Pakistan & India under the Nuclear Shadow
By Ras H. Siddiqui
Friends of South Asia (FOSA) held a screening of the documentary film “Pakistan and India under the Nuclear Shadow” at the Stanford University on Saturday, August 24, 2002. The film dwelled at length on the current nuclear-backed friction between India and Pakistan and raised concerns about the possible accidental or retaliatory use of nuclear weapons in South Asia.
The film has been produced and directed by Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy, a nuclear physics professor and social commentator from Pakistan (working with the Eqbal Ahmed Foundation). It raised many questions and much awareness. And true to the nature of such gatherings, only around 35 people of South Asian origin/descent gathered in sharp contrast to the thousands that gathered at the Pakistani or Indian Independence Day gatherings in the San Francisco Bay Area to listen to live music, eat lots of food and meet some of their favorite stars . (It so happened that some of Indian cinema’s big stars were in the area on the same day at an Indian Independence Day event). But let us get back to the small gathering at Stanford.
After a brief introduction by San Jose based Pakistani writer and peace activist Ali Hasan Cemendtaur, the approximately 45 minute movie began by taking us from the “small” and relatively crude atomic weapons that caused the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the more dangerous and thankfully unused hydrogen bombs inducted into some arsenals during the Cold War between the US and the former USSR (during which many hair raising accidents or close calls were reported). The movie also featured other countries that have developed these weapons since then and then focused on South Asia touching on the 1998 events when first India and later Pakistan joined the overt nuclear club.
The ties between extremist groups and such weapons in both countries are debatable but the zeal shown on the streets after these tests by such forces and their public display of happiness at going nuclear cannot be denied. The follow up to the tests included a sense of pride that was reflected on the many billboards and replicas of missiles and the Chaghai mountain peak (Pakistan’s test location) reconstructed on various street corners in Pakistan. The missile capability of both India and Pakistan received much attention in the film. Interviews of Dr. A.H. Nayyar, Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy himself and Dr. A.Q. Khan (father of the Pakistani bomb) dwelled on the scientific know-how, the
expense and issue of national pride.
Mrs. Tahira Mazhar Ali, Lt. General (R) Talat Masood and later Dr. Zia Mian (currently at Princeton University) and social activist Asma Jahangir offered some very illuminating words of wisdom. And the input from the more hawkish segments of Pakistani society via Syed Salahuddin, Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Maulana Samiul Haq gave the viewers a necessary window into their mindset.
Calling the arms race between India and Pakistan “criminally expensive” and their continued tension fraught with danger, the movie projected an alarming scenario of the damage that could be caused well beyond the point of impact of the weapons. If India and Pakistan attacked each other, or if an accident were to happen, much more than the targets or immediate locations would be destroyed. The damage to their shared ecosystems would create a long-term disaster for them, their neighbors, and the planet.
A lively question and answer session followed during which we were also addressed by Shalini, Sabahat Ashraf and Annie Chandra. It is heartening to note that this gathering brought together groups of people who had been pursuing peace in South Asia independently earlier this year. The first of these efforts was covered in another report. The second meeting between Indians and Pakistanis took place on August 11which was reported on by Mr. Abdus Sattar Ghazali in Pakistan Link of September 6.
In this third report, we are happy to note that Dinesh and Annie Chandra were able to make contact with FOSA. Now all of us together will need a renewed effort to make this peace movement grow larger via further contacts between like-minded people. Maybe next time FOSA and others could help to screen the recent film ‘War and Peace’ directed by Anand Patwardhan (which has received some rave reviews) to give us a better Indian viewpoint. And who knows where this will all lead us to?
In conclusion, as Annie Chandra said, peace between India and Pakistan may not be a tremendously popular issue to pursue currently. It is much easier to beat the drums of war. But times are changing. Kashmir and Kashmiris have already seen much devastation. It is time for all of us to try help to come up with a peaceful and lasting solution. We have to resist the temptation of playing to the same old gallery and we certainly have to look outside of our fixed mindsets. But for us to embark on this journey we must first say a collective “NO” to war.
(FOSA can be contacted at www.friendsofsouthasia.org . It continues to hold a monthly peace vigil on the last Saturday of every month at Lytton Plaza in Palo Alto at 7 PM).