I was Given 72 hours to Leave Pakistan: A High Commissioner’s Story
August 2019 brought one of the sharpest disruptions in India-Pakistan relations as India revoked Article 370, which had granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir. The move rattled Islamabad, sparking hurried diplomacy and an atmosphere thick with speculation. Here, Ajay Bisaria, then India’s High Commissioner to Pakistan, recounts the emotional weight and professional turbulence of […]
Dictator Next Door
Asim Munir’s power grab in Pakistan makes South Asia a more dangerous neighbourhood. The Pak military is no longer a state within a state. It is the state Yesterday’s attack on the Peshawar headquarters of Pakistan’s Federal Constabulary that killed three security personnel exemplifies the chaos engulfing that country. But the Pakistani leadership appears keen […]
Book Chapter: A Decade of Steady Economic Decay
Authors – Ajay Bisaria, Abhishek Kumar Abstract This piece analyses Pakistan’s persistent economic challenges, particularly in the decade from 2013 to 2024. It links the country’s financial crises with structural weaknesses, primarily military dominance, that has led to political instability, flawed economic choices and an addiction to IMF bailouts. The economic crisis has aggravated from […]
Munir’s Dangerous Doctrine
Ultimately, the Munir Doctrine is a dead end. It substitutes belligerence for strategic thinking. It indulges the military’s worst instincts. In trying to cast himself as heir to Jinnah and Zia, Munir is embalming a vision of Pakistan that no longer serves its people—and driving it toward becoming a reckless, war-making garrison state.
India’s Multi-Vector Engagement: Can It Include Pakistan?
A major question that arises in this context is whether India can reach tactical understandings, if not strategic resets, with its traditional regional adversaries, China and Pakistan. Both rivalries, at the very least, consume considerable strategic bandwidth and military resources. In the case of the northern neighbour, despite Chinese incursions into the Galwan Valley in 2020 followed by a military stand-off on the Himalayan border, India and China have doggedly continued military and diplomatic conversations to de-escalate the crisis and reach a modus vivendi. This has led to the stirrings of a tactical adjustment, with a Modi – Xi meeting in 2024 and softening positions in 2025.
Book Review: Anger Management: The Troubled Diplomatic Relationship Between India and Pakistan
For Bisaria, the relationship between India and Pakistan has been stormy, rocky, and turbulent since their birth as the successor states of British India amidst the chaos of partition in 1947. In the introduction of the book, he argues that “anger” is the defining motif of the Indo-Pak dynamic, stemming from issues such as partition, territorial disputes, and terrorism, hence the name Anger Management. These issues are deeply entrenched and challenging to resolve, making the effective management of relationships essential to prevent further deterioration. Moreover, the book seeks to answer critical questions such as what do Indian diplomats do in Pakistan, and how do they manage a relationship that is fraught with more lows than highs and more pessimism than hope?
The Ex Who Won’t Go Away
An imprisoned Imran Khan directing street protests is a thorn in Pakistan army’s side. The political instability deepens Islamabad’s ‘polycrisis’. Pakistan’s Qaidi Number 804, its former cricket captain and PM, Imran Khan, gave another ʻfinal callʼ to his PTI cadre for an assault on Islamabad on Nov 24, exhorting his supporters to ‘fight till the […]
Khan’s out of jail, but it’s still advantage generals
Ever since his famous breakup with former army chief Bajwa- and public revelations by both about their rocky ‘same page’ government of three years- it was clear that the army could not afford an Imran 2.0 regime.
Pakistan back to being Pakistan
The trial court judge showed extraordinary alacrity in convicting Imran on the weekend, in what was seen in Pakistan as a ‘fixed match’. The ruling dispensation wanted the Imran problem out of the way before the assemblies are dissolved on August 9 and a caretaker setup takes over.