INTERVIEW TO R. K. KARANJIA, EDITOR, “BLITZ”, BOMBOY, AT RAWALPINDI, September 7, 1972

Interviewer: One thing I noticed here is the free play of democracy. I mean Swaran Singh’s statement was front-paged in the “Dawn” the day I carne here. On the centre page was an article on the case for a secular Pakistan. Take “Pakistan Times”, for example. They have made very strong plea for the recognition of Bangladesh. They are going a little beyond you.

President: No, I think we are moving together. This is all preparation for the people; very difficult to go straight to complete freedom, you know, in these matters there are ups and downs and sometimes people don’t quite appreciate our difficulties across the border. We have got similarities but there are differences also and our people get emotionally tied up quicker than yours, I think. You can’t hit it, you know, on the face. You have to go and explain it to them, and if you know, you are doing the right thing; there is no difficulty in the long run. It only means a little loss of time. Originally I planned to take the Bangladesh issue to the National Assembly after first meeting Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. I said that not only to the Prime Minister of India but also to friends in Turkey and other places that my time-table and schedule was that we will be able to meet Mujibur Rahman in July. We were expecting to meet him. There were some indirect indications that he would meet us.

Interviewer: Did he tell you so before you had released him?

President: Yes, of course, before I released him. On the 27th of December I met him and again on the 7th of January and then lie himself volunteered the suggestion that he would meet me and he wants to meet me soon after he goes back to Dacca. He would establish, as he said, his footing and the first thing he would like to do is to return to London to have discussions with me.

Interviewer: On return from London?

President: No, from Dacca when he returns to London.

Interviewer: And meet you in London.

President: To meet me in London.

Interviewer: Aha, so that is the secret and that is probably the reason why you insist on meeting him, probably to remind him.

President: Yes, I told him on the telephone the other night. I phoned him from here enquiring about his health. I reminded him that he repeatedly told me on the 27th of December and 7th of January that we must meet, thrash out all our preliminary problems and then we can go ahead and take the next logical step.

Interviewer: Was he a free man or was he a prisoner then?

President: I told him I was releasing him. I had saved him from, I think, possible execution. So I don’t think he had any reasons to doubt my word and also that I was going to free him. So, I don’t think he was under duress.

Interviewer: Quite.

President: But after that also we had indications from some of our friends—from the Indonesians, I think, nebulous kinds of assurances that they will be able to arrange a meeting. I think we were moving in that direction. Wherever we went we were given the impression that he was going to meet us. So I thought we will meet in July. After the meeting I wanted to tour some parts of the country where feelings are high on this matter for understandable reasons. So, I thought that after preparing public opinion I would take this issue of recognition to the National Assembly and have it passed in the Assembly, and after that in the General Assembly of the United Nations we could have even supported the admission. So much so that I said to Mr. Kosygin in March that, I hope, we can move fast. Because the faster we move in these matters, the quicker we get down to the real basic issues of economic development. So you see this has all got dislocated by his position, by the stand he has taken that under no circumstances he will meet; that first there must be recognition. I am afraid; it is difficult to take that to the people. They expect negotiations. They expect that we would be able to tell him that we are still prepared to have some kind of relationship; it is also in the minds of the people that he might still consider the loosest form of arrangement like a customs union or something like that, preferential trade, common market or something of that nature, and even to say, by way of making a gesture that, look here, if you accept the fact that mistakes were made, we are prepared to make amends; you become the President of the whole country, you are the majority leader—things of that kind.

Interviewer: Supposing he does not?

President: That is all right.

Interviewer: But even then you would recognize?

