Three young Pakistanis – Qasim Aslam, Ayyaz Ahmad and Zoya Siddiqui – are providing schoolchildren in India and Pakistan with an opportunity to critically analyze, evaluate and question significant events in their nations’ shared history and heritage.

The History Project, comprising excerpts from three Indian textbooks and nine Pakistani textbooks, provides students an illuminating comparison of the ways that key historical events – leading up to partition – are taught in schools in both countries. 

Last month, Aslam, Ahmad and Siddiqui visited four schools in Mumbai – officially launching The History Project in India. Next month, the trio plans to introduce the project to schools across Pakistan, in the hope that it will spark healthy debate, underpinned by curiosity, impartiality, and an open-minded look at the tumultuous epoch that is India and Pakistan’s shared history.  

According to Aslam, the inspiration for The History Project came in 2005 from Feruzan Mehta, the then Country Director (India) for Seeds of Peace, an international NGO that seeks to inspire and train new leaders from conflict zones to build a more peaceful future. The inspiration grew in the ensuing years, and Aslam and Ahmad finally decided to make their shared dream a reality two years ago.

In an exclusive interview with The Diplomat, the founders of The History Project speak about the laborious process that went into the compilation of the book, the importance of a solid artistic element to complement the book and their experience of formally introducing their project to children in India last month.

What inspired you to undertake The History Project?

Qasim Aslam: It informally started off around 12 years ago when we met Indians across the border for the first time in our lives. We were at this conflict resolution camp [Seeds of Peace, hosted in Maine, USA], where a dozen Indians and Pakistanis were brought to live together for three weeks.

Over the course of that time, in addition to playing sports and indulging in other activities together, we found history to be a recurring discussion in our interaction. In some cases, the conversations resulted in flared emotions. Over those three weeks, we didn't quite reconcile our versions of history, but we did find it in ourselves to respect the alternative reality, its existence, and the fact that it was as authentic as ours. 

In an effort to scale this process, as it is super expensive to fly a couple dozen kids from the region to the U.S., we came up with the concept of The History Project; which, in essence, is taking the process to the kids themselves. 

Was compiling the book a difficult process?

Qasim Aslam: In retrospect, it was. It definitely was. We probably underestimated the task at hand when we set out to accomplish it. The first few months, we went around from expert to expert, trying to finalize the direction of the project. Everyone seemed to have an opinion – a legit, daunting contribution that sent us back to the drawing board more than once. 

We finally reached a conclusion after four months of extensive deliberations. Mid-way through the project, we realized that we couldn’t put out a book in pure text. We'd lose the interest of our target readership, kids between the ages of 12 and 15. The prospect of finding a decent illustrator turned out to be a journey in its own. 

And then came the grand finale of selling such an idea to the Indian High Commission for the purpose of visas, coordinating with schools across the border and a dozen other hoops that somehow got sorted out and we found ourselves in Mumbai one fine Monday morning in April this year.

Zoya, as the illustrator, tell us a little about the artistic element of the book. What did you visualize initially for the book and what did you think would work for your audience?

Zoya Siddiqui: I knew from the very beginning that the task would not be easy. An illustrator’s job is to very clearly show and reaffirm an opinion, whereas our idea for the whole project was to refrain from propagating our personal opinions and simply reproducing what information already exists in textbooks/history. The idea of a faceless man immediately struck as the solution to the problem.

The faceless man essentially depicts what we, the team, are doing: displaying established opinions as clothes or symbols that can be easily adopted, worn and shed. The faceless man has no symbols or opinions of his own, but he theatrically demonstrates both histories. History is thus shown not as absolute truth or “fact”, but rather as variable opinions and stereotypes. The truth is unknowable, like the faceless man.

Do you think children in Pakistan and India will be able to formulate their own opinions about their shared history after reading the book?

Zoya Siddiqui: Actually, we have not aimed for the children to formulate an opinion on Indo-Pakistani history when they read the book. Our goal is to trigger a thought process, to unsettle the students and confuse them, which is somewhat like what we went through after our Seeds of Peace camp experience. Even after all these years, we ourselves are struggling for answers.

However, the struggle is good, important and healthy. Having answers and well-formulated opinions, I personally believe, is dangerous. We wish for the students to get started on that journey to critical thinking, beyond textbooks.

Ayyaz, you and your team visited four schools in Mumbai last month. What was the response?

Ayyaz Ahmad: The response was phenomenal. The children and the teachers both were extremely interested to know and understand the Pakistani perspective. They also had a number of questions about Pakistan beyond the scope of history. They were quite curious about how Indian history was viewed in Pakistan and also about the cultural similarities between the two countries.

How did you go about contacting schools in India to introduce the book? Were they initially hesitant? 

Ayyaz Ahmad: In India, Seeds of Peace put us in touch with the local schools. In Pakistan, we are reaching out to different schools through friends involved with educational institutions.

When will you introduce the book to schools in Pakistan? 

Ayyaz Ahmad: We have already started a round of presentations in Pakistan. In the next month, we hope to visit a number of schools to introduce the initiative.

