Dodging Pakistani Sleuths to Cover a War and a Coup

Like any other accredited Indian journalist based in Islamabad before him, Amit Baruah was followed by Pakistani sleuths whenever he drove out in his car, be it to official press briefings or a visit to the neighbourhood utility store. The ever present motorcycle riders dressed in their trademark shalwar-kurtas would scarcely leave him alone. So Baruah, not used to giving in easily, devised a way to get even with his pursuers. He got himself a bicycle. And as he began to pedal his way around the city, life became that much more difficult for the motorcyclists. They were trained to pursue their quarries at a respectable speed. Driving dead slow to chase an Indian journalist’s whimsical pace wasn’t exactly part of their training manual. The trick appeared to work, but not always.

In his considerably delayed memoirs, “Dateline Islamabad” — published this year by Penguin Books — an account of his tenure in Pakistan from 1997 to 2000 for The Hindu, Baruah recalls a couple of other tricks he picked up in Islamabad to cope with a highly challenging assignment. One such trick was to increase the TV volume when discussing something confidential with a diplomat or any other discreet source. Sometimes the above tricks didn’t work, however, because Pakistani plainclothesmen would boorishly wade into his “friends’ living rooms”, as Baruah recalls. This was of course a nightmare for the family comprising Amit’s wife Minu, herself a noted journalist, and two small daughters. But all in all it turned out to be a major assignment for The Hindu correspondent who eventually left behind many Pakistani friends. These include some whose names he doesn’t want to mention in the book.

The period of Baruah’s book straddles momentous events in Pakistani politics, which inevitably include Islamabad’s rollercoaster relationship with India. He had a ringside view, so to speak, of three or four major events in Pakistan’s history — the tit for tat nuclear tests, the India-Pakistan summit in Lahore, the Kargil war and, of course, General Pervez Musharraf’s coup that toppled prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s elected government. And that’s why it was most unjournalist like not to have published the memoirs a few years ago. Nevertheless what Baruah has to offer should be of immense value to those who see in Pakistan’s recent history a means to understanding the country’s current pass, i.e. the arrival of Gen Musharraf first as Sharif’s handpicked army chief and then their dramatic volte-face following the Kargil standoff.

There have been a couple of readable books written by Indian diplomats who served in Pakistan about the period of their tenures. These include recollections by former consul general in Karachi Mani Shankar Aiyer and former high commissioner Jyotindra Nath Dixit. But Baruah’s is perhaps the only account by an Indian journalist about his days in Pakistan. This could be the beginning of a healthy trend. Nirupama Subramaniam, who became Baruah’s successor in Islamabad, has already written an impressive account of her days as The Hindu’s correspondent in Sri Lanka. It would of course be even more interesting to hear from a Pakistani journalist who worked in India about his days here. I said “his” because there have been no women journalists assigned to each other’s country before Nirupama arrived in Pakistan. It would be interesting to hear a Pakistani’s account of the sleuths that they encountered in Delhi or the tricks that they used to throw them off the scent.

I remember the days when Salamat Ali, Pakistan’s correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review, was shifted to Delhi after he ran into trouble with Gen Zia’s military regime. Because Ali was a fugitive in the Zia era he was given the kind of facilities and respect here that Pakistani correspondents can only dream of. Reading Baruah’s account of the Kargil war there are reasons to believe that Pakistani journalists were not entirely comfortable even under what should have been less intimidating civilian rule. The Najam Sethi episode blew the lid off this myth. One of the main disputes during the Kargil issue that Baruah tackles effectively was Pakistan’s claim that the operation was carried out not by regular troops but by Kashmiri mujahideen. To illustrate that this was not so, the author quotes a lengthy excerpt from a report in Time magazine which was filed by Pakistani journalist Ghulam Hasnain. The reporter, of course, “had to leave the country temporarily” after the report was published. The story was based on a first person account by an unnamed 35-year-old Pakistani soldier of his 77 days on Indian territory in Kargil. Baruah describes the report as vital in establishing the truth of India’s claim that the men atop the Kargil heights were regular Pakistan troops and not anybody else. Other “proofs” are cited to show that Pakistani troops were indeed involved in Kargil, not the least of which was the investiture of several soldiers with gallantry awards by President Tarar for their alleged service in the controversial war.

But this leads me to the question I have asked frequently somewhat in vain. We can quote any number of Pakistani journalists, and Baruah has marshalled quite a few including Dawn’s Ayaz Amir to shore up his point which are not too dissimilar to official Indian claims. But how many mainstream Indian journalists can we quote who have striven to contradict their government’s assertions in the course of a war or even in a verbal duel that India has been involved with practically all its neighbours at one time or another? Quotations from Pakistani journalists surface in practically every chapter of Dateline Islamabad. But can we name one Indian journalist in Delhi who could come anywhere near the blunt posers that are so often hurled by Pakistani journalists to people in authority, particularly so to military dictators?

Imagine the following dialogue taking place with any Indian prime minister. I quote Baruah as he reports from General Musharraf’s first press conference after he seized power and became Chief Executive. “To me, the high point of the long press conference was a question from a bearded, shalwar-kameez-clad Pakistani journalist,” he recalls. “In chaste Urdu, this correspondent asked the general: ‘Ayub Khan ne ham ko Gohar Ayub Khan diya, Zia-ul-Haq ne hamko Ijaz-ul-Haq diya, kya aap hamko Bilal Musharraf denge?’ (So far all army rulers have given us their sons who continued their legacy in politics. Would you too be giving us Bilal Musharraf?’

“For a moment, the easy talking general was stumped, and the assembled press corps burst into laughter. And then came the response: ‘Thank you, you know my son’s name.’ “It could have been dismissed as a joke. But, in a country where rulers have been more interested in perpetuating themselves than in governance, the exchange was significant. It was also a sign that the press would not behave like a poodle; Musharraf would have to account for his actions to this vigilant wing of Pakistani civil society.”

Prescient words. Baruah’s book is littered with similar analytical insights he shared with us during the turbulent years in Pakistan’s recent history. “Just as well that Baruah knows how to ride a bicycle bang in the middle of a turbulent assignment.”