President: I have told him that we are not living in a vacuum. We have to carry the people with us and we can’t go about the soldierly way of Ayub Khan and Yahya Khan that has caused us this disaster. Unless I can carry the people with me it will be difficult for me to move forward. I believe my evaluation is that I will carry the people with me. After all that much evaluation can be made by a person who is thrown up by the people and I don’t see how there is any other way of effecting reconciliation without having first recognizing them. Sometimes people here give the wrong analogy that if the Arabs don’t recognize Israel and if America did not recognize China for such a long time, what is the hurry in Pakistan recognizing Bangladesh? Mr. Maudoodi, leader of the Jamaat-i-Islaini, met me two days ago when I was in Lahore and he said the same thing to me. I told: “With all due respect to your experience and your long career in politics, the point is that the Arabs and the Israelis don’t want good relations, so, why should the Arabs want to recognize Israel. America did not want good relations with China but when the time came and America wanted good relations, the first thing they did was to meet the Chinese.” So I said to him if you want inimical and implacably hostile relations for all times to come with East Pakistan, then do not recognize. But if you want to repair the damage, heal the wounds, and then in that case the way would be through recognition.

Interviewer: Sir, in May, June and July, you gave the world to understand that the recognition was due and imminent.

President: But that is what I am saying. First of all what we expected was to meet Mujibur Rahman and go through the whole process. Then I wanted three weeks or so to prepare and assess public opinion because other leaders, who are hostile to recognition—they are not really hostile to recognition, it is opposition—went about and stirred up the emotional aspects of the recognition issue: talking about the recognition of the fruits of aggression; saying that if one part of our country is swallowed up by India in this way then other parts of the country would also be swallowed up and that recognition would mean the negation of the Two-Nation theory. I do not think it useful to go to the people without first meeting Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Interviewer: And then you have to take it to the National Assembly?

President: Yes, I say that to everyone and say it again to you, but I have told you of my difficulty. I am still prepared but after he meets me, anywhere, any time.

Interviewer: Next month.

President: Yes.

Interviewer: The trouble is that Mujib has his own difficulties. As you have your people, he has to consider his people and I know they have been through a lot of suffering. Now Mujib would say that it is too much of them to ask Pakistan that we do not want you to come to us and shed flowers on our ashes, we do not want an apology or anything but at least give us the minimum: the recognition of our new Republic. Mujib would say, is that too much to ask of Pakistan?

President: I see that point of Mujib. I always try to see the other man’s position by trying to put myself in his place because that is the only way you can really come to some understanding. If you look at things only from your point of view, there can be no progress. The difficulty here is that, in the first place, we are saying that we are going to recognize. It is not that we have said that if the negotiations break down we won’t recognize Secondly, it is not a question of apology; it is a question of trying to find out whether we have exhausted all efforts to bring about some kind of equilibrium between the two of us. And he had given me this assurance here. Thirdly, and to be frank, if there was no foreign element in the creation of Bangladesh we would have then said it is an outright people’s liberation and they really wanted to separate. There is that element of doubt; whether that would have happened without foreign intervention, and secondly what the people of East Pakistan, particularly in the rural areas, want. So these two elements are there.

Interviewer: Probably a man with your sense of history and your diplomatic genius, when you released Sheikh Mujib, you might have gone one step further and recognized Bangladesh. Then you would have told the people here, I have come here, I am trying to break with the past, I am trying to break through to a new era in our subcontinent and that is the least I can do. Why did you not do so?

President: I thought of that. I contemplated it. The point is thus in any case I knew that I would be taken to task for releasing him unconditionally. I mean by the Opposition. Its leaders have been saying 93,000 of our soldiers and others are prisoners of war, and he was the real nightingale in the cage and that I released him. I decided I could not do both simultaneously. Secondly, there would have been also a charge of hasty decision and impetuosity. And thirdly, there are so many other matters which we have to resolve—assets, liabilities and various other things. The goodwill would have been there. But immediately we would have come face to face with the question of liabilities, assets and things like that and again heat would have been generated. So I would much rather prefer to negotiate and settle all these things together, so that we remove any further source of friction.

Interviewer: Well, Sir, let us forget the past and look to the future. We are afraid that, that too, is being compromised—I mean the future, China has not only vetoed Bangladesh’s entry to the United Nations but also threatened to do so again. In these circumstances, do you envisage that a time may come when you can take a decision of your own even if China may disapprove or oppose it?

