The topic of Indo-American partnership elicits strong reactions - either optimistic sound-bites of shared economic and political values at the political level or pessimistic dismissals and accusations of double-standards at the level of Indian commentators, particularly in the shadow of the US Congress’ attachment of extraneous conditions to the Indo-US nuclear partnership, the proposed arming of Pakistan to the tune of $5 billion and the high-level penetrations of the Indian intelligence service by its American counterparts. Despite these acts of bad faith on the part of the Unites States, neither the Indian government nor market nor society has abandoned its engagement with it.

The so-called land of the pure, Pakistan, on its creation in 1947 had approximately 13 percent minorities residing within an Islamic population of 76 million. In its unholy fervour to achieve  physical instead of the spiritual purity, the minorities were reduced to 2.5 percent even as the country’s population soared to 156 millions by the year 2000. In any society, it is the minorities that play the crucial role of moderation. Their existence is a safeguard against extreme tendencies. Pakistan lost the benefit of this natural societal instrument of balance early in its history. Once the minorities, more or less, were out of the way, Pakistan’s Punjabi Sunni population which not only constituted the majority but also controlled the instruments of power in the state, turned to – killing Shias, expelling Ahmadiyas from Islam, denying basic rights to the Balochis, depriving Sind of water resources, and suppressing populations in the Pakistan Occupied Kashmir including Northern Areas.