India-Pakistan relations: A time to heal after the guns fall silent

On the evening of May 10, a fragile ceasefire took effect between India and Pakistan after yet another bout of hostilities. This truce, reportedly, was encouraged by US President Donald Trump. While the guns have gone silent for now, the more enduring challenge lies in ensuring that peace becomes a habit rather than an aberration.

Now, it is a time for sombre reflection and not for triumphalism or chest-thumping over battlefield metrics. Both countries have paid the price — not just in lives and economic cost — but in the consistent erosion of mutual trust. The greatest loss is suffered by the ordinary people, who have been deprived of the true promise of independence, hijacked instead by hatred, jingoism, and missed opportunities.

Looking back, one cannot help but recall the irony of history. The same peoples — irrespective of religion, caste, creed, or language — stood together in 1857 at the Kali Paltan Mandir in Meerut Cantonment to ignite the subcontinent’s first war of independence. They marched to Delhi, united in their desire to rid themselves of colonial oppression, beseeching Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar to lead them to freedom. Today, those descendants stand divided by barbed wire, rhetoric, and mistrust. How far have we come — and how deep have we fallen?

This reflection inevitably brings me to the memory of my late father, who passed away more than five decades ago. He would often reminisce about his youthful years and his travels between Lahore and Amritsar — on bicycle and on tonga — when undivided Punjab thrived on a spirit of cultural fluidity and camaraderie. His eyes would sparkle as he recounted volleyball matches between the two cities and named friends on both sides of the border. I vividly remember his hand in mine, guiding me through the narrow streets of Lahore’s walled city, pointing to homes once filled with laughter and shared meals, now empty or inhabited by strangers. Even as a child, I wondered: why did his friends have to go away?

Growing up, I witnessed the calculated engineering of hatred. Opportunistic elements exploited identity for political mileage. A contagion of suspicion infected minds and rewrote collective memory. It was as though generations were deliberately prevented from remembering that they were once neighbours, not nemeses.

Yet, there are moments that reaffirm the undying human spirit. In 1978, I was on a diplomatic mission to Beira, Mozambique — then a hub for sanctions busting during the Rhodesian crisis. In that remote African town, a lonely elderly Sikh came to my hotel upon hearing that a Punjabi-speaking person was in town. He wept as he embraced me, overwhelmed by the simple joy of speaking in his mother tongue. He insisted on sharing tea and sweets — not out of formality, but out of love. He said he had no one else to speak Punjabi with in that country. In that brief encounter, decades of partition, mob violence, and pain melted away. The lesson was profound: people can forgive. They can rediscover kinship, even after unimaginable loss.

India and Pakistan have fought wars, gone nuclear, and entrenched themselves in postures of antagonism. But for what? Both nations have failed to conquer the real enemies — poverty, illiteracy, disease, and lack of access to basic human services. The cost of military build-up and mutual hostility is colossal. It is a folly of Himalayan proportions to ignore development while stockpiling arms.

Together, India and Pakistan represent one of the largest reservoirs of talent and manpower in the world. Yet, as they glare at each other across fortified borders, nations once inspired by our anti-colonial struggle — South Korea, Vietnam, Malaysia — have surged ahead. How many decades have we squandered in rhetorical combat while others invested in progress?

Strangely, when Indians and Pakistanis meet abroad, something remarkable happens. Spirits kindle. In markets, universities, or diaspora gatherings, the barriers melt. There is an innate familiarity, a shared rhythm in the way we speak, eat, laugh, and argue. Sports competitions between the two nations bring out passion, but also admiration. The same spark of competition that once fuelled joint excellence in science, sports, literature, cinema, and commerce can again become a force for good — if we let it.

But the path to reconciliation is neither short nor smooth. The political baggage of the past — particularly over Kashmir — continues to poison discourse.

Mutual empathy is essential. We must talk to each other rather than talking at the other. A peaceful, economically viable Pakistan is not a threat to India; it is a strategic necessity. It reduces the risk of instability, and nuclear miscalculation.

This vision was not alien to our founding fathers. Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah and Liaquat Ali may have differed on ideology, but none envisioned the bloodshed that followed partition and the bitterness thereafter.

As the guns fall silent, I think again of my father and his friends — how they lived, played, and celebrated together. That image, more than any geopolitical map, represents what was lost — and what could be regained.

It is time to move forward, not by erasing the past but by learning from it. Let our energies be redirected from battlefield bravado to shared battles against ignorance, inequality, and injustice. Let us invest in people-to-people contacts, in cultural exchange, and in collaborative problem-solving.

Siblings do grow apart. But in time, they also find a way to coexist — each in their own space, but rooted in shared memory and common hope.

Let this ceasefire be more than a pause. Let it be a beginning.

Sajjad Ashraf served as an adjunct professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore from 2009 to 2017. He was a member of Pakistan Foreign Service from 1973 to 2008 and served as an ambassador to several countries.