President: Once the veto is exercised on a certain matter its repetition becomes necessary.

Interviewer: So far as China is concerned?

President: So far as any great power is concerned and so I don’t see any harm in the exercise of the veto if the matter goes again to the Security Council in its present situation. But, there is no conspiracy or diabolical understanding between Pakistan and China on this matter. From the day we had our meetings with the Chinese leaders after the breakaway of East Pakistan, we were adamant on the implementation of the U.N. resolutions, withdrawal of forces, and release of prisoners, and from our side we have done our best to implement them. Of course, you can say we hold very few prisoners but it is the principle that counts. When I offered to release them unconditionally the Indians thought I was trying to embarrass them. So I held my hand because my object was not to embarrass. The object was really to fulfill from our side, in letter and spirit, the U.N. resolutions. Recently we released Indian internees without any negotiations with you and we want to see that they take back everything with them, and they go back not feeling that they had been badly treated here. This is all preparing for the future. One of these days when I have the time I also intend to go and visit your prisoners of war in their camps to see how they are living. That is again all preparation for the future.

Interviewer: Recently there were various comments about your relations with China when you connected your announcement of your refusal to recognize Bangladesh with a forecast of the Chinese veto?

President: Negotiations do take place between countries and it is not that we were dictated to by them or that they were dictated to by us. We are in touch with one another. We have very good relations between our two countries, and I dare say when all your efforts fail to normalize relations with them you can turn to us. But the point is that there is no compulsion in it, and it was the question of implementation of the United Nations resolutions. I can’t speak for them. They can speak for themselves very eloquently. But I can tell you that they want good relations in the subcontinent—with your country as well as with East Pakistan or Bangladesh. So the sooner we get over this problem, the better—after all how long you twill keep those prisoners? It is becoming counter-productive. The law of diminishing returns applies. So if you see that, I think, we will be making a breakthrough.

Interviewer: Supposing some of them who are adjudged guilty of war crimes or excesses are tried and the majority are released, would that be acceptable to you?

President: Have no doubt in your mind. That will complicate my problems immeasurably and we will have reached the point of no return I have suggested a via media, that is, I don’t want to condone atrocities. No civilized person would like to. If there are certain cases, we are prepared to try them here by court martial. I have said that. This is a civilized method a doing it.

Interviewer: Could you elaborate on that? Because I had a question on this subject. That could be a via media, but how would you set about it? Would Bangladesh send you a list?

President: Yes and the evidence.

Interviewer: So-called alleged crimes, and the evidence.

President: It is only a question of form.

Interviewer: You would set up some tribunal too?

President: Yes, a military tribunal, and we will see to it that justice done. After all, over there what will happen will be a big tamasha, palra tree justice and then the whole atmosphere will get vitiated. The story will come to this side and things will become unmanageable.

Interviewer: One feels you are slightly on the defensive, bringing democracy into what has been almost a semi fascist state. I mean history has put you in power. Historical forces have put you in power. I don’t see why you should be so careful.

President: On the defensive? The point is that I am dealing with the legacy as well …..

Interviewer: Mr. President, what is your assessment of the post-Simla situation, so far as our subcontinent is concerned, broadly speaking, of course?

President: I came back and my friends came back in hopeful anticipation of the future and I made it clear to your delegation and to your Prime Minister that we are determined to start a new chapter. It is a much greater challenge because looking back at the past it is so easy to go on the negative side. But it is a great challenge to put things back on the rails. Because they have not been put on the rails by greater men than us. So that in itself is a very big historical challenge, and we are determined to succeed. However, in order to really breakthrough this maze of prejudice that has hit the subcontinent for so long, I made it clear that we must move slowly and step-by-step and this does not mean that I am trying to avoid issues. Even if I did not want to avoid issues and plunge into them, I would come up against a dead end. So it is much better to really see the tunnel slowly and move step-by-step and look for the light on the other side. But we are hopeful.