Through your research, what were some of the major discrepancies that you found in the textbooks? 

Ayyaz Ahmad: The primary difference is in the way different aspects of the same event are highlighted. This also became our focus as we worked on the book. The idea was that instead of imposing another narrative or our opinion, we would simply lay out what has already been written, to show that history is extremely dynamic and is a combination of numerous perspectives.

What do you hope your initiative achieves?

Ayyaz Ahmad: The History Project initiative has a two-fold objective; first, to enable the youth in conflict-stricken countries to have access to the other side of conflict history in their formative years. And second, to get youth to question the generally accepted stereotypes (not just pertaining to history) which form the foundation of their ideologies. We hope that the books will instill in the youth, the importance of recognizing alternative perspectives; that there is always another side to every story.

Sonya Rehman is a journalist based in Lahore, Pakistan. She can be reached at: sonjarehman@gmail.com.

Last month, well-known Pakistani pop star, Shehzad Roy made an appearance at Harvard to talk about music, activism and his new documentary series, Chal Parha (Urdu for: Come, Teach), which highlights the extensive issues plaguing Pakistan’s education system.

Having visited over 200 schools across the country, in an interview with DAWN, Roy stated: “In each episode we highlight an issue from public schools, for example, corporal punishment, medium of instruction, population, textbooks, curriculum, teachers.”

He added, “I want to share the lessons that we have learnt; both good and ugly. We want people to know the obstacles standing in the way of improving the structure of education in government schools while also highlighting the remarkable individuals committed to the teaching profession. These people prove the power of individual efforts.”

Broadcast on a local television channel, GEO TV, the show  has gained immense popularity, fast making an impact in a country where, according to the non-profit Alif Ailaan, the government spends just 2.4 percent of its national GDP on education and where just over half of children enroll in primary school.

Mariam Chughtai, the founder of Harvard’s Pakistan Student Group told The Diplomat that the singer was invited primarily because the student group “is committed to changing the discourse on Pakistan at Harvard from one of terrorism and challenges, to that of resilience, art and social change.”

“[Roy] embodied for us an activist who is using music to make an impact on the ground, which is why his discussants, Professor Ali Asani and I were able to have a conversation with him in light of how artists have historically played a key role in keeping governments and rulers accountable,” Chughtai said.

“Roy himself spoke of the main learnings he has had in his journey of Chal Parha, including clippings from his show which illustrated these learnings. They represented both strengths and weaknesses of society in being ready for change on education.”

Alongside his music career, which, over the past couple of years, has veered sharply into the direction of socio-political commentary, Roy has managed to rather successfully integrate both his music and humanitarian work.

Having launched Zindagi Trust, an NGO that focuses primarily on education for the underprivileged in Pakistan, in 2003, Roy made headlines in local and foreign media when the musician brought Bryan Adams to Pakistan in 2006 as part of Roy’s Rock for a Cause charity concert in the wake of the tragic earthquake that killed thousands and left many homeless in Pakistan.

Apart from raising awareness about the appalling condition of public schools in the country, Roy also hopes to bring about considerable, tangible, and long-lasting change within the national education system itself.

Roy told Dawn, “We have installed thumb-printing attendance machines in the five provinces to bring transparency to the issue of teacher absenteeism. We are now collecting this data and are happy to report that teacher attendance has increased considerably in these schools. Similarly, in the episode on corporal punishment, we are proposing a law banning physical abuse in schools and we plan to diligently pursue this issue in the media.”

The particular episode on corporal punishment that Roy mentioned features a young girl, Malaika, whose eye was damaged after her teacher threw a pen at her for not paying attention in class.

The episode prompted the approval of a bill on corporal punishment by the National Assembly in March that prohibits the physical abuse of children in educational institutions in Pakistan. Once the bill becomes law, an individual found guilty of administering corporal punishment in an educational institution in the country will be liable to pay a fine of Rs. 50,000, serve a one-year prison sentence, or both. 

Given the state of public school education in Pakistan today, there is hope that Roy’s high-impact initiative will act as a much-needed impetus for change and reform of the country’s education emergency.

Sonya Rehman is a journalist based in Lahore, Pakistan. She can be reached at: sonjarehman@gmail.com.

Now that we know Nawaz Sharif will succeed Raja Pervez Ashraf as the next prime minster of Pakistan, it’s worth noting that Pakistan has never seen a democratic transition as smooth as the one set to take place between the outgoing Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the newly elected Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, or PML(N).

In its 66-year history as an independent nation, Pakistan has witnessed three military coups and extended rule by army generals. Even today, the nation is plagued by political turmoil. But this year seems to be a new chapter in its turbulent history.

The verdict from the 2013 elections gives the PML(N) 123 seats out of 254 declared results as of Tuesday evening, giving Sharif’s party an unassailable lead over its main rivals, PPP and Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, which had secured 31 and 26 seats, respectively. The electoral results for the final 18 of Pakistan’s 272 National Assembly seats remain unannounced.

