Until recently, the Pakistani military was facing criticism for its alleged role in politics from all sections of society. Many in accused the generals of manipulating last year’s general elections to keep ex-PM Imran Khan out of power. They particularly blamed the army chief, General Asim Munir, for his role in , an accusation the military denies.
“We are facing so many problems because of the army,” a cab driver in Karachi told DW a month ago. “They are keeping Khan behind bars because he has challenged the military’s dominance.”
But everything changed after the — in India-administered — on April 22, in which 26 people, mostly Hindu men, were killed.
The attack was claimed by a group calling itself the Kashmir Resistance, which India says is also known as The Resistance Front and is linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a UN-designated terrorist organization.
New Delhi blamed Islamabad for backing the attack, an allegation Pakistan denies.
The crisis soon spiraled into a major military conflict between the two nuclear-armed arch-rivals.
On May 7, the Indian air force launched missile strikes, targeting what New Delhi said were terrorist camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir.
Dozens died in these attacks, and the death toll increased when Pakistan retaliated with its own strikes two days later.
Pakistani military back in the driver’s seat
“Unpopular regimes get a boost from these kinds of military conflicts. After India’s attack, even the [Pakistani] military critics, who are generally liberal and secular, were demanding that Islamabad should teach a lesson to New Delhi,” Naazir Mahmood, an Islamabad-based political analyst, told DW.
Both India and Pakistan claimed victory in the recent Kashmir conflict, with citizens rallying behind their governments.
In Pakistan, social media users have showered praise on the armed forces with a heightened nationalistic fervor. In some cities, people took to the streets to “celebrate the success” of the Pakistani military over Indian forces.
For instance, Mariam Hassan, a 36-year-old doctor in Lahore, told DW she was proud of the army’s performance.
“We have protected our country and did not emerge weak. We shot down Indian fighter jets and attacked India at various places,” she said, referring to Islamabad’s claims.
Analyst Mahmood believes the military regained its domestic strength. “Although the military already controlled all spheres of governance, its grip on politics will now be tightened,” he said.
Lahore-based journalist and analyst Farooq Sulehria said there is no scientific way to measure how much the latest fighting spurred the military’s popularity — social media posts and commentaries on mainstream media definitely show an upward trend.
“What we must understand is that the support for the military emerges from an anti-India sentiment. The military will now present this brief war as its own success. It will be used for image-building,” Sulehria told DW.
The ‘defender of Hindus’ narrative
Nationalists in are also portraying the episode as a “triumph” for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his (BJP).
The attack in Pahalgam put intense pressure on Modi’s government to strike back and punish the perpetrators and their backers.
“For India and Prime Minister Modi, the April 22 attack had to be responded to, more so after the opposition and social media users played clips of Modi berating former PM Manmohan Singh in the aftermath of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack in 2008 [for a lack of response],” Uday Bhaskar, a retired Indian naval officer, told DW. “Hence, Modi had to prove that he can lead India to ‘ghus kay maaro’ (enter and hit) all the way to Pakistan’s Punjab province, Muridke, and Bahawalpur.”
“This narrative bolsters the image of a ‘Modi-led India’ as being assertive, muscular, and with zero tolerance for jihadi terrorism. Axiomatically, this leads to the ‘defender of Hindus’ narrative, which has electoral benefits. The upcoming Bihar assembly elections will be a test case,” Bhaskar underlined.
But the between India and Pakistan has irked the Hindu nationalists in India, according to Shanthie Mariet D’Souza, president of the Mantraya Institute for Strategic Studies.
“I do not think the ceasefire is acceptable to all Indian nationalist groups as it falls drastically short of their expectations of inflicting losses on Pakistan,” she told DW.
“The BJP’s future policy towards Pakistan, however, will remain the same until Islamabad renounces its claim on Kashmir and stops promoting terrorism. That has broadly been the policy of other political parties as well,” D’Souza underlined.
Further curbs in India and Pakistan
Experts say that despite the jingoistic sentiment in both countries in the aftermath of the conflict, it will ultimately be the common people of the two nations that will bear the cost of the violence.
“The Pakistani military’s interference in politics will increase further, and the space for politicians will reduce even more,” analyst Mahmood said.
The latest conflict will also have an economic cost for Pakistanis, according to Mahmood: “The government is set to present the annual budget in June. The government has already said it plans to increase the defense budget substantially. The funds for development will shrink. I see the military ruling the country with an iron fist in the years to come.”
For Sulehria, the current scenario doesn’t augur well for civil rights in Pakistan. “There will now be a bigger crackdown on people’s movements in and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces. The authorities will resort to more repressive measures across the country.”
When asked about whether New Delhi could use the conflict to marginalize critics, including political opponents and minority communities, Bhaskar admitted that the “” could augment, but he hopes that New Delhi will not go down that road.
Murali Krishnan and Haroon Janjua, DW reporters in New Delhi and Islamabad, respectively, contributed to this report.
Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru
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