solution of the problem, a problem of their own creation and which has been inherited from the communal partition oF the subcontinent. : i
Both governments are playing | an ostrich- like > game of not: facing realities. New Delhi has, for example, refused to release the Kashmiri leaders like Sheikh Abdullah, Mirza Afzal Beg and Maulana Masoodi. We endorse the demand made by the Sarvodya leader, Jaya Prakash Naragaan (while we reject his supraclass humanism in favour of internationalist humanism of the proletariat) for the release of Sheikh Abdullah and his colleagues.
- We algo believe ‘that: ‘India. should. take - the initiative: ‘to find . a mutually’ acceptable “solution of the disputes. between the: two coun+ tries; but the bourgéois rulers of either country cannot.be relied : upon to preserve peace in the subcontinent. The people of the two countries, therefore, must be vigilant to ensure that the tragic events of September 1965 are not repeated once again.
Further, an effective solution of the Kashmir problem and the Indo-Pak disputes cannot 'bé° found unless the Indian government also_ takes the initiative to bring about a settlement of its border dis-
pute with China. Here again the Congress government cannot be "cajgoled" into talking peace with China; it has to be compelled to do so by a powerful and ‘vigilant mass movement in the country.
A LETTER FROM