A crucial misstep in India’s response to Pahalgam is the unsustainable nature of its lines drawn. Making each terror attack more expensive for Pakistan is just the first, obvious, military line. 

But water denial, internet shutdowns, culture bans, ‘punishing’ artists like Diljit Dosanjh, fuelling the “ghus ke maarenge” narrative to rouse public rage, and anti-Pak advocacy at IMF to financially squeeze the neighbour – these are many sophisticated levers being deployed all at the same time. 

The overkill does three things. Firstly it exposes all India’s cards outside, leaving fewer tricks up its sleeve. Secondly, it inflates expectations inside after fuelling hate that are nearly impossible to dial down. Thirdly both of these paint India into a corner, limiting options. 

A society in flux like Pakistan, currently questioning and exploring its origins, connecting with the ‘other’ in a new generational digital engagement across borders; can be handled in two ways. 

The ideologically fearful response would see it as a threat and slam the shutters down. Yet long-term strategy requires multiple dimensions and sophisticated nuance – not a one-horse policy of bans and hate-streaming. 

Despite the current state of war, a wiser response would see the flux as an opportunity. To do this requires the government to overturn its own foundational mythology and appreciate a key understanding. The people of Pakistan are different from the state of Pakistan, its terror infrastructure and its army. 

This is hardly new thinking. It is India’s much maligned people-to-people policy that kept engagement alive despite friction. Post 26/11, it lost its sheen and was eventually put into Siberian deep freeze with the BJP regime. 

Counterintuitively, in this new era of digital engagement, it might be time to dust it off and polish up a fresh version. 

In this version, a multiple lever policy alongside hard military or threat assessments would judiciously keep a door open to moderate sections of Pakistani civil society and new generations that may think differently – especially on terror and India.

However, acknowledging that there are moderate and different sections of Pakistani civil society is too far out of the government’s ideological comfort zone. 

The Indian regime sees Pakistan through a single demonising lens of terrorism, its so called ‘jehadi’ people holding out a begging bowl, their state a minute away from final collapse. Heaping contempt on this ‘lost case’ of a country very ‘different from us’ or sneering at its ‘backwardness’ reveals a startling level of crudity and fuels the unrealistic spin fed to its core constituency. This may be more damaging than the government thinks. 

Right after Pahalgam, this hate signalling to the government’s B Team – right wing media houses and its social media army – was amplified to become a powerful metaverse, operating aggressively against Pakistan. 

Snatching the baton from the government, they soon ran the narrative out of control. Hypernational anchors became India’s face as a hysteric mob shrieking with war-lust and showcasing fantasy ‘attacks’ like Karachi’s ‘ruin’ and Islamabad’s ‘destruction’ by borrowing visuals from video games and Gaza bombings. 

Bombarded by this extreme disinformation; troll expectations were raised sky-high to video game levels anticipating instant annihilation of Pakistan without consequence or damage to self. When annihilation did not actually happen and damage was felt via the IAF losses – the rage started devouring its own. 

From Foreign Secretary Vikram Mishri when he announced the ceasefire to the courageous Himanshi Narwal when she bucked the narrative to defend innocent Muslims and Kashmiris being targeted and even the Chief of Defence Staff Anil Chauhan when he conceded the IAF’s aircraft losses – no one was spared the wrath of the trolls. 

Two months later, it is clear Indian TV media’s freakish, unintelligent crusade of disinformation backfired in the international war of perceptions. It downgraded legitimate Indian concerns to cartoon villain aggression. The video game visuals deconstructed later by international media, led to meme fests and serious credibility loss. Sober assessments by Indian intellectual capital remained unheard because no one wanted ‘traitorous’ truths that might puncture the feel-good cartoon narrative. 

The cost of losing narrative control was to blur the Indian story’s clear moral high ground and cede critical territory on the digital battlefield. The dexterity with which Trump and Pakistan reworked the post war scenario is testimony to this diminution. Even today, attempts at lowering temperatures are anathema to the troll army and other supporters. 

The recent reopening of some banned Pakistani accounts generated instant outrage. They were hastily shut down again and blamed on a “technical glitch”.

Demonising Pakistanis has also had other costs. By labelling everyone a terrorist or madrassachhaap, this zero sum game has served the purpose of uniting a fractured Pakistani population. 

The old multi-dimensional people-to-people policy understood that Pakistani society was no monolith. Its far more sophisticated goal was to enhance the accessibility of shared cultures, fully aware that their influential reach went beyond military might. 

Reminiscent of the USA-USSR example, it first distinguished the Pakistani people from their irrational army and shadowy proxies, then aimed Indian soft power at them hoping to showcase a shared, subcontinental belonging despite their Islamic state ideology. 

That subcontinental belonging is finally making inroads into hearts and minds – ironically when the Indian government in power doesn’t comprehend its value. 

Today’s offensive rhetoric slams every door shut and leaves no off ramps. This achieves the opposite. By equating all Pakistanis with radical lashkars, it forces moderate Pakistanis to turn towards institutions (i.e. Pakistan army) they actually dislike. In the end that’s a self-goal whichever way you see it.

