Shimla Agreement - Victory in War & Defeat in Diplomacy

Victory in War

After the Bangladesh liberated war, India held the significant landmass of Pakistan and had captured around 90,000 prisoners of war. Six months later, when the game of negotiation started at Shimla, India held all the cards to win the game. But still India is said to have lost the game when Indira Gandhi signed the Shimla agreement with Pakistani President Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Let us retrospect if India really lost the game.

The Initiation of Talks
In Pakistan, Yahya Khan had resigned and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto stepped in to take his place. Bhutto told the former British prime minister Sir Alec Douglas-Home that he was keen to forge ‘an entirely new relationship with India’, beginning with a summit meeting with Mrs. Gandhi. The message was passed on, with the advice that in view of Pakistan’s wounded pride, the invitation should come from India.

The Indians were at first apprehensive, given Bhutto’s unpredictability and history of animosity against India. Confidants of the Pakistani president rushed to assure them of his good intentions. The journalist Mazhar Ali Khan, the editor of Dawn, told his fellow ex-communist the Indian Sajjad Zaheer that Bhutto was honestly trying to forget the past. New Delhi should work to strengthen his hand, otherwise, the army and the religious right would gang up to remove him, an outcome that would be disastrous for both India and Pakistan.

Zaheer and Khan had worked together in pre-Partition days as fellow activists of the Student Federation of India. Now, encouraged by their former fellow-traveller P. N. Haksar, they met in London in the third week of March 1972 to discuss the terms of a possible agreement between their two national leaders. Khan reported on these talks directly to Bhutto, while Zaheer conveyed
them via P. N. Haksar to Mrs. Gandhi.

The Talk
The Pakistani president was invited for a summit to be held in the old imperial summer capital of Simla in the last week of June 1972. He came accompanied by his daughter Benazir and a fairly large staff. First, the officials met, and then their leaders. The Indians wanted a comprehensive treaty to settle all outstanding problems including Kashmir, while the Pakistanis preferred a piecemeal approach. At a private meeting, Bhutto told Mrs. Gandhi that he could not go back to his people ‘empty-handed’.

The Pakistanis bargained hard. The Indians wanted a ‘no-war pact’; they had to settle for a mutual ‘renunciation of force’. The Indians asked for a ‘treaty’; what they finally got was an ‘agreement’. India said that they could wait for a more propitious moment to solve the Kashmir dispute, but asked for an agreement that the ‘line of control shall be respected by both sides’. Bhutto successfully pressed a caveat: ‘Without prejudice to the recognised position of either side’

However, Bhutto had apparently assured Mrs Gandhi that, once his position was more secure, he would persuade his people to accept conversion of the line of control into the international border.

Defeat in Diplomacy

The Clauses in Agreement

1. India agreed to return the Pakistani territory it had occupied, except some strategic points in Kashmir, mainly in the Kargil sector, which were necessary to safeguard the strategic road link between Srinagar and Leh in Ladakh.
2. In return, Pakistan agreed to respect the existing Line of Control in Kashmir and undertook not to alter it unilaterally by force or threat of force.
3. The two countries also agreed to settle all their disputes through bilateral negotiations without any outside mediation by the UN or any other power.
4. India also agreed to return the prisoners of war to Pakistan but this was to be contingent upon a Bangladesh– Pakistan agreement. This occurred the next year when Pakistan recognized Bangladesh in August 1973.
5. In order to restore and normalize relations between the two countries step by step, it was agreed that: 
1. Steps shall be taken to resume communications, postal, telegraphic, sea, land, including border posts, and air links, including overflghts. 
2. Appropriate steps shall be taken to promote travel facilities for the nationals of the other country. 
3. Trade and cooperation in economic and other agreed fields shall be resumed as far as possible. 
4. Exchange in the fields of science and culture shall be promoted

(Check full text of agreement here)

Reactions after Treaty

The ink had hardly dried on the Simla Agreement when Bhutto reneged on this (admittedly informal) promise. On 14 July he spoke for three hours in the National Assembly of Pakistan, his text covering sixty-nine pages of closely printed foolscap paper. He talked of how he had fought ‘for the concept of one Pakistan from the age of 15’. He blamed Mujib, Yahya, and everyone but himself for the ‘unfortunate and tragic separation of East Pakistan’. Then he came to the topic that still divided Pakistan and India – the future of Jammu and Kashmir. As the victor in war, said Bhutto, ‘India had

all the cards in her hands’ – yet he had still forged an equal agreement from an unequal beginning. The Simla accord was a success, he argued, because Pakistan would get back its POWs and land held by Indian forces, and because it did ‘not compromise on the right of self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir’. He offered the ‘solemn commitment of the people of Pakistan, that if tomorrow the people of Kashmir start a freedom movement, if tomorrow Sheikh Abdullah or Maulvi Farooq or others start a people’s movement, we will be with them’.