Interviewer: Where do we go from here? Do you consider the time is ripe for the second summit? If so, what are the issues you would like to discuss?

President: The second summit now has had a slight set-back. However, these are temporary developments. If we are to meet again, and we welcome your Prime Minister to come to Pakistan, we must have some results out of it. Otherwise, it will be an anti-climax. We can discuss, of course, on our side the prisoners of war. We have not changed our mind on what we believe on Bangladesh. It is only a question of time. There is a little delay in time. The principle is intact. So we can have a productive meeting at the second summit. However, if this is not possible then outside the summit framework, she is welcome at any time to visit Pakistan. We would like her to come. And let her come. Let her see our country.

Interviewer: So the coming summit might be delayed. It is not October.

President: I would like it to be still in October.

Interviewer: As we in India see it, there are two major imperatives of a just and durable settlement. First, the doctrine of bilateralism which absolutely precludes the jurisdiction of interference by the United Nations or any third party in the problems bedeviling our subcontinent. And, secondly, recognition of Bangladesh upon which depends the solution w the POWs problem. But apparently you have some serious reservations. May I know lie difficulties or the problems?

President: I have partly answered your second question. Normalization is partly dependent on our recognition of Bangladesh. And I say that on merits, independent of your own interest. We believe genuinely that we have to come to good terms with Muslim Bengal. Actually I would like to say something on this. I will take a little time, When Ayub Khan was President we had developed a complex relationship with the United States, CENTO, and SEATO. With this special relationship, we had also started moving in the direction of Soviet Union and China. And I think at one stage we were perhaps the only country in Asia with this kind of relationship. Many countries had not recognized China, and were its neighbors. We had both the Soviet Union and China as our neighbors. The United States had special relations well entrenched in our country. The conflicting demands and interests of these three great powers were really making our diplomacy spin. Ayub Khan had discussions with me and said he was getting dizzy. The Soviet Ambassador comes and makes one demand, the American another demand and the Chinese in their own polite way let us know what they think in that particular issue. I told him that the best thing would be to evolve the policy of bilateralism. It is more flexible. It is based on principles. Multilateralism creates these kinds of problems and you get into the melting pot and go in all directions. So he asked what bilateralism was. I told him what bilateralism basically was. As Mathew Arnold said, an ignorant army clashes by night, but here ignorant Generals ruled by day. And to explain it I told him, you know Afghanistan has had a successful foreign policy over the centuries and that is because essentially it is a policy of bilateralism. Then I wrote also on the subject both in my little book “Myth of Independence” and in another book “Pakistan and the Alliances”. I believe in bilateralism and here I have had a great deal to do with the concept of creating a kind of bilateral foreign policy. Now this is accepted. But even if we have a bilateral relationship it is impossible to exclude the world. We can’t draw a curtain round the subcontinent. There are repercussions and these repercussions flow over. There are common interests and there is the United Nations. I think the world is too small really to have literally A to Z bilateralism. Once you recognize the essence of bilateralism that is enough. What we want are the essentials of bilateralism that is, not running around all the Chanceries of the world, one Indian Minister being followed by a Pakistan Minister and vice versa. We have really made a laughing stock of ourselves. And the world looks down snootily on a small country.

Interviewer: Mr. Bhutto, you mentioned the fact that China is playing a positive role. I may probably introduce myself. I was the President of the Indo-China Friendship Association for long years and this was an Association which was subsidized and was encouraged in every possible way by the then Nehru Government. But somehow lately one feels that China wants to keep this subcontinent in a perpetual state of conflict and confrontation. I give an example. Take the United Nations Security Council. The Chinese delegate referred to India and Bangladesh as stooges controlled by Russia or something like that. Now there were ten other nations which had supported Bangladesh entry. Could they all be Soviet stooges? You see this is the kind of argument which makes us infer that China is bent on upsetting the apple-cart of the Simla Pact and Indo-Pak goodwill. May be I am wrong. So I would like to be corrected by you. This is the feeling.