The voter turnout this year was impressive, with 60 percent of all registered voters turning up to the polls, up from a 45 percent turnout in the last national elections in 2008. This impressive turnout came despite the threat of violence. More than 150 people lost their lives and scores were injured in attacks by insurgents across the country during the election campaigning period and on election day. This brave statement by the people of Pakistan sends a new message to the outside world and gives hope for peace on the Subcontinent.

In particular, India has a stake in the democratic success of its neighbor, with whom relations have been turbulent. There is widespread hope in India that Sharif, who formed a new Indo-Pakistani relationship in the 1990s, will revive the peace process and improve Islamabad’s ties with New Delhi.

Indian Prime minister Manmohan Singh was one of the first world leaders to congratulate Sharif after his emphatic victory. In a letter, Singh talked about charting a new course for the relationship between the two countries and invited his Pakistan counterpart to visit India.

Sharif reciprocated and emphasized the need for improved relations with India. He further stressed the importance of resolving issues, including Kashmir, through peaceful means. He even informally invited the Indian premier to his inauguration ceremony in Islamabad.

According to veteran Pakistani author and political analyst Ahmed Rashid, circumstances may be more favorable this time for Sharif to improve ties with New Delhi. He writes, “During his two premierships in the 1990s, Sharif made genuine efforts at peace with India but was thwarted by an aggressive and uncompromising army.” But, he continues, “The army—faced with a severe weakening of the state—now seems more amenable to improving relations with New Delhi.”

The Hindu opines that where Sharif “gives most hope is in his strong and unambiguous articulation of better India-Pakistan relations, though this will depend on his stated determination to correct the civil-military imbalance, and reclaim the national agenda from the security establishment. Whether he can succeed is another question, but India will be hoping he will.”

As Pakistan passes through a rough economic patch, deeper engagement with its immediate neighbor will not only give the volatile country increased political stability but will also boost growth. India can play a major role in reviving Pakistan's bankrupt economy as a potential investor.

According to an article published by the New Delhi-based think tank Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), trade between the two South Asian countries could receive renewed impetus under the new regime, barring complications from opposition by the religious right. However, the IDSA article also notes that “one should not expect a lot of change in policies related to terrorism targeted at India or its aversion to India’s presence in Afghanistan.”

Despite skepticism, there is a general mood of optimism in India about the regime change in Pakistan. Just a couple of weeks ago Indian media was full of anti-Pakistan stories in the wake of the attack on Indian prisoner Sarabjit Singh in a Pakistani jail. While most Indian reports were full of jingoism in their coverage of the death of Singh, the election has changed the tone of the discourse.

The optimism stems from Sharif’s earlier initiatives in the 1990s to deepen ties with India. In 1999, he started a bus service that runs between Lahore and New Delhi. Then Indian PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee visited Pakistan in the inaugural bus ride. This bonhomie, however, was short-lived. Later that year hostilities erupted between the two nations at the Kargil sector, when the Pakistani army crossed the Line of Control under the leadership of former military ruler Pervez Musharraf.

The new leadership in Pakistan has a very tough job at hand: alleviate the deep-seated historical fear and mistrust between the two countries.

Likewise, India will have to show maturity in understanding the changing mood and aspirations of the people of Pakistan.

New Delhi needs to recognize that never before has there been such an overwhelming consensus for Pakistan to normalize relations with India. If the leaderships of both countries work hard to tap this desire, they may be able to usher in a new era of peace and progress on the Subcontinent.

Preoccupied with its own border tensions with China, India has given little attention to the other border dispute brewing in the region, the one between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Yet a spate of border clashes between the two states to India’s west could have a far-reaching impact on the wider region, which could also compound Delhi’s clash with Beijing. 

Afghanistan has historically refused to recognize the legitimacy of the Durand Line, contending that it is a relic of the region’s colonial past. The line, drawn by the British in the 19^th century, was meant to delineate British India from Afghanistan and cuts through lands populated by Pashtun tribes. Since Pakistan’s creation in 1947, the Durand Line has served as the de-facto border between the two nations. In stark contrast to Afghanistan’s position, Pakistan considers the Durand Line a settled international boundary and has consistently refused to discuss its legitimacy.

In recent weeks, the Afghan government has loudly denounced a slew of new Pakistani border posts, which officials in Kabul claim are being built in their territory. On May 2, border fighting erupted in the rugged Goshta area of eastern Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province, following growing complaints over construction of the outposts. According to a Wall Street Journal report, Afghan officials said the incident began after an Afghan Border Police unit deployed on the Goshta border noticed Pakistani forces beginning additional work to fortify their outpost, despite recent agreements to suspend construction.

The ensuing clashes, among the worst in recent years, left one Afghan border guard dead and two Pakistani soldiers injured. In a measure of growing Afghan fury over Pakistan’s perceived violation of Afghan sovereignty, thousands of protesters took to the streets, chanting “Death to Pakistan”. 

