An imperfect peace: The success of Simla Agreement

Telling It Straight

When exactly was the 50th anniversary of the Simla Agreement? Technically, it was signed at 12.40 am on July 3, 1972, but it carries the date July 2, 1972. This is because the talks had been announced as failed and the Doordarshan crew had packed up and gone. The Indian side wanted an Accord while the Pakistanis proposed a Joint Statement. Eventually, negotiations did lead to an Agreement, based on the third draft presented by India; the TV crew was called back to film the signing ceremony. The Simla Agreement has just six paras; the myths criticising it run into volumes.

It is unlikely that a more strident Indian line at Simla would have even allowed Pakistan’s 1973 constitution to be drawn up. That constitution holds to this day. It is unlikely that Pakistan would have tolerated Zulfikar Bhutto for five years as it did. More humiliation may have bred such insecurity and animosity in Pakistan that all paths to future peace would have been closed. After three wars in the first 24 years of independence, the two countries have had only one limited war – Kargil -- in the next 50. The peace that Simla brought, an imperfect one, was better than no peace at all.

Contrary to the popular myth about Simla, the Agreement contains not one word about the release of nearly 90,000 prisoners of war (PoW), who were in the joint custody of Bangladesh and India. The prisoners, including 12,000 civilians and 22,000 police and paramilitary personnel, were released in August 1973, after 19 days of separate negotiations between the three countries. Those who argue that India should have imposed more stringent conditions on Pakistan, including getting back all of Kashmir, in exchange for the PoW, are ignorant of facts.

As a signatory to the Geneva Convention, India was duty-bound to treat the PoW fairly and ensure their safe return. This was a promise made repeatedly by Army Chief Gen. Sam Manekshaw when he asked the Pakistani forces in East Pakistan to surrender. Any mistreatment of the PoW would have been a solemn breach, and would have lost India international goodwill, including that of the Soviet Union.

The forces that surrendered on December 16, 1971, in Dacca to the joint command of Mukti Bahini and Indian Army were only those operating in East Pakistan. A ceasefire was announced with West Pakistan the next day, and only 600-odd Pakistani soldiers were captured on that front. Although India gained territory in Sindh, it was of limited value in what was a military stalemate in the west. At Simla, India was willing to discuss the return of these 600 men but wanted Bangladesh to weigh in when it came to the 90,000 PoW from East Pakistan.

West Pakistan was never a target for India in 1971 as it did not have the military strength to succeed on two fronts. There was also the risk of US and Chinese intervention, and loss of Soviet backing, were it to go to occupy West Pakistan militarily.

Bhutto, for his part, had little interest in the return of the PoW. Their surrender had strengthened him politically to keep the humiliated Pakistan Army under check. The wily politician privately told Indira Gandhi’s Principal Secretary P N Haksar: “So far as prisoners of war are concerned, you can throw the whole lot in the Ganges…” He made public noises about the PoW for domestic politics.

Importantly, India did not wish to humiliate Pakistan at the negotiating table, leaving an embittered neighbour obsessed with revenge as happened in Europe after the Treaty of Versailles. It focused on the strategic aims set during the 1971 crisis, the foremost being the creation of an independent Bangladesh and return of 10 million refugees from Indian soil. Another aim was to ensure that all issues between the two countries, including Kashmir, would be resolved bilaterally and by non-military means.

Post-1962 Sino-India war, there was US pressure on Delhi to hold talks with Pakistan on Kashmir. Even the Soviet Union had forced Lal Bahadur Shastri at Tashkent in 1966 to return the Haji Pir pass and other militarily important areas to Pakistan. India did not want such third-party intervention any further, and the Simla Agreement became the shield India would use to ward off such foreign intervention thereafter. This changed only in the summer of 2020 when, faced with the prospect of a two-front collusive threat if the Pakistan border became active after Chinese forces moved into eastern Ladakh, the UAE played the broker between India and Pakistan.

To have the UN-brokered ceasefire line of 1948 amended to India’s military advantage and have it rechristened as the Line of Control was an aim added later, with the idea that this LoC is the de facto border and a pointer to a future solution. Worried of being seen as surrendering Kashmir, Indira Gandhi was not ready to immediately convert the LoC into the international border. Bhutto, as per Swaran Singh’s briefing of the Soviet ambassador to New Delhi, agreed that Pakistan was not ready for it either and promised not to raise the matter in the UN, though he would continue to raise ‘self-determination’ for domestic political ends.

Did India achieve its ends in Simla but aim too low? Possibly, but it presented an important roadmap, and treating it as the last line misses the essence of the wisdom contained in the late diplomat Sati Lambah’s words in 2014 that “expected gains from a solution may not be automatic and require sustained effort. But if it opens the door to a new future for India and Pakistan, without compromising our security, integrity and constitutional framework, it is worth pursuing”. The Simla Agreement opened such a door, but there was a lack of sustained effort thereafter.