Govt to go slow on engagement with Pak

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Government in New Delhi is likely to go slow in its engagement with Islamabad, notwithstanding the hullabaloo over a recent meeting between an aide of yoga guru Baba Ramdev and 26/11 mastermind Hafiz Saeed in Pakistan.

Home Minister Rajnath Singh is likely to have a bilateral meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Chaudhury Nisar Ali Khan in Kathmandu on the sideline of a Saarc conclave in the first week of August when he would take up Islamabad’s inaction on Saeed and the tardy progress of the trial of the seven terrorist involved in the Mumbai attack. New Delhi will factor in Khan’s response and the outcome of the meeting before taking a call on the future course of its engagement with Islamabad, sources told Deccan Herald.

Modi’s invite to Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for his swearing-in ceremony in New Delhi on May 26 and the meeting between the two leaders next day fuelled speculation about early restart of the stalled dialogue between the two neighbours.

But, according to sources, the new BJP-led Government has rather been moving cautiously over the past few weeks. The Prime Minister’s Office is understood to have sent words that the Government should not be seen walking the extra mile to restart the stalled dialogue with Islamabad, unless the latter expedites the trial of the 26/11 plotters and reins in Saeed.

New Delhi has particularly taken note of the repeated adjournment of the trial of the seven Lashkar-e-Toiba terror operatives – all accused of planning and coordinating the 26/11 carnage – in an anti-terrorism court at Rawalpindi in Pakistan. A day after Modi stressed on speeding up the protracted trial during his meeting with Sharif in New Delhi, the prosecution lawyers, appointed by Pakistan Government, did not appear in the court for a pre-scheduled hearing in the case. The judge had to adjourn the trial.

This was repeated on June 4, June 18 and July 2. The prosecutor Chaudhury Abuzar filed an application to the court on July 9 stating that he was indisposed and could not attend the hearing scheduled that day. The chief prosecutor Chaudhury Azhar too did not turn up in the court. The judge has fixed July 16 as the next date for hearing.

The prosecution lawyers had in fact on May 21 filed an application in the court alleging that the Jamat-ud-Dawa, the front organisation of the LeT, activists had been threatening them and asking them to stop pursuing the case.