Pakistan must become a secular state for better ties with India: Gen Rawat

[Av8er]

SOURCE: ENS

Pakistan must turn into a secular state to better its ties with India, said Army Chief General Bipin Rawat on Friday. He was delivering a lecture during the National Defence Academy (NDA) passing out parade ceremony in Pune. “Pakistan is an Islamic State. They must willingly become a secular country like us. If they have to stay hand-in-gloves with us, they have to develop themselves as a secular state,” General Rawat said.

General Rawat’s statement comes amid Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan expressing willingness for greater engagement with India.

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Thursday acknowledged that it was not in the country’s interest to allow its soil to be used for terrorism. Khan said he is ready to talk to PM Narendra Modi at “any time”.

General Rawat said he feels that Pakistan’s claim of taking strong steps towards good bilateral relations is contradictory unless there is a direct impact visible on the ground about its claims.

The Army Chief added that a positive step from Pakistan is what is needed presently because India has a clear policy that terror and talks cannot go together.

Talking about the induction of women in the Indian Army in a front-line combat role, General Rawat said, “You will see an increase in the role of women in armed forces. We have not yet taken them in the front-line combat role. We feel we are not yet ready. Western nations are more open. Boys and girls are operating together in big cities here but people in the Army do not only come from big cities.”

He said keeping women officers in fields like language interpreter and military diplomacy would be more beneficial. “We are seeing if women can be given Permanent Commission. In some fields where we need permanency and male officers in a command-oriented Army don’t fit everywhere, keeping women officers will be beneficial,” he said.

Only qualification required to be IA chief is to be diagnosed with verbal diarrhea!

 

[graphican]

India must turn a Muslim state for better tires with Pakistan. Just reversing India's stupid argument to see if its reverse also sounds the same - and yes it does.

Wondering who was moron who promoted this filth on top of Indian ranks, but whoever he/she was, this stupid is an epic stupid.

 

[Nefarious]

Someone should first ask him if he even knows the meaning of that word... seriously.

 

[padamchen]

Pakistan has a problem.

A serious one.

They claim they have never given political space to religious elements. That none of their mainstream parties are communal.

But then why is Pakistan in the throes of religiously funded and motivated violence and strife for so many decades?

War on terror? Come ON man .....

India is no doubt getting radicalised. But that is because we have a frank communal leadership currently ruling, which comes under the umbrella of a communal supremacist fascist organization, the RSS. The wider parent body being the Hindu Mahasabha.

These have no illusions in what they stand for. Neither does any Indian anymore.

You are either with them and want a Hindu Rashtra or you are against them and want a secular India. There is really no third middle or tangent path anymore in the public discourse.

So India will keep going two ways depending on how it votes. Both sides have their diehard constituencies. With a key swing voter base in between.

But what does Pakistan do?

If it is where it is IN SPITE of having ONLY secular parties always voted into power?

Then one must surmise that the radicalisation and polarisation is not top down like in India, but already deeply entrenched into the populace. Bottom up.

And no party, however secular, is going to be able to really change things.

Pakistani members may please intervene here if they feel my line of thought and logic is flawed in any way. Indians too of course.

Cheers, Doc

 

[Indus Pakistan]

Chatur ji, if Pakistan becomes secular then it's people will start questioning partition and creation of the country itself?

Please tell me how would secularism initiate a yearning in Pakistani's for the British Raj along with Union Jack to be hoisted in New Delhi?



Explain? Why would we want to join Myanmar, Bangla, India under the British Raj????

 

[Crystal-Clear]

we wil think when indian military start operation against rss .

 

[AUz]

Lol, just imagine---even their army chief is such chutiya....common man ka to haal hi na poocho


Pakistan is an Islamic Republic and would remain so forever Inshallah. This is what unite us and forms the very basis of our nationhood.

He should worry about india more. Hinduism is no way near as powerful a force of human organization as Islam. Hindutva nuts are already alienating Southern india. Minorities are going to be 1/3 of all india in near future. Erosion of secularism threatens that sh!thole far, far more than anything threatens Pakistan right now.

We are a 96-97% Muslim country, with our values, culture, and social life rooted in the unifying force of Islam. Don't worry about us mate.

We all know that Hindutva's secretly wish to create a "Hindu Pakistan" with hinduism enjoying as much social influence and relevance in shaping the broader society as Islam enjoys in Pakistan. Its so OBVIOUS to see that. But alaas, their wishes can only be wishes. Now they have legalized gay sex and their hindu temples are open to women on the order of their SC while they are all crying on the internet

 

[hussain0216]

You know this guy talks alot

Every other day he makes statements and speeches concerning politics and foreign policy

 

[Clearly]

Well that statement alone, confirms he doesn’t want better ties with Pakistan. Next..

 

[Indus Pakistan]

Then one must surmise that the radicalisation and polarisation is not top down like in India

No, it's not that simple. Are you a dictatorship? Because they are top down. The very basis of democracy is the grassroots decides the top. Or 'down top'. That is what elections are for. The fact that you have Modi in power tells us large number of Indians support this type of thinking or at least it resonates.

