As a South Asia columnist for the Wall Street Journal, Sadanand Dhume follows Pakistan “fairly closely from afar”. On his recent trip to Lahore (his last one was ten years ago), he attended the ThinkFest - Afkar-i-Taza 2020 and engaged with the audience on a range of issues – Kashmir, Citizenship Amendment Act and the Modi government.

Dhume writes about South Asian political economy, foreign policy, business, and society, with a focus on India and Pakistan. He has worked as a foreign correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review in India and Indonesia and was a Bernard Schwartz Fellow at the Asia Society in Washington, D.C. His political travelogue about the rise of radical Islam in Indonesia, My Friend the Fanatic: Travels with a Radical Islamist, has been published in four countries.

During the two-day ThinkFest, he says, “It was heartening to see large numbers of young people turn up…” Yet, not everything struck him as positive in Pakistan. Read on…

The News on Sunday (TNS): You’re not a keen taker of the participation of Muslim activists appealing explicitly to faith in the ongoing protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). You recently tweeted, “India’s protest movement has a problem: Muslim identity entrepreneurs [Muslim activists] want to give it a religious tinge to boost their own narrow prospects. They may succeed in this, but only at the cost of destroying the movement itself.” Would you identify the problem areas in this form of anti-government protest?

Sadanand Dhume (SD): I’m glad that you asked this question because that tweet has generated a fair bit of debate in India. Let me start by clarifying a couple of things: First, I have nothing against the shahada or any other profession of faith. I’m not religious myself, but I recognise the emotional appeal of the words and do not grudge anyone their right to feel inspired by them. Second, I do not believe that the anti-CAA protests in India have been dominated by religious slogans. On the contrary, for the most part the protestors have been careful to wrap themselves in the symbols of Indian nationalism, such as the flag, the constitution and the national anthem.

So, the purpose of my tweet was not to characterise an essentially secular protest movement — one in which Indian Muslims have played a large part — as religiously motivated. It was to warn against the prospect of its becoming religiously motivated, or being seen as religiously motivated. This would harm the movement by allowing its opponents to frame objections to the citizenship law as a narrowly Muslim concern rather than a broadly national concern, and by inciting — including by unfair means — fears that the protestors represent Islamic extremism. Moreover, it ought to be pretty obvious that secular symbols and slogans will be palatable to a wider cross-section of Indians, including many non-Muslims appalled by the citizenship law, than explicitly religious appeals rooted in the Islamic faith.

TNS: What’ll be the political future of this movement, especially since the mainstream political parties have largely stayed away from it?

SD: At this point it’s too early to say. The protests have undoubtedly struck a chord among many students, secular liberals, leftists and Muslims. But we still don’t know how this will play out in electoral politics. India is a vast place and the answer to this question may unfold differently from state to state.

TNS: The crackdown in Kashmir and CAA have somewhat tarnished the image of India internationally. It’s now being viewed as a violator of human rights. Will Modi be able to successfully deflect this pressure and lead India to promised ‘greatness’?

In India, the Modi government benefits politically from keeping relations with Pakistan on the boil. In Pakistan, Imran Khan has irresponsibly personalised attacks on Modi in such a way that it’s hard to see a path back to civility, let alone to cordiality.

SD: There’s no question that India’s international image as a pluralistic democracy has taken a severe beating over the past six months. How this plays out in the long term will depend on whether the Modi government is able to course-correct away from anti-minority rhetoric and policies, and also on its success in turning around the economy, which is experiencing its sharpest slowdown in six years. The muscular India that has been promised to voters cannot become a reality with a stuttering economy.

TNS: You have been critical of Imran Khan’s support for demonstrators rallying against CAA. “Their [majority of the protestors] aim is to protect Indian secularism, and Mr. Khan’s support is no help,” you write in your Wall Street Journal column of Jan 9, 2020, titled Pakistan’s Premier Is No Good for India’s Secularists. Does Imran Khan and the country he governs occupy enough space in the national narrative of India to influence the Muslim cause? Please elaborate.

SD: There was a time when Imran Khan would have made the ideal ambassador for India-Pakistan rapprochement. In the 1980s and 1990s he may have had as many fans across the border as he had in Pakistan. But times have changed, as has Khan’s public persona. The issue is not whether Pakistan occupies enough space in India, but what kind of space it commands. Bluntly put, Imran Khan’s support for India’s protestors effectively paints a target on their back. Their opponents will use it to portray them as fifth columnists backed by an “enemy” nation. Since he cannot play a positive role, he should at least desist from playing a negative one.

TNS: How do you see the future relations between Pakistan — led by Imran Khan who is perceived by many as a military puppet soft on Islamists — and India — led by Narendra Modi who represents the Hindutva ideology? Is it likely that tensions between the two countries will ease some time soon? What will it entail for economic and political relations in South Asia?

SD: It’s hard to be optimistic in the short-to-medium term. There are those who argue that only Imran Khan and Narendra Modi can engineer a breakthrough in India-Pakistan ties because each enjoys the trust of the most hardline elements in their respective countries — the military in Pakistan and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and other Hindu nationalist groups in India. I’m skeptical of this view. In India, the Modi government benefits politically from keeping relations with Pakistan on the boil. In Pakistan, Imran Khan has irresponsibly personalised attacks on Modi in such a way that it’s hard to see a path back to civility, let alone to cordiality. This means that, at least for the foreseeable future, any economic and cultural integration in South Asia will have to take place without the India-Pakistan piece of the puzzle falling into place.

TNS: You were in Lahore last week to attend the ThinkFest - Afkar-i-Taza 2020, where you attended some thought-provoking sessions. What impressions are you carrying back with you? Would you draw parallels between the media, people and life in general in the two countries?

SD: It’s a bit of a cliché for an Indian to say this, but it’s also true: I was enchanted by the wit, warmth and graciousness of the Pakistani people. It was heartening to see large numbers of young people turn up for the ThinkFest, and to see their curiosity about a range of subjects — from geopolitics to genetics. For me, who follows Pakistan fairly closely from afar, getting to meet in person with some of my favourite journalists, columnists and authors was a special treat.

That said, not everything struck me as positive. Compared to my last visit ten years ago, the space for free expression in Pakistan appears to have shrunk dramatically. I knew this in theory before landing in Lahore, but was still taken aback to see it in practice. It’s kind of depressing when even prominent journalists — people who command a following outside Pakistan’s borders —feel that they must pull their punches when discussing certain issues and institutions. The media in India too faces challenges. But on the whole there’s more room to criticise the most powerful people there than there appears to be here in Pakistan.

The writer is a staff member