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THE Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee has played his diplomatic cards so deftly that Pakistan is now feeling the heat of international diplomatic opinion vis-a-vis its Kashmir policy, to the extent that it has been forced to take `action' against two terrorist outfits _ Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad.

Had Mr Vajpayee not put pressure on the Pakistani dictator, General Pervez Musharraf, after the December 13 attack on Parliament, this action on the part of Islamabad just would not have materialised.

If one takes into account the `big picture' — that is, the US-orchestrated campaign against Osama bin Laden and international terrorism, generally — the precise value of New Delhi's diplomatic blitzkrieg lies in the fact that it has been able to focus attention on Islamabad's nefarious activities in the field of international terrorism, with special focus on Pakistani designs on India.

Indeed, if one were to formalise the entire scenario, one would probably have to describe the December 13 outrage in New Delhi as the sufficient and necessary condition to pinpoint the guilt of the Pakistani military rulers vis-a-vis the abetment of, and direct participation in, international terrorist activities, the September 11 destruction of the World Trade Centre in New York being the most important substantive indication in recent times of the existence of such a nexus via the Osama bin Laden-Taliban link.

It is well-established that Mr Vajpayee is a past-master in the art of playing politics. Perhaps the latest proof of this is New Delhi's success in pushing Islamabad into a tight corner on the Kashmir issue by using the instrument of international diplomacy. Quite rightly, the Prime Minister has shown no restraint whatever in unleashing on Pakistan a lethal diplomatic assault, action which has (for the time being, at least) brought in appropriate results. The question is: How much longer should this assault continue, and what should the objective be considering the fact that total surrender is not a practicable option in today's world?

The basic objective in the current phase of the Indo-Pakistani standoff should be such that while the immediate requirement (that is, a severe clampdown in the Pakistani export of terrorism 0Kashmir) is met without any compromise, nothing should be done to create ripples in the Pakistani psyche that will continue to destabilise India-Pakistan ties in the future.

This effectively rules out a military conflict as an available option _ unless, of course, Islamabad starts one for its own short-term reasons. New Delhi should, therefore, aggressively play down the prospects of such a conflagration which, unfortunately, some politicians (particularly of the BJP) are at the moment consciously fuelling keeping the forthcoming State elections in Uttar Pradesh, Uttaranchal and Punjab in mind.

The refrain is that political parties should sink their differences at this juncture for the cause of `national security', which effectively means that the hands of the NDA Government should be strengthened at the expense of support for other political parties. It is of some concern that even the Prime Minister, being the astute political tactician that he is, appears to be playing this game.

Ranabir Ray Choudhury

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