An insightful study of ISI ploy against India?

By MV Kamath?

Fulcrum of Evil: ISI-CIA-Al Qaeda Nexus; Maloy Krishna Dhar, Manas Publications, Pp 402,  Rs 795.00?

There are some people  including diplomats and politicians in India who still think that every effort should be made to make friends with our unfriendly neighbour, Pakistan. There is nothing basically wrong with attempting to befriend confirmed enemies and forgive proclaimed criminals. After all politics is a way of achieving the impossible and one can appreciate good intentions even if they turn out to be self-defeating, which is another way of saying that there are many in India who do not realise that where ignorance is bliss it is folly to be good. Where Pakistan is concerned it is gross lunacy to think that peace with it is possible and one has only to read Dhar to understand why so.

Maloy Krishna Dhar is no ordinary citizen. He is a former Joint Director of India’s Intelligence Bureau and has served it for over three decades and if he does not know what he is writing about, whom else are we to trust? He must be – and it is evident that he is – one of the very few in India who knows about intelligence agencies all round the world, but especially in the US and Pakistan. As he claims in his Preface, this book “is a narrow focused study on the Inter Services Intelligence of Pakistan, growth of Pakistan as a Fulcrum of Evil and its collaborative relationship with two other important Fulcrums of Evil – the Central Intelligence Agencies and other security and intelligence arsenals of the US and the Middle Fulcrum, represented by Royal Saudi Intelligence and allied religious and NGO props floated by the Wahhabi House of Saud for exporting Islamic jihad throughout the world”. That saya it all.

Dhar has no illusions. He maintains that the American CIA has “helped and continues to help the Global Fulcrum in re-shaping destinies of nations and peoples through wars, assassinations and power manipulation”. Obviously not an agency to be trusted. In Dhar’s view – and one can fully agree with him – the emergence of ISI has “fortified Pakistan’s existential Hate-India philosophy and strengthened the building blocks of the Fulcrum of Evil”. Pakistan, says Dhar, “is still suffering from the opium dose for religious hatred and hang-over of the lost ‘first nation’ status on Indian soil”.

What this book does is to go deep into the tactics and techniques employed by Pakistan to dismember India such as support to Khalistanis, support to rebels in North Eastern States, using Nepal as an Intelligence base against India, subverting India through use of some vulnerable Indian Muslims who are not yet reconciled to ‘Hindu’ India, adopting provocative tactics through formation of underground tanzeems to spread jihad in India and use political parties in the name of caste polarisation for achieving political leverage. The cases cited by Dhar are revealing and mind-boggling, like the use of dirty tricks, women, the running of over 100 training centres for the Mujahideen located in Pak-occupie Kashmir, grooming Islamic militants in India through madrasas, activating Kashmiri jihadi groups etc.

Dhar is not just generalising his views. His statements are supported by evidence that cannot be challenged, which is what makes this book unique. Dhar exposes a whole list of Pakistani ‘leaders’ moved by hatred against India. They include Gen  Ayub Khan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Gen Yahya Khan, Gen  Zia-ul-Haq, ISI Chief General Hamid Gul and a whole lot of others. Plainly he says that in Pakistan “one cannot survive by disagreeing with the Army and the ISI”. That is the naked truth. Many are the ways Pakistan functions against India. Thus, some Pakistani visitors to India manage to stay back and settle down in sensitive locations. There are over 3,000 such over-staying and missing Pakistani nationals in India. Several religious groups are funded through third country-based NGOs for proselytising operations and bringing out religious publications which are often rated as hate-literature.

More shockingly one learns that such papers “were also gathered through certain Members of Parliament”. Says Dhar: “Members of Parliament frequenting the intellectual hubs in Delhi and prestigious hotels were tapped directly and indirectly through common media friends”.

This book has to be read to be believed. How long will all this last? Dhar says “there is a possibility of collapse of the US—Pakistan honeymoon on the make-believe issue of war on terrorism and this may transform Pakistan as the main pivot of Islamic jihad”. But he has his doubts because “Pakistan continues to be a client of vital US strategic interests and the Pakistani Establishment is expected to derive advantage out of American compulsion”. India will continue to be a victim of Pakistan while the US will look the other way. One wonders whether Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh understands this. 

(Manas Publications, 4402, 5-A, Opp. HDFC Bank, Main Ansari Road, Darya Ganj, New Delhi-110 002, email-manaspublications@vsnl.com, website-www. manaspublications.in)?