This response, however, has done little to end the violence. On May 12, at least two children were injured and four houses damaged after shelling by Pakistani forces in Afghanistan’s Kunar province, indicating that border tensions were far from over. The clashes have led to mounting public support for the Afghan military – an irony given that years of fighting with the Taliban have seldom led to similar levels of support.

For India, the Afghan-Pakistan border row could be a double-edged sword. New Delhi and Islamabad have long fought a turf war for influence over Afghanistan. Between 1996 and 2001, Pakistan’s support for the Taliban regime ensured that India remained on the fringe in Afghanistan. Following the Taliban’s ouster in 2001 after the US-led invasion, however, India soon emerged as one of Afghanistan’s biggest regional donors. In the last decade, India has pumped aid into Afghanistan to the tune of more than U.S. $2 billion, building important highways, constructing the Afghan parliament and training the Afghan military.

India’s high-profile Afghan engagement has been a constant source of worry for Pakistan, which has sought to maintain “strategic depth” in Afghanistan. With foreign forces due to withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014, Pakistan’s leverage over the Taliban as its former backer is seen as being crucial to facilitating talks between Kabul and the Taliban. While that may well be a window of opportunity for Pakistan to regain a foothold in Afghanistan, the furious reaction among Afghanis in recent days may indicate deep-seated suspicions and misgivings about Islamabad’s intentions.

Moreover, given the zero-sum game that India and Pakistan often find themselves in vis-à-vis Afghanistan, New Delhi may see the row as a vindication of its own Afghan policy, which has been a blend of hard power – such as economic aid – and soft power elements like Bollywood’s reach and goodwill from student exchange programs for Afghans.

However, New Delhi’s stand on the row will be dictated by tensions with China over the disputed Sino-Indian border, where its position mirrors that of Pakistan on the Durand Line. Like in the case of the Durand Line, the McMahon Line dividing China and India is a vestige of the British colonial era and is not recognized by China.

Agreed by Britain and Tibet in 1914, the line became the de-facto China-India border after Beijing’s annexation of Tibet in the 1950s. Unlike Beijing, New Delhi considers the McMahon Line a settled international boundary. This dispute sparked the recent three-week standoff in Ladakh after the Chinese military set up an outpost, 19 kilometers inside Indian territory.

It is said that politics makes strange bedfellows. In the case of the Afghan-Pakistani border row, it seems likely that India’s position will be dictated by its own territorial row with China, rather than any hope of winning a game of strategic one-upmanship over Pakistan.

Declan Walsh, the Islamabad Bureau Chief for The New York Times, was ordered to leave Pakistan, on May 9, just before this year’s crucial elections.

As reported in the paper, a vague letter, delivered to Walsh by police officers on Thursday night, stated: “It is informed that your visa is hereby canceled in view of your undesirable activities. You are therefore advised to leave the country within 72 hours.”

Given that Walsh lived in and covered Pakistan for nearly a decade – during his tenure at The Guardian, and then later with The New York Times – the order has come as a shock to the journalistic community both within and outside the country.

“Pakistan has expelled one of its most reliable and sane foreign voices,” Saad Sarfraz Sheikh, an independent photojournalist, told The Diplomat, “It just shows how our ‘democracy’ and establishment cannot digest a free media. And then we complain of having a bad image in the West!”

“Here I go. Hard to believe this is happening,” Walsh tweeted  on May 12. He later tweeted, “72 hours, wheels up. To all friends, especially in Pakistan, who offered overwhelming support in recent days, thank you so much.”

Journalist Rabia Mehmood told The Diplomat that Walsh’s expulsion sets a “scary” precedent for journalists in Pakistan. Mehmood said this incident “shows us yet again that the security of a journalist remains one of the biggest issues” in the country and that “the powers that be will keep reminding us as to who calls the shots [in Pakistan].”

According to Malik Siraj Akbar, the editor of The Baloch Hal, a website that remains blocked in Pakistan, Walsh was “one of the most well-known and widely respected journalists” in Pakistan. “He was one reporter who covered Pakistan beyond the stereotypical lens of security, terrorism and fundamentalism,” Akbar told The Diplomat.

Akbar added, “During the past couple of years, space for free expression has alarmingly shrunk in Pakistan even during democratic governments. Journalists are uncertain about the level and the period of freedom they can enjoy. The government still is powerful enough to unplug any journalist's activities.”

In 2011, Walsh gave an enlightening talk at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) on the “War on Secrecy: The Impact of WikiLeaks on Journalism” to a packed auditorium. At the time, the journalist was working as a correspondent for The Guardian.

Personally, I found Walsh’s talk to be a fascinating one. He not only spoke about WikiLeaks and its impact on the world and the media industry in general, but also about his own personal experiences working as a journalist in Pakistan.

But Walsh’s expulsion is only one example of the local government’s efforts to silence the media and curb freedom of speech in Pakistan.

YouTube, for instance, has been banned in Pakistan since September 2012, when the trailer of the controversial production, Innocence of Muslims, was uploaded to the site. The trailer sparked protests across the country.