President: Well, I don’t share your feelings. In my long association and contact with the Chinese leaders I have always detected a consistency in their policies. After all, what prevents Mr. Mujibur Rahman from meeting, me? What prevents us from coming to a settlement on prisoners of war. Take it entirely out of the context of China and Pakistan. Surely we are civilized enough to appreciate our own interest.

Interviewer: I am again coming to the same question. We realize thin Pakistan is a sovereign country, free to have its own relations. Let there be no misunderstanding about it. We are not questioning your relations with China or America or anybody else. But so far as the sub continental thinking is concerned everything depends on whether such relations help or obstruct the construction of a new super-structure of peace, cooperation and goal neighborliness in our part of the world. And this is why sometimes China becomes our concern.

President: I don’t see any incompatibility. As much I do not see a compatibility of your relations with the Soviet Union coming in the way of goodwill or the foundations of peace that we want. Who knows, in the future, Soviet Union’s interests and yours might not coincide as much as you might think today. And if you look into the distance, in the future, perhaps that might happen. But we don’t consider that an impediment.

Interviewer: Well, problems might persist, Mr. President, but I must bring home this issue of life and death for both our sister countries. We can’t continue the stalemate of no-war and no-peace for ever. History today presents both of us with the choice between cooperation and confrontation, co-existence and co-destruction. Now we believe that cooperation can he achieved only through bilateral negotiations, and settlements without third party interference, while counter-bilateralism can only lead to confrontation and conflict. That this is logical, history should be obvious to a seasoned politician like you. Previous regimes in Pakistan carried out every form of confrontation. You yourself referred to it just now. Taking your problems to the UN, London, Washington, and Peking but with what results nothing but wars and disaster. When Pakistan cut itself into less than half neither Peking nor Washington nor London nor the UN helped her. Then it was history which came to her rescue with Mr. Bhutto.

President: That is how I take it.

Interviewer: Surely, historical forces have brought you up. You came to Simla and signed the agreement of bilateral relations with our Government. Things went splendidly till August when something went wrong and the process towards cooperation got reversed into making a renewed confrontation. Why? How does it help either our countries?

President: I don’t see it that way. I see a slight set-back in the timetable of the Simla picture. I don’t see an irreversible process. It is just a slight dislocation and you will see in the months to come that this is how it will be and we signed the Simla agreement with the purpose of honoring it. And I say this because I am a representative of the people. If somehow or the other Ayub Khan could not understand the full implications of signing an agreement it was because he, in a way, operated in a vacuum.

Interviewer: You mean Tashkent?

President: Yes. Away from the people. So I don’t look at it that way.

Interviewer: So that may be your difficulty, in the sense that you have got to carry them with you.

President: But they form my strength also. I mean I stand with their support. So I signed the Simla agreement, knowing that my people would also—our people—I won’t use my people because Mujib keeps using it—our people also would accept this new turn of events between India and Pakistan, and I detected this even before the 1971 war, and I don’t think that the common man wanted this conflict.

Interviewer: I do not have this in our people.

President: But the conflict came and now we want to start afresh and forget. So, therefore, there should be no difficulty. Essentially I told you we are committed also to the concept of bilateralism not only with India but with other countries also. Again I have written on the subject. For how long has the subcontinent given itself readily to foreign arbitration? You go from Clive’s Diwani and you start and then there have been award, awards from outside, Bagge Award, Radcliffe Award, so many awards. It does not become, again I say, civilized people to keep on going outside for awards. I made a reference to it earlier as well when I spoke of going to the Chanceries of the world. Believe me, essentially, we will take till all the cows come home. And it is much better to talk rather than to fight. In the National Assembly, on the last occasion, someone said that negotiations in the past have always failed. What has happened to peaceful method? We have never had any results. I asked him what has happened when we had wars. As a result, the country’s territories have been lost, prisoners of war have been taken, and the economy gets a terrible reverse which we can ill-afford to have. So even if our talks don’t prove productive we should not lose our patience. We must be patient. After all a thousand years have passed. It does not rest on me alone to see all our problems resolved in my time but once the way is paved, we set a pace, set a direction, and then I think we will find successive governments doing the same thing.

