After stating in his first address to the nation that durable peace was not possible till the Kashmir issue was resolved, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has indicated that he is a votary of the resumption of bilateral trade with India.
In an interview with a Turkish news agency, Sharif said: “We are cognizant of the economic dividends that can be accrued from healthy trade activity with India” and called it a part of Islamabad’s shift from geo-strategy to geo-economics. At the same time, Sharif has spoken on Kashmir and demanded restoring Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir, more than five times since he took over in April.
After granting the most favoured nation (MFN) status to Pakistan in 1996, India withdrew it a day after Pakistan based Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist group targeted a CRPF vehicle in Pulwama in a suicide attack, killing 40 troopers on February 14, 2019. The total bilateral trade between India and Pakistan was USD 329 million in 2020-2021. This has gone up to USD 514 million in 2021-2022, as per the ministry of commerce, with Indian exports outnumbering imports from Pakistan. Pakistan has never granted MFN status to India despite being a member of the WTO regime.
PM Sharif’s desire to resume bilateral trade with India without giving up either the claim on Jammu and Kashmir or uprooting the India specific terrorist groups in Pakistan is no different from China’s desire to multiply bilateral trade with India without letting up military pressure all along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and dragging its feet on restoring April 2020 status quo on patrolling point 15 on Kugrang River in Hot Springs sector of East Ladakh.
The India-China bilateral trade stood at USD 86.36 billion in 2020-2021 and climbed up to USD 115.41 billion in 2021-2022 with Indian trade deficit touching more than USD 71 billion. The jump in trade with China despite military tensions on the LAC is a clear indicator of Beijing’s global clout in the manufacturing sector and a strong case for PM Modi’s “Atmanirbhar Bharat” initiative so that India is weaned out from the Chinese grip.