“The government’s decision to continue blocking YouTube also shows Pakistan’s problems with freedom of expression,” Akbar told The Diplomat. “Pakistan is one such country that feels deeply insecure about Western journalists. Officials in the country’s military suspect many Western journalists are spies for foreign governments.”

This sensitivity to the outside world, it seems, is the heart of the matter.

“Within Pakistan, there is a certain level of expectation of the government from the journalists to respect ‘our nationalist interests’ or ‘to improve our national image,’” Akbar added. “When Western journalists report on sensitive issues (like terrorism and human rights) that embarrass Pakistani authorities, they then accuse these journalists of spying or indulging in undesired activities. These are just some of the pretexts the government uses to expel foreign journalists.”

Sonya Rehman is a journalist based in Lahore, Pakistan. She can be reached at: sonjarehman@gmail.com

Former Iranian President Hashemi Akbar Rafsanjani registered to run as a candidate in Iran’s upcoming presidential election, currently scheduled for June 14. His candidacy must be approved by the country’s Guardian Council, an election body chosen by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and its Chief Justice, who is himself appointed by the Supreme Leader.

Rafsanjani, often called “the shark” owing to his clean shaven face and shrewd political maneuvering, served as Iran’s president following the death of the Islamic Republic’s founder Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. He also played a pivotal role in Khamenei’s appointment as Supreme Leader, but the two men have been engaged in a power struggle ever since.

Since before the Iranian revolution Rafsanjani was a close confidante of Imam Khomeini and served in a number of posts during his lifetime, including Speaker of the Parliament and the day-to-day commander-in-chief of the Iranian military near the end of the war with Iraq. In the latter position, he was reportedly one of the individuals responsible for persuading Khomeini to agree to a ceasefire with Saddam Hussein after eight bitter years of war.

Rafsanjani’s last presidency (1989-1997) was characterized by a focus on rebuilding the economy following a decade of revolution and war. As such, he filled his cabinet, “the cabinet of reconstruction,” with a group of technocrats. According to Saïd Amir Arjomand, an Iran expert at Stony Brook University, Rafsanjani’s second cabinet consisted of nine engineers and eight individuals with M.D.s and PhDs.

As president Rafsanjani also reopened Tehran’s stock market and put forth a legal framework for privatization in his First Five-Year Development Plan (1990-1994), although the latter faltered amid opposition from Iran’s Parliament.

That said, the size of the government swelled during his presidency with the number of public employees (excluding armed forces) growing from 1.4 million people (2.8 percent of the population) in 1987, to 2.3 million people (3.9 percent of the population in 1997), according to Arjomand. Ultimately, Rafsanjani’s economic agenda was largely unsuccessful as the economy was plagued by high levels of inflation among myriad other issues.

As part of his drive to boost the economy, Rafsanjani also tried to repair Iran’s relations with its neighbors and global powers including the United States and Europe. Following George H.W. Bush saying “good will begets good will” during his inaugural address in 1989, Rafsanjani reached out to the American administration through the UN.

When told that the U.S. would recognize Saddam as the aggressor in the Iraq War if Iran would convince Hezbollah to free American hostages in Lebanon, Rafsanjani put heavy pressure on the Lebanese group to do just that. Owing to Rafsanjani’s pressure and the extraordinary effort of Italian UN diplomat Giandomenico Picco, the last hostage was freed in 1991. By that time, however, the Bush administration decided that it no longer wanted to form a new relationship with Iran.

Undeterred, Rafsanjani began reaching out to the U.S. again after Bill Clinton’ was elected in 1992. This culminated in Rafsanjani awarding Iran’s first post-revolutionary oil contract—worth US$1 billion— to the American oil company Conoco, believing that a beneficial economic relationship would pave the way to the resumption of political ties.

Despite the State Department having assured Conoco that the White House would approve a deal during its negotiations with Iran, Clinton issued two executive orders following the announcement that effectively banned any U.S. companies from investing in Iran’s oil industry. As Clinton and later President Obama’s Middle East aide, Dennis Ross, explained: “We weren't interested in creating a new opening towards Iran. We were interested in containing what we saw as a threat.” The next year the U.S. Congress made Clinton’s executive orders the law of the land with the passage of the Iran Libya Sanctions Act of 1996.

Although Rafsanjani has lost both a Parliamentary campaign and the 2005 Presidential Election since his presidency ended, he has remained a powerful figure in Iranian politics (the second most powerful after Khamenei, most observers agreed until 2011). Besides being a cleric and one of the wealthiest individuals in the country, he served for years as both the chairman of the Assembly of Experts, a body charged with selecting and theoretically supervising the Supreme Leader and of the Expediency Council, which adjudicates disputes between the Parliament and the Guardian Council. His implicit support of the Green Movement following the 2009 elections created even more animosity between Rafsanjani and Khamenei, however, and he was removed as Chairman of the Assembly of Experts in 2011. He remains the chairman of the less powerful Expediency Council.