Interviewer: Two more controversies remain to be discussed, Mr. President, Kashmir and POW’s. You have said that we can do no more than keeping 70 million away from the U.N. for the sake of 90,000 prisoners in India. This sounds rather a desperate bid.

President: No, just giving an interpretation to the resolutions of the Security Council and General Assembly of December 21 and December 7.

Interviewer: Now coming to Kashmir.

President: Excuse me. Suppose even if you take the position that Mujibur Rahman’s consent is needed, which I don’t see why—however, he has a list. I believe, ranging from 120 to 1,000 whom he wants to try—what justification is there for not releasing the rest of them? Why must you keep the whole lot and also the civilians and the small children? I would like your people to realize this. So the point is that you could nevertheless take certain steps in this direction without displeasing the Bangla Bandhu.

Interviewer: Coming to Kashmir, you have been suggesting that wall should come down.

President: This proposal is within the concept and the framework of self-determination. It means that if we allow free access, it does not mean we have abandoned the right of self-determination.

Interviewer: But self-determination, you said, you cannot export it. It must come within Kashmir itself. How can it come? People start getting violent.

President: No, not necessarily violent. After all the question of violence alone has not brought self-determination to many lands. The point that this position, we can never abandon. But within this position, I believe there is scope for adjustment beneficial to the people of Kashmir on both sides.

Interviewer: Excuse me; you cannot abandon this to cold storage. You said the next generation, our generation is too heated up about it.

President: Well, I do not know. This is such a sensitive subject.

Interviewer: Or for a better climate, a cooler climate.

President: Yes, with a cooler climate, and we like to have at the right time some contacts with the Kashmiri leaders. They make conflicting statements. I am not casting aspersions, but sometimes their statements cannot be reconciled.

Interviewer: By the leaders of Kashmir?

President: Sheikh Abdullah sometimes says that he has not given up his position on self-determination; on other occasions, he says, he has this im mind within the Indian Constitution.

Interviewer: Yes, he has come down to some kind of autonomy within the Indian Union.

President: I do not know his position. At some stage or the other proipriety permitting, we would like to have some discussions with them also because the bowl cannot be hotter than soup. And we must know the thinking, the genuine thinking of others also. There is Maulvi Farooq. I have never met him. I met Sheikh Abdullah. I have never met Maulvi Farooq And then Afzal Beg. He is a protégé of Abdullah. We are somewhat out of touch with the latest position. Your intelligence and CID is so good that we cannot find out their latest thinking.

Interviewer: Your intelligence must be active too.

President: Not as good as yours as far as Kashmir is concerned. I would like to know because I believe that we must be subservient to objective conditions. Nobody can really ignore objective factors. I must know exactly the feelings, the situation there and it will take time.

Interviewer: And, in the meantime, you would like …..

President: Why should the people suffer? Without abandoning our established position we are not in a hurry to go back to the United Nations. I have made that clear in our National Assembly and also I have made it clear in the Security Council. I have very little time for the Security Council, and to me, I might be wrong, unless there is unanimity between the Great Powers—and I don’t see that unanimity coming—the United Nations position cannot he effective on these issues. It is not only in Kashmir.

We have seen it in all other matters because the whole concept of United Nations is based on the unanimity of the Great Powers.

Interviewer: Now, what kind of relationship do you envisage between the Centre and the Provinces? What is your opinion of Wali Khan’s demand that the future constitution of Pakistan should be based upon the concept of a loose federation with a bicameral system of legislature?

President: Our position is the same on bicameral legislature and, as far as the autonomy is concerned, it is only a difference on the quantum. We are prepared to have in our Constitution the autonomy given by the Indian Constitution within certain marginal differences here and there. But I can’t be a party to an autonomy which is bordering on secession.

Interviewer: They talk about you setting up a civilian dictatorship, that you have an ambition to set up a one-party state.

