Nothing ever changes between India and Pakistan. That is the considered opinion of a cynical friend of mine who has grown weary of fervent hopes and innocent longings for peace in the sub-continent by people like me, who have close friends and loved ones on both sides of the divide. Given the unsettling reaction of opposition BJP and the increasingly shrill Indian media to Manmohan Singh-Yousaf Raza Gilani encounter in Sharm El-Sheikh this week, you have to admit there’s something to the wisdom of the crowd.

Indeed, the more things change, the more they remain the same for India and Pakistan. While the world is progressing at a breakneck speed, the South Asian neighbors have been trying hard to stay the same place. It seems staying the course is more important than doing the right thing. The neighbors have been standing around here for the past 62 years. And in all likelihood they will be here tomorrow, next month, next year and perhaps for another 62 years.

For far too long we have blamed politicians for the never-ending woes of the two countries and for being a hindrance to peace and progress in the sub-continent. And perhaps, rightly so. However, if politicians have behaved the way they have over the years, some credit should go to civil societies, especially the media, on either side.

It’s the Indian and Pakistani establishments that have prevented their largely peace-loving people from burying the past and moving forward to a new dawn of hope. They have thwarted all attempts to find solutions to the irritants that have poisoned the relations of the two people who had not long ago been one and who still have so much in common.

Look at the reception Manmohan Singh got at home after his tete-a-tete with Gilani and a half-hearted agreement to resume the long-stalled dialogue with Islamabad. Everyone in the feverishly patriotic Indian media, and many in the governing Congress, went ballistic accusing the soft-spoken Singh of “a sell-out” to Pakistan. As if the prime minister had not agreed to resume talks with Pakistan but pledged away the prized Kashmir to Islamabad.

All that Singh had agreed to at the Sharm El-Sheikh summit was to “de-link” India-Pakistan dialogue from the terror threat from Pakistan-based groups. To be more precise, the two sides concluded that “action on terrorism should not be linked to the composite dialogue process and these should not be bracketed.”

Instead of being lauded for demonstrating rare courage to bury the hatchet with Pakistan and moving forward on peace front, Singh was booed and attacked in and outside Parliament as though he had signed away India’s interests to Pakistan by shaking hands with Gilani.

Are we, the world’s largest democracy and one of the emerging world leaders, so vulnerable that a scrap of paper and merely sitting across the negotiating table with Pakistan would critically undermine our national and strategic interests?

It is this attitude of India’s ruling classes and elites, and those of Pakistan, that has been at the heart of this never-ending conflict. They are the real stumbling block to peace and progress in South Asia, and beyond. They make it impossible for their politicians and leaders to take bold steps and make necessary sacrifices for peace. If India and Pakistan remain locked in a never-ending conflict, you know who is to blame.

The Singh-Gilani encounter last week has been followed by two interesting developments: Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf’s dramatic disclosures on an India-Pakistan agreement on Kashmir that never happened and the chilling confessions of Ajmal Qasab, the lone surviving terrorist who perpetrated the shameful attacks on Mumbai’s landmarks killing nearly 150 innocent people last year.

First, in an interview with Indian journalist Karan Thapar, Musharraf revealed how three years ago Pakistan and India had come very close to resolving the Kashmir knot and that Prime Minister Singh was to visit Islamabad to formally sign the pact with Pakistan.

This is Musharraf’s first significant interview after stepping down nearly two year ago. But that’s not what makes this an extraordinary one. It’s the stunning details of what would have been a groundbreaking move for peace and progress in the Himalayan state, allowing its long suffering people “maximum autonomy” and free movement between the two parts of the state divided between India and Pakistan. 

Obviously, this mantra to resolve one of the world’s longest running conflicts couldn’t have materialized overnight. Long years of planning and diplomacy must have gone into it. But the rough contours of this Kashmir road map match with those hinted by separatist Hurriyat chief Mirwaiz Umer Farooq in a 2003 interview he had granted me. Of course, this is not exactly what the Kashmiri separatists have long demanded and wanted: Azadi or “total freedom.”

However, the proposed road map for the Himalayan paradise over which India and Pakistan have gone to three wars and are ever ready to fight a fourth one would have largely addressed the aspirations of the Kashmiri people on both sides. Or at least that’s what the architects of the proposed accord assumed.

Secondly, Qasab’s (what an apt name! Qasab literally means butcher in Urdu and Hindi) detailed confession and his naming of his handlers in Karachi and Islamabad have only confirmed what India has long alleged: That the 26/11 strikes on Mumbai had been planned and perpetrated by Pakistan-based groups. But the confession doesn’t really come as a surprise to anyone in India or Pakistan. It only brings to life our worst fears. That the extremists have succeeded in bringing India and Pakistan dangerously close to the precipice over Kashmir.

It’s now up to India and Pakistan to decide which way they want to go: The path of peace, dialogue and reconciliation that the neighbors wanted to pursue three years ago but couldn’t; or the path of war and terror, as epitomized by the attacks on Mumbai.

According to Musharraf, who still rues having missed the bus at the Agra summit with Prime Minister A. B. Vajpayee, Islamabad and Delhi couldn’t take the final plunge because of “distractions” at home in Pakistan as well as a lack of sufficient political will in New Delhi. Apparently, Prime Minister Singh and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, both new to power then and dependent on their allies, couldn’t muster the courage to take the extraordinary step. After all, Singh comes from a religious minority and his boss was born a Catholic in Italy. Perhaps, a leader like Vajpayee would have been more comfortable in walking the last few, critical steps.

Let’s hope in his second term and armed with a powerful mandate, Singh would be more confident and assertive in his quest for peace and friendship with Pakistan. As Musharraf insisted in his CNN-IBN interview, the old road map can still be resurrected.

While Pakistan’s leaders have to clean up their act and effectively deal with the characters like Hafiz Saeed, who have brought nothing but disgrace and endless misery to the Islamic republic, India has to confront the problem that stares it in the face in the troubled Valley. God knows the Kashmiris have suffered enough in this battle of giants. 

It’s time for India and Pakistan to sort out this mess. After all, groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahedeen, exporting terror to Indian cities for years, had all been spawned by the so-called Kashmir cause. For its part, Pakistan cannot allow the loose cannons like Hafiz Saeed and Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi to speak and act on its behalf any more. With friends like these, Pakistan hardly needs to fear its enemies.

This is a historic opportunity for India and Pakistan to put the ghosts of history to rest, gifting lasting peace and security to their people; an opportunity that the neighbors would miss at their own peril.