He is also one of current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s most ardent rivals. Rafsanjani lost to Ahmadinejad in the 2005 election during which Ahmadinejad campaigned in no small part on criticisms of Rafsanjani and other revolutionary elites who he charged had become corrupt and used their positions in power to amass large personal fortunes. Ahmadinejad has made it a point throughout his presidency to portray himself as standing up to Rafsanjani and other regime stalwarts, and in the 2009 presidential election claimed he wasn’t merely running against former Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi, but rather against a united front comprised Mousavi, Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami, Iran’s former Reformist president.

Khamenei is almost certain to try to undermine Rafsanjani’s campaign, although it’s unlikely the Guardian Council will declare him ineligible to run given Rafsanjani’s clout with Iran’s clerics and certain political leaders, including the Reformists. During the 2005 presidential campaign, one of Rafsanjani’s sons, Mehdi Hashemi, told the Atlantic Council’s Barbara Slavin that if Rafsanjani won he would work to turn the Supreme Leader into a ceremonial post like the “King of England.”

Around the same time, in an interview with Slavin, the elder Rafsanjani also suggested he’d still be open to having a dialogue with the United States if he was reelected to Iran’s presidency.

He appears to still have similar views regarding negotiations with the U.S., writing on his website last month, that only “domestic empathy and global coexistence” could solve Iran’s problems, and stating “if we could realize these two facts, our problems will solve gradually.”

Although Rafsanjani is almost certain to be in favor of negotiating with the United States, the chances of a U.S.-Iran deal could, paradoxically, be reduced if he is elected president next month.

Any deal with the U.S. would require the approval of Supreme Leader Khamenei, who is unlikely to want a rival to power like Rafsanjani such a diplomatic coup, especially given Rafsanjani’s reported interest in weakening the post of Supreme Leader. In the past, Khamenei has been more receptive to a deal when he calculated the credit would go to him, although he has acquiesced to Iranian presidents making offers at other times as well.

Zachary Keck serves as assistant editor for The Diplomat.

Last week, I hosted a friend and former classmate, who comes from the Pakistani city of Multan. India-Pakistan ties are tenuous at the best of times, and a great deal of mutual suspicion often ensures that visas are hard to get. In my friend Humayun’s case, the visa came through after weeks of suspense topped by a visit to my home by junior officials from the Indian Home Ministry who sought to vet his credentials.

Our shared penchant for sub-continental politics inspired me to fill his three-day itinerary with visits to places high on political symbolism. Our first stop was Old Delhi, home to the Red Fort and the Jama Masjid, both built by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan. Walking through the Lahore Gate, the Red Fort’s main gateway, Humayun exclaimed that one of the 13 gates leading into Lahore’s Walled City was called Delhi Gate. Soon after, at India’s largest mosque - the Jama Masjid - he revealed that the edifice was almost identical to the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore. This made me wonder about the extent of our countries’ shared history.

The journey from Old Delhi to New Delhi was seamless and soon we were in Lutyens’ Delhi, home to India’s corridors of power. There we visited the Teen Murti Bhavan, which served as the residence of the Commander of the British Indian Army in the days of the Raj. After independence, it became the home of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his daughter and India’s third prime minister, Indira Gandhi. Since Nehru’s death in 1964, the historic building has served as the Nehru Museum and Library, offering rich insights into India’s independence movement, which culminated in the end of British rule and the creation of India and Pakistan in August 1947.

However, for Humayun and I the highpoint of our attempts to retrace our countries’ pasts was the visit to the Indira Gandhi Memorial at 1 Safdarjung Road. India’s “Iron Lady” lived at the address until she was assassinated here by two of her Sikh bodyguards on October 31, 1984. During her 15 years as prime minister, slogans such as “Indira is India, India is Indira” were common and indicative of Gandhi’s larger-than-life persona. Newspaper reports covering her tumultuous years in office adorned the walls of the memorial. Looking at them, it was easy to understand why she was loved and reviled in equal measure.

At one point, I excitedly signaled towards a story in The Statesman headlined “Joi Bangla”, a reference to the unconditional surrender of Pakistani forces to the Indian Army in Dacca that led to the creation of Bangladesh. But I quickly realized the story would have an entirely negative connotation for my friend. If the military victory in 1971 was the high point of Gandhi’s political career, her choice to call for a state of emergency and suspend civil liberties from June 1975 to March 1977 in what would become known as the Indian Emergency was the lowest point in independent India’s history. 

Later that evening, on the BBC, we saw video footage of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf chief Imran Khan tumbling from a makeshift lift at an election campaign rally in Lahore, effectively ending his ability to campaign further for the May 11 general elections. Until then, the assumption – and one I shared – was that former Pakistan Prime Minister and head of the Pakistan Muslim League (N), Nawaz Sharif, would return to power. Humayun debunked the assessment, saying that Khan’s fall would catapult him to political superstardom and probably to the position of Prime Minister. 

It seemed incredulous to me that the Pakistani electorate would be so gullible as to vote for a candidate simply on a sympathy vote of this nature. But, if the visit to Gandhi’s museum should have taught me anything, it was that people in South Asia love charismatic leaders, however flawed. After all, the Indian electorate gave Gandhi a resounding mandate in 1980, after the short-lived Janata government (1977-80) indulged in a political witch-hunt attempting to punish Gandhi for her emergency excesses.