President: They say all these things because they have nothing else to say. Mr. Nehru was accused of the same things in 1947-48 by Mr. Tandon when he (Mr. Nehru) threw him out of the party office. On the one hand you give a sense of direction or on the other hand, you invite the forces of chaos and anarchy. I can’t do that. If they think chaos is democracy that is not my concept of it.

Interviewer: In the recent issue of a Karachi weekly, “Outlook”, Asghar Khan writes about you that the symbol of the policy of confrontation with India cannot easily become an apostle of peace. The contradiction between Bhutto, the sabre-rattling politician, and Bhutto, the peace-seeking President, cannot be easily resolved. Does this contradiction still persist?

President: No. First of all, possibly the article is ghost-written. And secondly, the point is, as I stated it earlier to you, that there are objective forces—I have also said it, without any qualms, that there was a time when objective forces were tilted in Pakistan’s favor as a result of the massive military assistance we received from the United States in 1962, and perhaps you might criticize me for it, if I were in Ayub’s place I would have seized this opportunity. I do seize opportunities, I would have seized them without hesitation—but now the objective conditions have materially changed and I cannot ignore these objective conditions.

Interviewer: That means today Pakistan cannot afford …..

President: This new phase that has come between India and Pakistan, it has come through confrontation. You intervened in East Pakistan, you used arms, force and that was confrontation implemented. Mine was confrontation not implemented by Ayub Khan. You did it, and the issue was clinched.

Interviewer: We were swept into …..

President: Whatever you like to call it. Whatever it is, India is too big a country to be swept in.

Interviewer: So, it was un objective condition.

President: And also the policy of confrontation is vindicated. Now this new chapter that we are opening of peace, it happened through confrontation, by your intervention in Fast Pakistan.

Interviewer: Final question. I would like to know your assessment of Mrs. Indira Gandhi.

President: Yes. I found her to be really her father’s daughter. I have high admiration for her father. As a student when I was in Bombay, I believed in and worked for Pakistan but, nevertheless, among the Congress leaders I had admiration for him. I have read his books. In those days his concept of socialism was more than when he became Prime Minister.

Interviewer: Yes. I know. When you were Foreign Minister your Ambassadors in Cairo and other places were made to read the speeches of Nehru and Krishna Menon.

President: Yes. And, so I have respect for him. He was a romanticist. He was a historian, an idealist, but later in negotiations, I found that he twisted the terms sometimes. That was disillusionment. Of course this disillusionment was not the picture we had envisaged. Therefore when I say that she is her father’s daughter, I mean it in a complimentary sense.

Interviewer: Yes.

President: And she is a lady who, I think, has a great sense of discipline in her approach to matters. She makes up her mind and she tenaciously pursues it. She is also willing to take risks. She has a calm control over her colleagues. I found it most congenial.

Interviewer: The trouble is that I don’t think you saw enough of her or she saw enough of you at Simla. The total does not come up even to an hour.

President: Yes, you see the ice was to be broken in the sense that the circumstances in which we were meeting were ominous, taking into account the past. And also, I deliberately wanted the officials to, you know, thrash out the issues. Let the sparks fly at that level because if immediately we had taken the discussions to the Chief Executive level, we might have had sparks there too. I did not want that. I wanted two of us to remain in a position where we can consider the differences and bring about some semblance of an agreement.

Interviewer: Thank you very much. You have been very kind indeed. Yes Sir, we must get Pakistanis some way or the other to visit India. In the course of interviews you complained that we had not given facilities to Pakistani journalists.

President: Yes. I wish you would permit them.

Interviewer: It should be necessary. I shall see to that. We will invite, through you, a number of journalists.

President: We will be happy to send them. They will be good fore-runners, I think.

Interviewer: I think, your interviews with Indian journalists have been very productive. We understand that you are in a difficult position. Only we feel that a man of your stature, and I mean you, has to break with the past.

President: We had a very difficult situation. Apart from the classical ones there were the un-classical ones.