With regards to Pakistan the problem was incubated in the very DNA of Pakistan from the begining. Secular politicians like Jinnah used religion to build muscle in order to take on Congress and press the British. The recipe of using relgion worked wonders. One of the most illuminating extracts from the Munir Commission Report 1953 into anti Ahmedi riots was "religion can be used to mobilize the masses into a frenzy to do almost anything". Jinnah possibly knew the dangersthe Pandora's box that he had helped to open and tried to put the lid on. However he died soon. His successors had zero political support or traction and they began to use religion to sustain their rule. After that each successive government with exception of Gen Ayub used religion in cynical attempt to gain power. Gen. Ayub Khan was removed from office largely thanks to street power of religious groups.

At some point the mullahs realised that they were the custodians of the recipe that gave power. That of course emboldened them and you can see the results to with TLP's Rizvi et al.

Because of our history Pakistan has a constitution that suits the Islamists. I mean the slogan "Pakistan kya matlab ...?" is enough to tell us something about Pakistan. This means if secular ladies have to bend and flex to stay within the confines of the Pakistani political milieu. In India adopted under Nehru a solid secular constitution with strong foundation provided by the fact that you have huge numbers of Muslims, Sikhs etc. India cannot and will not function without secularism because of the structual demographic reasons. Therefore in Pakistan where we can have secular leader trapped in pseudo Islamic clothing in India you can have a Hindutva kept in check by a secular constitution.

 

[Qutb-ud-din Aybak]

India should adopt Islam for better ties with pakistan.

 

[Kompromat]

Spoke like a true Bania.

 

[Taimoor Khan]

Joker. His own country has ditched secularism when the Hindu terrorists rose to power and now firmly control India.

 

[newb3e]

bas subha say sab madarssay masjid bind supa general ka order ayya hai how about renaming Pakistan mata land? kindly fwd my suggestion to supa general agar permission dain toh subha say kaam prh lag jaye!

 

[padamchen]

No, it's not that simple. Are you a dictatorship? Because they are top down. The very basis of democracy is the grassroots decides the top. Or 'down top'. That is what elections are for. The fact that you have Modi in power tells us large number of Indians support this type of thinking or at least it resonates.

With regards to Pakistan the problem was incubated in the very DNA of Pakistan from the begining. Secular politicians like Jinnah used religion to build muscle in order to take on Congress and press the British. The recipe of using relgion worked wonders. One of the most illuminating extracts from the Munir Commission Report 1953 into anti Ahmedi riots was "religion can be used to mobilize the masses into a frenzy to do almost anything". Jinnah possibly knew the dangersthe Pandora's box that he had helped to open and tried to put the lid on. However he died soon. His successors had zero political support or traction and they began to use religion to sustain their rule. After that each successive government with exception of Gen Ayub used religion in cynical attempt to gain power. Gen. Ayub Khan was removed from office largely thanks to street power of religious groups.

At some point the mullahs realised that they were the custodians of the recipe that gave power. That of course emboldened them and you can see the results to with TLP's Rizvi et al.

Because of our history Pakistan has a constitution that suits the Islamists. I mean the slogan "Pakistan kya matlab ...?" is enough to tell us something about Pakistan. This means if secular ladies have to bend and flex to stay within the confines of the Pakistani political milieu. In India adopted under Nehru a solid secular constitution with strong foundation provided by the fact that you have huge numbers of Muslims, Sikhs etc. India cannot and will not function without secularism because of the structual demographic reasons. Therefore in Pakistan where we can have secular leader trapped in pseudo Islamic clothing in India you can have a Hindutva kept in check by a secular constitution.

Of course there is a large part of the Indian populace that the current thought process resonates with. As you rightly said, Modi could not have come to power, and the way he did, without that groundswell.

When I said top down, I meant that Indian society is usually in a state of equilibrium, with flashes of communal violence, before things go back to a very Indian calm. A calm that has been learned by co-existing, even in spite of oftentimes hating the guts of the other community and what it does.

The social institutions, the judiciary, the law, the police, the army, and the executive and the legislature have all but their backs into this equilibrium.

Till someone like Modi and the BJP, backed by the RSS gameplan for a very different India, comes in and talks the language of the masses, of secular India, yet with the promise of unspoken goodies based on prior track-record, and comes to power.

What follows is radicalization by neglect. By omission rather than commission. By turning a bling eye and emboldening the lumpen. By fostering an us vs them victimization narrative under the guise of an umbrella tag. To polarize people and capture a votebank.

All of this is top down. The bottom resonates. But only when the tuning fork is struck at the right point from the top.

The other point is that you say Pakistani leaderships have always used religion. Yet here on PDF I find most Pakistanis saying with considerable pride that in spite of not being a secular country, in spite of being an Islamic Republic, Pakistan has always voted secular.

I am confused by this bit. It seems at odds from what you describe.

Cheers, Doc