T Thomas: Business as a bridge between neighbours

By developing trade with Pakistan, we can gain more because we have a much bigger and much more competitive manufacturing base.

Historically, the most effective way of establishing peace between rival nations is that of trade and commerce. The worst enmity during the Second World War was between the Allied forces led by the UK and the US, on the one hand, and the Axis powers, led by Germany, on the other. Bitter memories of the atrocities committed by Nazis were vivid among people, especially in countries like Holland, Poland and Russia. Since France had surrendered and had a Nazi-tolerant puppet Vichy regime under Marshal Petain, the French did not suffer as much as the Dutch. The Germans were never able to occupy any part of Great Britain. Yet it took some decades after the war for the British to warm up to the Germans. But all the prejudices and bitterness among European nations were diluted with the formation of the European Common Market, which benefited people in all countries. With Germany emerging as the largest economy on the continent, it offered significant opportunities for manufacturers and service providers from other European countries to trade profitably with Germany. As the next generation came of age by the 1970s, the enmities and atrocities of World War II gradually receded in the minds of most people, even in Holland.

In a similar manner, a real breakthrough in the peace process between India and Pakistan can come only through the establishment of trade and commerce between the two countries. At the moment, the obstacles to bilateral trade are unbelievably severe""worse than between enemy nations. Since I am an Indian and addressing an Indian readership, let us start with the obstacles which our country places in the way of a Pakistani businessman who wants to buy things from India. I am basing my views on the experience of a company in Bangalore. This company has a rather sophisticated product for electrical energy management. Since India, as the country of origin, had some negative connotations in several countries, our company established a wholly-owned subsidiary in Dubai to service the market in West Asia, the Central Asian republics, North Africa, etc. Since its products now originated from the UAE, the company could export its products to Pakistan. The customers in Pakistan were pleased with the products, as they were significantly less expensive than what they were importing from Europe. Secondly, communication between the subsidiary in Dubai and the main dealers and customers in Pakistan was much easier, as we spoke the same language and the market dynamics, customer expectations, etc. were very similar.

As part of the growing interaction between the company and the customers in Pakistan, they arranged to invite a few dealers from Pakistan to visit its facilities and R&D centre in Bangalore. The site in Bangalore, although not very large, is impressive and so are the R&D team members. But the experience of the Pakistani visitors with our government bureaucracy was so horrendous that it was a real study in "How to repulse visitors"""the opposite of marketing. Let me outline the bureaucratic hurdles:

A Pakistani citizen has to get a separate visa for each city that he is scheduled to visit in India. If he arrives in Delhi, he will need a separate visa for Delhi. If he wants to visit the Taj, he will need another visa for Agra, and of course a third visa for going to Bangalore. Without such city-specific visas he cannot go to any city in India. This is a big departure from all international visa procedures. If I as an Indian go to the US, I do not need separate visas for New York, Boston, San Francisco, etc. Similarly, visitors to India from any country other than Pakistan do not need separate visas for each Indian city.

The visitor from Pakistan has to report to the police station nearest to his hotel""within 24 hours of his arrival in each city. This can literally make the man run from one police station to another, as happened to our visitors in Bangalore. The hotel in which they stayed did not know which police station had jurisdiction over that hotel, as most hotels have very little to do with police stations. So our Pakistani visitors had to visit five police stations before they could establish which particular station had jurisdiction over their hotel! This itself took a couple of days, despite the best efforts of the host company. You can imagine the frustration of having to go from pillar to post, especially when the pillar and the post are uninviting police stations that are also citadels of suspicion and rudeness.

Each of these visitors had to get a residential permit from each police station on his arrival and again report to the station to obtain a departure certificate 24 hours before departure. And this procedure had to be repeated at each city. Every time copies of documents like passport, hotel declaration and residential permit had to be submitted to each police station.

Despite these humiliating procedures, our Pakistani visitors were impressed by the technological progress made by India and the company they visited.

Our bureaucracy and politicians could explain by saying that Indians are subject to a similar set of humiliating procedures when they go to Pakistan! This is indeed true. But we have to bear in mind that by facilitating and developing trade with Pakistan, we as a country have more to gain in terms of trade and commerce because we have a much bigger and much more competitive manufacturing base than they have. We will gain access to a market of 140 million people.

There are bonuses to such opening up of trade with Pakistan: (i) If we are able to route our trade through Pakistan, we will have easier access to countries further west of Pakistan, like Afghanistan and Iran; (ii) increased trading relations with Pakistan will add far greater security for the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline; (iii) as trading volumes grow and both parts of Kashmir become part of this seamless trade zone, the line of control (LoC) could become a mere legal border with no need for massive military protection.

The time has come for our government to take some bold steps to make this vision a reality. The combination of Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi has the stature and wisdom to take the initiative. If they pluck enough courage to do so, it will be a glorious chapter in Indian history. Furthermore, it will enhance the prestige and standing of India in the comity of nations. Today, we are not recognised as the dominant force in South Asia (which in fact we are) because of the combative relationship we have with Pakistan. Once that handicap is removed, India will be accorded by the world with the stature that we truly deserve.