And here in Pakistan was a hugely popular and charismatic cricketer-turned-politician promising the youth – a third of all registered voters – freedom from political dynasties and access to economic opportunity by ushering them into a new era of promise and hope.

My cynicism was reflective of the fact that too often Indians have been swayed by promises made by their own political knights in shining armor, only to be bitterly disappointed. With the current government mired in corruption scandals running into billions of dollars, faith in our political classes is at its nadir. But, one cannot grudge the optimism voiced by Pakistanis like Humayun.

Alas, when results from the polls came in last night my skepticism proved correct.

"The people might admire him and worship him as a cricket hero, but when they go into the polling booth they are thinking about practical issues like which party will deliver jobs," said PML-N candidate Sardar Ayaz Sadiq.

“I congratulate the entire nation for taking part in such a massive democratic process,” Khan said in a video message yesterday evening after the results came in that he had failed to make the political gains he promised his followers. “We are moving forward on the path of democracy.”

Amid the congratulatory message, Khan also vowed that his party would formally protest alleged vote rigging, which some suggest kept the former cricket superstar from winning.

While Khan may not have won the elections, according to the news on Sunday night, he still shook things up in Pakistan. His party, which had only won a single parliamentary seat in the past, gained an impressive 30 seats and a strong foothold in the country’s troubled northwest in this election. In this sense, the cricket icon still delivered what he promised: tabdeeli (change).

The Assembly election results in the southern Indian state of Karnataka this week sent out strong signals to what both the Congress Party and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) must do to be successful in the general election next year.

When BJP won the state in 2008, it was considered to be a big achievement for the party given that its traditional stronghold has been in northern India.

Five years later, however, the party is now relegated to the third position; the electorate in Karnataka evidently does not consider the BJP fit enough to be the main Opposition party, which is the hub of the IT industry and a dynamic face of modern India. The party won only 40 seats out of 224 compared to the 110 seats it won in 2008. Its vote share came down to 21 percent from over 40 percent five years earlier.

How can one explain this abysmal showing in one of south India’s most significant states? What impact it will have on the party’s fortunes in the upcoming general election next year?

The conventional political analysis is that the Hindutva party’s poor showing was the result of its misgovernance and indulgence in large scale corruption that led to the removal of its most popular Chief Minister, B S Yeddyurappa. The BJP had to change Chief Ministers three times in the span of five years, and several of its ministers were jailed under graft charges. A frontline state known for its robust economic growth became a byword for corruption.

But one school of thought believes that the BJP paid the price for turning the Karnataka into a Hindutva laboratory and attempting to alter the secular and cosmopolitan ethos of the state

The BJP paid the price for underestimating the sensibilities of voters and undermining the liberal tradition of the state.

For the Congress party the verdict in south India has been a much needed victory and it comes at a time when the Grand Old Party is besieged with a plethora of problems related to misgovernance and corruption charges against several top Cabinet ministers.

Indeed, over the last year the party has been in throes of a series of crises. The constant demands for Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh to resign and the BJP’s constant disruptions in Parliament have paralyzed the government.

The victory in Karnataka,therefore, serves as a big morale booster for the Congress. It managed to win 121 seats out of 224 in an election that witnessed the emergence of Janata Dal (Secular), which ultimately became the main Opposition Party in the state, taking 40 seats.

However, the irony is that the party’s return to power in Bangalore, the state capital, after twelve years, is somewhat bittersweet -- the verdict demonstrates that people are willing to trust the Congress party provided it mends its ways and addresses the issue of governance in a serious manner. Failing that, the party awaits the same fate in the national capital that BJP met in Bangalore.

Finally, diplomacy has prevailed. After almost three weeks of standoff, India and China decided to maintain the status quo along their ill defined border and withdraw troops from their respective camps in the Daulat Beg Oldi area of Ladakh in eastern Kashmir. The agreement was reached after two weeks of intense parlays.

The agreement paves the way for Indian Foreign Minister Salman Khursheed’s visit to China, which commenced today, as well as the planned visit of Chinese premier Li Keqiang to New Delhi on May 20, his first foreign trip since assuming the role.

India has denied striking a deal with China on the withdrawal of troops from Ladakh. “The governments of India and China have agreed to restore status quo along Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Western Sector as it existed prior to April 15,” Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin told CNN-IBN. “Flag meetings have been held to work out modalities and to confirm the arrangements.”

The channel also quotes sources who said that the standoff stemmed from the failure of India and China to exchange maps of the western and eastern sectors of the LAC.

According to the Financial Times, New Delhi claimed that 30 Chinese troops, supported by helicopters, set up tents 19 kilometers inside territory it normally holds near the disputed border in Ladakh. In response, Indian forces surrounded the Chinese camp.

The incident at the undefined border created hysteria in the country with political parties and hawkish experts accusing the Congress-led government of going soft on China. Critics suggested that New Delhi had allowed its neighbor to gain a strategic advantage at the Kashmir border. Debates on television and commentary in newspapers urged the government to take a stand and use military intervention to push the Chinese back.

