India’s external affairs minister, Sushma Swaraj, can mix diplomacy with hard talk. She said that while India produced IT power, engineers and doctors, Pakistan churned out jihadis. She told the UN General Assembly that if Pakistan stamped out terrorists in its territory, the whole world should welcome it. She wondered how Islamabad could have the cheek to preach human values in India, referring to Pakistani Prime Minister, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s charge of atrocities in Jammu and Kashmir. Islamabad has been botching up all Indian initiatives to normalise and improve bilateral ties. She had obviously done a U-turn on a guftagu with former Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif. She did not pull her punches either about slamming the international community for being blind to terrorism as a global threat. That cannot be an internal law and order problem, she said. Sushma Swaraj, who had recently thawed the ice between India and China on Doklam urged it to drop its opposition to Pakistan-based Jaish-a-Muhammed chief Masood Azhar being designated as a global terrorist. At the same time, she held a brief for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s economic initiatives like Jan Dhan and demonetisation which were aimed at fighting poverty.
Swaraj also had a bilateral meeting with US Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson. She raised the issue of terrorism and H-IB visas. Discussions were held in order to strengthen the US-India political and economic partnership. She is evidently trying to derive maximum mileage out of President Donald Trump’s glare on terrorism in Pakistan and the Taliban. It’s been a long time since India talked tough at the global high table and it is perhaps time for the world to take note of India’s disadvantaged position vis-a-vis Pakistan which continues to fight subversive battles on Indian soil and literally bleed it with a thousand cuts.