The same Pakistani army whose perennially high appetite for risk has been heightened by its own need for survival. 

A wave of anger since 2023 against it has seen open resentments against its sprawling economic empire, crippling attacks by the BLA and others and most importantly, mass protests against the locking up of Pakistan’s most popular leader Imran Khan that even dared to ransack the house of the Lahore Corps Commander – an unprecedented occurrence. In the days before Sindoor, the Pakistan army’s deep unpopularity was visible. In March, thousands demonstrated in Gilgit accusing it of stealing their region’s resources. 

Yet soon after the ceasefire, things changed. At a post-war sporting event where the military brass was in attendance, viewers reported applause – unthinkable just two months ago. Laudatory messages were posted on social media, film stars bragged about “freedom of speech” in Pakistan, a celebratory rally held with firecrackers in the heart of Lahore brought together liberals and Islampasand residents who poured out together to enjoy solidarity as ‘Nara-e-Takbeer’ blared in the background and Pakistan’s “handsome” spokesperson Air Vice Marshal Aurangzeb Ahmed’s cracks against his rival Air Force, especially the line “PAF vs IAF 6-0”, went viral. 

A warmongering army in Pakistan that has clapped a democratic leader in jail is now some sort of object of affection – just the target FM Munir had in mind? 

Meanwhile an ageing establishment in India has not factored in new elements that have shaken up the Indo-Pak matrix. While it has been ageing, the landscape has been changing. 

A key shift. 

This is a time of disruption for anything that sounds like a grand narrative. The questioning of origin stories in a time of open information cannot be reversed. 

Whether it is Jinnah’s Two Nation theory being called out or Modi storming the Nehruvian bastion – there are far bigger forces at play, shaping communities and societies and forming responses. No ideology is safe ahead – least of all Hindutva or radical Islam. 

The second shift. Besides the podcasters, vloggers, journalists, historians, old and young who actively challenge grand narratives, there is an entire universe of 90s born or later generations who have built organic, digital networks, and have normalised the ambiguity and pluralism that come with open access to information. 

This means they are patriotic to their own countries but also share bonds with each other – outside the old-school lines drawn by their governments. These can no longer be hard enforced. 

Their education, cultural rituals, aspirations and lifestyle are startling mirrors of one another. It is practically impossible to separate the tightly shared worlds of music, dance, TV shows, middle class trends, films, language, fashions, wedding traditions, entertainment, sport or humour into two neat country-specific bundles. India’s “Looking like a wow” meme or Pakistan’s “Yeh hamari pawry hori hai” went viral in both countries. Come sunshine or war Virat stays undisputed king on either side – he was trending in Pakistan a day after the war started.  

This lost battle can’t be fought. 

Which is why the demand of the Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE) for a “cultural disconnect” with Pakistan is a dinosauric ask, a goal made irrelevant in a digital world. Sardaar Ji 3 with Hania and Diljit, is already smashing box office records in Pakistan. Does Indian policy truly want to shut down this influential metaverse? 

Which is why dusting off the old people-to-people policy and trying its formula with tweaks, makes sense. 

If it can yield massive dividends in Afghanistan where the Indian government supports the Afghans without actively recognizing their ruling Taliban government, it is certainly worth keeping the door ajar for those whose beliefs travel beyond their country’s ideological limitations. Any policy that harvests friends in India’s not-so-friendly neighbourhood would be welcome.

 While raising the stakes for each terror attack, it is also critical to keep India’s unique soft influence alive. The pre-war respect given to India’s developmental journey, its still functioning democracy and its massive entertainment and sporting arenas is widespread. To not use this as bench strength would be illogical. To destroy it would be plain silly. 

Here’s what this doesn’t mean.

It doesn’t mean Wagah vigils, Fawad movies or Atif concerts in an era of acute uncertainty. It doesn’t mean instant visas. It doesn’t mean young Pakistanis won’t angrily defend their own country. It doesn’t mean India won’t attack when it deems fit. Most of all, it doesn’t mean the end of Pakistan’s terror attacks or India’s abusive trolls. 

It means understanding that hard, physical borders in today’s world are irrelevant for an intertwined, indistinguishable digital community. Like a scrambled egg it cannot be unscrambled. 

It means taking back control because troll narratives restrict powerful ideas more influential than military dominance and diplomatic pressures. It means re-setting expectations from video game finishes and dialing down zero sum ‘patriotism’ that can’t comprehend complexity.  It means staying vigilant for grid trippers like the Jyotis and Jasbirs but switching the digital world back on and letting the chips fall where they may. 

Young Indians and Pakistanis can digitally stumble along this bumpy road of anger, deep dives and unstructured truths. By evading formal processes, they could reignite multifaceted policies and slowly change beliefs. They could arrive at destinations not yet factored in or imagined. 

That might yet be the key that inserts sanity in future insane times.

Read the first of this two-part series on rethinking India's strategy on Pakistan here.

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