Dialogue is an all-weather bridge

I am mirroring here a post that has been brewing since May 20205 and that I just posted on another blog.

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Impossible divide, imperative dialogue

This piece originated in online conversations with friends on both sides of the India-Pakistan border in May 2025. It took me months to write it—because it was personal, because it was challenging, because of the demands of everyday life. It is still not everything I would want it to be. Embracing its imperfections, I am posting it today as a reflection and a prayer for peace on International Day of Peace.

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Months after hostilities were paused/ ceased, India and Pakistan remain tiptoed on a cliff’s edge. There is no peace.

There is no peace despite decades of official and non-official, public and back-channel, attempts to talk. Every single time we have got the most well-meaning Indians and Pakistanis into a room, over a few days of discussion, familiar lines appear between us. For Pakistanis, this line reads “Kashmir” and for Indians, it reads “terrorism.”

The Kashmir line

Pakistan’s initial national imagining was based on a vision that included Kashmir and the ideology behind this was the “Two Nation Theory”—an understanding of social relations in the region that saw Hindus and Muslims as two nations rather than religious communities. As each nation seeks statehood so that their peoples might be sovereign and self-governing, so must Hindus and Muslims. The Indian freedom movement—dominated by (upper class, upper caste) Hindus—was seen as essentially seeking a Hindu state, and the corollary was that Muslims—that is, Muslim-majority regions—must have their own. (This was a view shared by the Dravidian movement, incidentally, which has since found a way to live with and within the Indian state.)

For Indians, Muslim-majority Kashmir was made out to exemplify the refutation of the “Two Nation Theory.” If the Muslims of Kashmir were voting regularly and settling in other parts of India, they were said to be voting with their feet to be a part of the secular Indian state—meeting plebiscitary conditions. The flaw with this logic was of course, that successive elections in Kashmir were allegedly rigged and elected governments were overthrown by the central government through constitutional interventions. This is often listed as the cause for the insurgent movements in Kashmir since 1989. Furthermore, the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019 removed any semblance of regional autonomy, forcing the integration of a special status accession into the Indian/Hindu mainstream. 

Many now recognise that there are three points of view that should be represented at any Kashmiri peace table—Indian, Pakistani and most essentially, Kashmiri— but this is still far from a mainstream position. In Pakistan, the assumption is that the Pakistani and Kashmiri positions are the same, and in India, it is that the Kashmiri position must be subsumed within an Indian one. For Pakistan, there is only one negotiation on Kashmir, and that is a bilateral, inter-state negotiation. For India, there is only one negotiation and that is an internal negotiation which, depending on your politics, is either a multi-stakeholder dialogue or an internal security problem. What Kashmiris think is rarely considered, and if it is brought up, the question becomes: who will legitimately speak for (which) Kashmiris.

In almost eight decades, we have not built a road between these perspectives on “Kashmir.”

The terrorism line

For Indians, Kashmir is not the main issue between India and Pakistan. The main issue is “cross-border terrorism.” In the Home Ministry’s annual report to Parliament, four types of internal security threats are described, each as confined to one geographic region. One of these is “cross-border terrorism in Kashmir.”

For decades, the government of India has squarely accused the Pakistani government, specifically the Army and intelligence services, of fuelling, funding, training and supporting logistically, militant operations in Kashmir. In a political culture where foreign policy is securitised, information is relatively scarce and any discussions are opaque. Furthermore, the public is inclined to believe the government. After the 2008 Mumbai attack which played out live on television screens, this inclination has taken further root. The government of that time chose the diplomatic route, presenting dossiers of evidence to the Pakistani side. In multiple attacks since then, it has become easier for the Indian public to believe in the Pakistani ‘hand.’ In April-May 2025, it was not just hawkish politicians who were speaking about Pakistani support for cross-border infiltration and violent activity by militants, it was also those otherwise critical of Indian government policy and actions.

Like their Indian counterparts, Pakistani leaders make belligerent statements from time to time, primarily intended for a domestic audience, and these statements reinforce the Indian public’s faith in Indian government statements. The Indian government contends that as long as Pakistan supports cross-border terror, it is not possible to hold any talks. (In any case, in the Indian view, Pakistan has no locus standi on the question of Kashmir which it insists is an internal problem.)

Pakistanis point out, rightly, that they have also been victims of terrorist attacks, asking, “How can you accuse us of supporting terrorists when they are also attacking us?” This is correct. It is true that since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, Pakistanis have experienced countless small and large attacks by armed groups. Pakistan has also lost its leaders to violence by militant groups. In addition, people in their border areas have been caught in the cross-fire of others’ wars with drone attacks in civilian areas. It is true that the Pakistani public has been a victim, as much as the Indian public has.

However, the Indian accusation however, pertains not to the people of Pakistan but to the Pakistani military. Even if the civilian rulers of Pakistan are unaware and unable to stop them, this accusation makes them complicit. Given that neither ordinary Pakistanis nor ordinary Indians are privy to “proof” and we both live in a time of obfuscation and disinformation, we are left to choose, purely emotionally, what we want to believe. Or, at best, with several questions and no hope of finding definitive answers.

I struggle with this question of terrorism for many reasons. Even a lifetime of scepticism about government claims leaves me wondering about these accusations. Can there be smoke without fire, one wonders? The accusations of interference through support for insurgents are made on both sides—Pakistanis supporting Kashmiri groups (or now, supporting groups that are affiliated to transnational networks but operating in Kashmir and elsewhere in India) and Indians supporting Baloch groups.

