KARACHI, Nov 24: “The participation of the common man is important for peace to become a reality,” said Pritam Rohaila, a peace activist who heads the US-based Association for Communal Harmony in Asia (ACHA). Dr Rohaila was speaking at a gathering organised by the department of International Relations at Karachi University on Monday.

Currently in Pakistan on what he calls a ‘peace pilgrimage’, Dr Rohaila and wife Kundan plan to visit several cities in India and Pakistan to spread the message of friendship among the people of the subcontinent. Stressing that India and Pakistan had 13 centuries of a common culture, Dr Rohaila lamented that the relations between the two nations were marred by what he referred to as the “genocidal partition” of the subcontinent and the bitterness resulting from the Kashmir issue. “Now both governments realise that negotiation, not war, is important and that both sides can and should coexist,” he said.

Dr Rohaila called for an exchange of ideas between the two countries and said they should cooperate with each other.

He praised President Asif Zardari’s recent statement in New Delhi that he held a no-first-use stance on the question of nuclear weapons. However, he warned against entities such as the military industry that benefited from war, as well as various prejudices that the Pakistani and Indian societies harboured against each other. “These suspicions and prejudices lurk in the corner to disrupt peace,” he said.

The Indian scholar took a positive view of the attempts made by the two governments to foster peace in the region. He said although both governments had to contend with domestic problems, Indo-Pakistan ties had never been better. He said although the relations were still not as good as they should be, the peace process was under way.

Dr Rohaila identified “the demons of secession, intolerance, illiteracy, poverty, terrorism and unsafe living conditions” as impediments to peace. “To make peace meaningful, it is important that we join hands and work across the border to eradicate these evils,” he said.

A general discussion followed Dr Rohaila’s talk. Scholars including Prof Shamim Akhtar, Moonis Ahmar, Arif Kamal, Aqeel Ahmed and Shakil-ur-Rehman Farooqui took part in the discussion. A number of questions were asked by students in the audience. It was pointed out that the mistrust between the two countries went beyond partition and extended to the period when the Muslim rule began in India.

Another observation made by a student was that peace could not be attained unless the intelligentsia showed a willingness to talk about it.

Dr Rohaila was asked about what his organisation had done to curb violence since the Babri Masjid incident when ACHA was established. “We are still evolving as we do not have any formal training in conflict resolution,” he said, adding that ACHA’s reach was now global.

Participants also said that while there was a hue and cry against extremism elsewhere, India had its own brand of fundamentalists such as Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who unless stopped would derail the peace initiative. Dr Rohaila said, “It is not for us to curb other views. We can only spread our own message to counter those.”

Wrapping up the discussion, Dr Moonis Ahmar said there was neither war nor peace between India and Pakistan because of their policies of the past few decades. However, the two countries had reached a stage where in order to protect certain vested interests both were resisting change for the better. According to him, such interest groups saw change as a threat to their concerns.