The crisis at the border came at a time when the government is facing hostile opposition on several domestic issues. To its credit, the government in New Delhi maintained its composure and withstood domestic pressure on the matter. This represents a departure from the recent tendency for domestic political pressure to virtually dictate New Delhi’s foreign policy.

For instance, India could not sign the Teesta Water Treaty with Bangladesh last year due to opposition from Mamata Banerjee of West Bengal, raising doubts in Bangladesh about India’s ability to stand by its ally. Domestic voices have also opposed the Constitution Amendment Bill that would ratify the land boundary agreement between India and Bangladesh.

Meanwhile, India’s relationship with Sri Lanka has been plagued by regional politics in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, where support from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) regional party is important for the survival of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government in New Delhi. DMK leaders have protested the Congress-led government’s stance on Sri Lanka’s alleged war crimes.

The Congress-led government voted in favour of the U.S.-sponsored UN Resolution, calling for Sri Lanka to address "continuing reports of violations of human rights" in the country, including threats to judicial independence and media intimidation. This vote has since strained India-Sri Lanka relations.

India’s ties with Pakistan have also been strained. The recent death of an Indian prisoner in a Pakistani jail has invoked nationalist sentiments in India against its western neighbor, prompting political opposition and the media to pressure the government to slowits push to increase contact and commerce with its neighbor.

Yet, all is not lost. While domestic politics and media pressure have taken a toll on diplomacy in many cases, the recent stand-down with China on the Ladakh border is an improvement and perhaps signals a diplomatic shift. Khursheed’s visit to China this week and Li’s upcoming visit to New Delhi will be telling.

As votes were being tallied in the south Indian state of Karnataka yesterday afternoon, it became increasingly clear that India’s ruling Congress Party was routing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has ruled the state for the past five years.

Last night it was official: Of the 224 assembly seats up for grabs in the Karnataka elections, Congress won at least 121, a comfortable majority. The BJP, which formerly claimed Karnataka as its stronghold, secured a meager 40. Meanwhile, regional party Janata Dal (Secular), or JD (S), made large gains, matching the BJP with 40 seats. A list of key winners and losers can be seen here.

Of more than 41 million eligible voters in the state, 71 percent turned out to vote for more than 2,900 candidates. The desire for change resounded across the state, including the youthful capital city of Bangalore, an information technology powerhouse known as the “Silicon Valley of India.”

According to the BBC’s Soutik Biswas, the win represents a major blow to the Hindu nationalist BJP, which may portend disappointment in India’s general elections next year. “We have had a setback," conceded former Karnataka chief minister and BJP leader Sadananda Gowda. The BJP won 110 seats at the last Karnataka elections in 2008.

Handing in his resignation, the BJP's Jagadish Shettar said, "What image we lost earlier, that continued... Allegations against ministers, Chief Ministers were in the minds of the people."

Reactions from the other major parties were equally strong.

"The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) rout in Karnataka is a clear result against (its) ideology,” added Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who gave credit to his party’s vice president Rahul Gandhi for his role in the win. "The people of the country know what's what and they will reject the BJP ideology as the result in Karnataka shows."

Meanwhile, HD Kumaraswamy, JD(S) leader and former chief minister of Karnataka, vowed that his party will to "fight against Congress like we fought against BJP... We will sit in the Opposition." 

Throughout the election, allegations of corruption were hurled from both sides in Karnataka The BJP dispatched Nadrenda Modi, touted as the party’s potential prime ministerial candidate, to the state, while the Congress party sent Rahul Gandhi and other senior leaders, both to downplay accusations of graft and campaign in the state ahead of next year’s national polls.

Gandhi was credited with playing a major role in the win, but BJP leader Modi, chief minister of Gujarat, suffered a setback. “No one knows Narendra Modi outside Gujarat,” said Digvijay Singh, general secretary of Congress. “It has been proved again by Karnataka.”

Going a step further, Union Telecommunications Minister Kapil Sibal added, “It has been proved that he (Modi) is a big zero. He has no impact on the voters of Karnataka.”

The next step in the election process will be filling the chief minister’s post. Leading contender K Siddaramaiah said, "We are thankful to the people of Karnataka for giving a clear majority. We will give a corruption-free, stable, able government." Alongside Siddaramaiah, Mallikarjun Kharge and RV Deshpande are also considered candidates to watch in the race for the chief minister post.

While the victory is a strong indicator of forward momentum for Congress leading up to next year’s national polls, it is worth noting that the mandate also reflects a populace fed up with corruption and mismanagement. In light of this reality, some suggest that the party’s jubilant response could be premature. It is, after all, embroiled in an image crisis due to its “Coalgate” and “Railgate” scandals.

“Shouldn't Congress be worried by the Karnataka mandate?” asks a post in India Times. “Because hailing it as a sign that voters will punish corruption in governance, the Congress looks really silly as it struggles with multiple corruption scandals at the center.”