THE attack on the army camp in Uri by four heavily armed militants has resulted in the death of 18 soldiers of the Indian army. This vicious assault has raised the question of how India should respond. Earlier, the attack on the IAF base at Pathankot in January this year had posed a similar problem for the Modi government.

The RSS and its cohorts have demanded a strong response. In Ram Madhav’s words a “whole jaw for a tooth”. The television channels are full of retired military officers and self-proclaimed strategic experts demanding that Pakistan be taught a lesson. The BJP and Narendra Modi himself had campaigned against the soft approach to Pakistan displayed by the Manmohan Singh government during the Lok Sabha elections.

All this has put the Modi government in a hard position on how to respond to this latest provocation. A sober assessment would have made it clear to the political establishment that all the military options have serious limitations or risk the danger of an escalating conflict between the two nuclear armed powers. The minimal military response would be to direct fire power across the LoC through shelling and missile attacks. The experience of the cross border shelling and firing in 2014-15 show that this will only have damaging effects on the civilians living on both sides of the LoC and cause large-scale dislocation. There is no sense in putting an end to the ceasefire in place at the LoC since 2003. Cross border firing and localised conflicts would only increase the scope for infiltration from across the border into an already troubled Kashmir.

A full-fledged diplomatic effort is required to put pressure on Pakistan to stop harbouring terrorists and jihadi outfits. There has to be multilateral diplomacy and sustained political initiatives to bring the issue of Pakistan sponsorship of the terrorist organisations on to the international stage. Doing this requires a hard look at how India has benefited from aligning itself with the US strategic interests. The United States and Russia have both condemned the terrorist attack on the army base in Uri.  But the US statement does not mention Pakistan. It is the Russian statement which has acknowledged the Indian claim that the terrorists came from across the Line of Control from Pakistan. Russia which has been a trusted friend of India is embarking on its first joint military exercise with Pakistan later this month. This step has to be seen in the background of the burgeoning US-India alliance.

Maintaining strategic restraint, the focus should be on strengthening the security arrangements on the Line of Control and the international border with Pakistan to ensure that infiltration does not succeed. The results of the enquiry into the infiltration by the group of militants who attacked the Pathankot base are not known. How the militants could cross the LoC in Uri and penetrate a heavily guarded camp remains to be investigated. More comprehensive measures are required to tackle the threat posed by the infiltration of jihadi suicide squads.

The Uri incident has occurred in the background of the mass uprising in the Kashmir valley. The indiscriminate State repression to deal with this popular unrest and the use of pellet guns have raised widespread concerns and damaged India’s standing in the eyes of the world.

Any diplomatic offensive against Pakistan cannot be fully effective unless the Modi government takes immediate steps to end the use of lethal weapons like pellet guns and suppression of the democratic rights of the people in Kashmir. It should initiate a political process of talks with all shades of political opinion in the state without further delay. The Uri incident cannot become another pretext for heightened repression in the valley.

(September 21, 2016)