All states survive through the use not just of force within and without, but a host of covert activities—espionage, surveillance, political interference—that each considers its legitimate right to security. Transparency is inimical to the success of these activities so we know but we never have proof. Those who challenge the idea that such activities are essential are dismissed as naïve and those who demand accountability for them are branded treacherous. Citizens learn to survive through silence and therefore, tacit consent for such undertakings. Thickening smoke and smouldering fire obscure thinking.

Can we cross these lines to sit and talk?

For peace activists, this is a very challenging situation.

Talking—via official and unofficial talks, through confidence-building dialogue—is an expression of faith. You cannot speak with someone you demonise (and until you speak with them, you will demonise them!). Statements by Pakistani civilian and military leaders (such as this one and this one) that anticipate and affirm a long-term “enmity” with India reinforce Indian accusations. But the rhetoric of Indian leaders too, is now intemperate—sometimes in the tone of streetside gang war–and my friends on the other side of the border must have exactly the same questions.

Every time the two governments descend into the cesspit of mutual vilification, it is harder for ordinary people to make the simple point that they would like to hear the other side’s story. In informal gatherings—such as university campuses outside the region or third-party convenings on other matters—Indians and Pakistanis may bond over a host of questions and they may even have one-on-one conversations that cross these lines. However, the official vilification works as a taboo, imposing a cost on those who will publicly push it aside and ask for talks. For most, the prospect of being accused of betraying our countries simply by asking questions or seeking to learn is an impossible cost to bear.

Working on peace means you cannot work on partial truths. Even if Pakistani agencies are supporting violent activities across the border in India, that is one part of the truth. There is also the Indian state’s culpability in creating conditions that facilitate such activity, most notably through rigged elections and interference in the functioning of governments. Making Kashmir a symbol of something in the idea of India has made Kashmiris mere instruments of geopolitics. Dialogue depends on listening to and acknowledging all these truths which must coexist in our heads and collective conscience, even as they coexist in reality.

But the absence of transparency in the security sector means that on both sides, we are dependent on a state that says “Trust us” but we really can’t. Whose information will we then trust? Who is telling us the truth? What is truth and what is the truth in this situation and what is each person’s truth? Whose truth matters more? Dialogue for peace involves finding a way through all this, but that is easier said than done.

The murky adage, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” lends to violence a romantic and hopeful glow it does not deserve. When Indians raise the question of cross-border terrorism, the answer cannot be, “But they are fighting for freedom, do you not see that?” It has to be, “This method is wrong and whoever is endorsing and supporting it, is wrong too.” Yes, a non-violent fight against a militarised state seems hopeless, but attacks like Pahalgam (and the Indian Parliament attack in 2001, Sarojini Nagar bombing in 2005 and the 26/11 Mumbai attack, to list a few) just diminish the legitimacy of whatever cause is being espoused. The suspicion that they are being backed by a state makes the cause too seem spurious. I would even say it obfuscates the original cause almost entirely.

When I raise the issue of arbitrary violence, regardless of the perpetrator, it is wrong. It cannot be correct in one circumstance and wrong in another. When the Indian state absolves the lynching of minority citizens by ignoring it and focusing attention on irrelevant detail (“were they really eating beef?” or “what is the real meaning of this social media post?”), it is also wrong. When the state enables violence against the citizens of another country, it is wrong. The wrongness of violence is the one thing that is crystal clear and unchanging.

Dialogue despite the dividing lines

To reach this clarity, it is important that we are able to sit and listen fully and openly to each other’s accusations. We need to be able to sit and listen to each other without flinching and jumping up defensively. It is not necessary to counter each statement with contestation (“you are wrong”) or contingency (“but…”). Just as we place our weapons outside the door of the negotiating room, we must place all our issues—offensive, bleeding, spurious, inflammatory, as they may seem to us—on the table. That airing is a prerequisite for peace.

This is why dialogue, at multiple levels, is important. We cannot stop talking, no matter what. And if symbolically, official dialogue stops, it is imperative that other tracks continue to communicate. The maintenance of bridges becomes even more critical in bad weather.

Two kinds of behaviour further challenge the process of dialogue. The first is the pressure to perform. There are invisible models of how to be—what a true peace-lover would say, or the correct line for a “progressive,” or expressions of genuine patriotism—that lurk within and without us, making it hard for us to open our hearts and minds to learn and reflect and grow. Conformity and performance are easy and we make it hard for each other to remain true to the messiness of inner transformation which is the hallmark of peace-making. The work of peace is the work of inner transformation leading to outer change. It is the work of the satyagrahi—a person whose integrity and values are strong, who is not easily swayed by emotion or passion and who has the discipline to do what is right.

The second is the insistence on perfect consonance. When the expectation in a room is that everyone will agree to exactly the same things, dialogue is doomed. It used to be the habit that when one bought or stitched clothes for a growing child, one added room for alterations that would accommodate their growth. Similarly, peace processes, both official and non-official, must build in rooms for disagreement and dissent so that one departure, one edit suggestion or one question cannot derail the broader work. Language matters but semantics must not sideline what we need to say to each other. We must embrace the idea that talking peace takes time and this is because we need to be willing to pause, listen, reflect and either shift our “text” or find a space for the difference of opinion without stopping the process altogether. We are building peace, not a house of cards.

I want to talk peace. All summer, I struggled with this practical, political question–how can we bring Kashmir and cross-border terrorism into one dialogue, where raising one question is not to deny the validity of the other concern. I want a cessation of the violence that only hurts the innocent. I dream of a time when militarised borders will not divide peoples who share so much. I wonder what it means to celebrate our nation-state collectives, if we are not free from this legacy of carefully nurtured mutual enmity, so that we can actually nurture our own talents and enjoy the rewards of our daily labour, without fear or want. To be free, truly free, we must open our hearts and minds and speak freely with each other. We must be at peace.