Indo-Pak Menu

The other day I visited a glittering shopping mall in Noida, a suburb neighboring New Delhi, where I saw this restaurant with a unique name: Indo-Pak Kebabs & Tikkas. Below it was the obvious explanation, Yaaran Da Dhaba: Asli Punjabi Chaska. I’m not from the Punjab but I could not afford to ignore the mouth-watering fare on offer – Murg Sialkoti, Murg Tikka Lahori, Kakori Kebab, Murg Patiala (Gravy), Lucknavi Dum Biryani, Kakori Roll, Kukkad Gurdaspuri and so on. There were combo packages also. All at affordably lower price. I am very ethical about gastronomical practices: favor the flavored meal and eat to your heart’s content. I did exactly that at the first instance. The taste was good, the food was digestible and the combo made me monetarily wiser.

The nomenclature of the restaurant can offer a food for thought and the combo pack has the power of attracting people from both sides of the border. There is a certain smoothness of agreement over such common heritage – be it food or language or music. The place was not a peculiar political parlor; it was a people’s corner. Our political leadership can do rounds and rounds of peace talks on never-to-be-resolved issues. They can make things look like a double-decker lachha parantha or endlessly joined noodles. We know that politicians from both the lands are trained to smile and shout, and skirt the real issues by issuing statements of disagreement. The diplomatic dilemma has been chiseled to perfection over the years. Phew! You cannot blow up the lid off this closely guarded secret of playing on the deadlock.

There has been another round of handshakes between the Indian and Pakistani premiers recently. I sincerely hope they are sincere in implementing what they promise to their countrymen. Already the handshake has given way to shaken and cracked grounds. The diplomacy around conflict management has gone back to the proverbial square one. This is a sleeping volcano – it can erupt any time. Reams will be written on that score. Pleasantries and brickbats will continue to occupy the centre court of blame-game even in 2047, a good hundred years of our independence. Meanwhile, the governments will raise the allocation of defence budget every year leaving its people in unbearable poverty and despondency. The question is should we take this lying down in the name of a pompous enmity inflated by political obstinacy?

Many eons ago this was a continuous, vast land inhabited by peoples of all race, color and creed. Through the ages people lived here in peace and prosperity, albeit spiced with some turmoil sometimes. We had a shared culture, tradition and a common language spoken and understood by a large section of people. Then wars were fought, cities cemented by emotions and nurtured by nostalgia were ruined too. There have been clashes and conflicts of opinions. We faced the harsh process of partition: it torn apart everything, just everything imaginable. There is no balm to heal the human wounds. Nobody can be proud of the agony that accompanied the division. We were the colonial cousins separated at birth at the cost of British mirth. Even then, the present Indian Prime Minister reads out his written speeches from Urdu script, Pakistani youngsters share as much interest in Bollywood as any fellow Indian and Indian cricket fans are invited to dine free by Pakistani hoteliers. I know it sounds like a cliché, repeated endlessly without any benefit. History is a burden of intolerable truth that cannot be wished away. We will do well to admit that we stand on different political platforms and on different lands. Our countries have enjoyed sovereignty and independence, separately. We accept the truth. There are differences, there are disputes and there are unresolved issues born out of geopolitics. We do not dream a miracle overnight. There is no Berlin Wall to be broken but there are roads and ways to build to one another’s heart instead of hitting the imaginary cul de sac.

The development of a country’s foreign relations cannot entirely ignore the wishes of the people concerned. Ordinary people have an indirect say in matters of policies, though bureaucrats or politicians apparently frame them. It’s nice to hear PM Manmohan Singh say that some day we can have breakfast in Delhi and lunch at Lahore the same day. Let’s not wait for the close-fisted governments to send us lunch or dinner invitations. When we are adult enough to munch on boneless Kebab-e-banno with Lahori Murg Tikka at our own cost, we can rather contribute our bit to disentangle the so-called bone(s) of contention between the two countries. We are no experts on international relations. But even at the risk of sounding like a layman, we can put our heads together to ponder over some simple points and possible suggestions. Some can be do-able; some may not be so. The discussion is open and the list may grow up, if you only wish to add more:

1. History is past and the vice versa. We cannot undo it. Let us respect the past and let the relics be there. No use of crossing swords and spewing venom.
2. Let us make one’s government in power more responsible and responsive towards its people. Tell them to upgrade the education, health or infrastructure sectors and to lower the defence budget allocation. After all, who is the enemy?
3. Leave aside the summits, on-the-sidelines-of-conference handshakes, reluctant leaders’ smiles and ostentatious visits and dinner diplomacy and the like. Cricket matches are better diplomatic move. Better still would be the people-to-people contact.
4. Do away with the war cry, drumming of patriotism, the angry enemy look and intimidating gestures at Wagah border. Arrange an Indo-Pak joint cultural extravaganza. Let the best artistes of both countries meet and perform at the border. Everyone will surely enjoy and appreciate the music of love. And they will go their own way after the show is over. No visa needed to share and hum the music of love.
5. Let’s there be a culinary feast where the best of Lahore and Karachi meet the best of Delhi and Lucknow (or for that matter, any other pair of cities). I’m sure no one will complain such gatherings.
6. Let the journalists, students, writers, academicians meet in exchange programs at government expenses and share the untold stories never ever published.
7. Publish a series of creative writings incorporating the best of both worlds. It can be poetry, it can be prose or otherwise in Urdu, Hindi or English translations (Political commentators, please excuse for the exclusion this time).