There was widespread displeasure in India after the signing of the treaty and Atal Bihari Vajpayee, then leader of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, called it a “sell out”. Vajpayee said that Pakistan’s agreement to not use force was of no consequence since Pakistan had made similar promises in the past as well, but never adhered to them. He also went on to say that some sort of a secret understanding had been agreed upon between Indira Gandhi and Zulfkar Ali Bhutto during the signing of the treaty. 

The justification Indira Gandhi offered to parliament in July 1972 for signing the Shimla Declaration was significant. She said: ‘All I know is that I must fight for peace and I must take those steps which will lead us to peace . . . The time has come when Asia must wake up to its destiny , must wake up to the real needs of its people, must stop fighting amongst ourselves, no matter what our previous quarrels, no matter what the previous hatred and bitterness. The time has come today when we must bury the past.’

Was it a failure?

Looking back between the relations between India and Pakistan, one can safely say that the Shimla Treaty did nothing much to preserve the relations between both countries which went on to deteriorate. The most recent was Operation Meghdoot in 1984 (in which India seized most of the inhospitable areas of the Saichen Glacier where the frontier had not been clearly defined in the agreement) and the Kargil war of 1999 (in which Pakistani soldiers and Kashmiri militants had occupied positions on the Indian side of the LoC).

Sources:
India after Gandhi by Ramachandra Guha
India since Independence by Bipin Chandra
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simla_Agreement

http://www.mapsofindia.com/on-this-day/july-2-1972-shimla-treaty-is-signed-between-indira-gandhi-and-zulfikar-ali-bhutto

First Battle of Panipat - The Retrospect

“From the year . . . [1504], when Kabul was conquered, until this date [1526] I had craved Hindustan. Sometimes because my begs (high-ranking officers) had poor opinions, and sometimes because my brothers lacked cooperation, the Hindustan campaign had not been possible and the realm had not been conquered.”

— Emperor Babur, on conquering India, in his memoirs 

On 21st April 1526, happened the first battle of Panipat (in present day Haryana) between Babur and Ibrahim Lodi (Delhi Sultanate). This battle ultimately led to the establishment of Mughal empire, one of the biggest empires in the history. Eventually, this battle is historically very significant. Let us have retrospect of the battle.

Who was Babur:
Roots of Babur's family are traced back to other Asian conquerors. His father was a descendant of Timur while his mother's family had its roots back to Genghis Khan. At the age of 11, Babur's father died and he became the ruler of Fergana.

Why did Babur come:
Babur faced the rebellion from his own relatives. He conquered Samarkand but lost the city of Fergana. In his attempt to recapture Fergana, he lost his control over Samarkand. He made several attempts to establish his control over parts of Central Asia, but he couldn't get much success.

After losing Samarkand for the third time, he turned his attention to India. At that time, North-India was ruled by Ibrahim Lodi of Afgan Lodi dynasty. In 1524, Daulat Khan Lodi, a rebel of Lodi dynasty and governor of Lahore, invited Babur to overthrow Ibrahim Lodi.


The Battle:
Babur's army consisted 13,000 to 15,000 soldiers while Ibrahim's army consisted 30,000 to 40,000 soldiers (some sources cite this number as 1,00,000) and 1,000 elephants. But this numerical superiority of Ibrahim Lodi was compensated by the artillery of Babur.

In the ultimate battle, Babur won a decisive victory with the loss of around 4,000 of his own soldiers while killing 15,000 to 16,000 enemy soldiers (some sources cite this number as 40,000 or 50,000). Ibrahim Lodi himself died in the battle.


Why did Babur win:
Despite the numerical superiority of Lodi's forces. Babur had a decisive win in the battle. What were the factors playing the crucial role in the battle? The answer is the Technology and Tactics. Let us see how.

• Technology
  Babur made the use of cannons. Ibrahim was relying on sheer numbers and elephants. Using tulughma formation (discussed in next section), Babur trapped Lodi's army and then used the cannons to great effect. Elephants had never heard such a loud and terrible noise. They turned around and ran through their own lines crushing Lodi's soldiers.
  Babur made successful use of gunpowder, because of which Mughal empire is known as one of the three Gunpowder Empires (Ottoman and Safavid being the other two).
• Tactics
  Ibrahim Lodi was no tactician. On the contrary, Babur employed two tactics unfamiliar to Lodi which turned the tide of battle. The first one was tulughma formation which meant dividing the forces into various units viz. the Left, the Right, and the Centre. Left and Right units were further divided into forward and rear units. Their primary task was to surround the enemy forces and drive them towards the Centre unit, where Babur had arrayed his cannons.
  The second tactical innovation was the use of carts, called Araba. Babur shielded his artillery forces behind the row of carts. Babur ordered his men to gather up as many carts as possible. There were around 700 carts which were then tied together with leather rope. Enough space was left between each pair of carts to place five or six mantlets. Babur's matchlock men were posted behind the mantlets. This tactic prevented enemy forces to attack the artillerymen.
  Supposedly, Babur borrowed these tactics from Ottoman Turks.

After carefully deploying technology with tactics, the next task for Babur was to provoke Ibrahim Lodi to attack. Both armies forced each other weeks before the battle and Babur made several attempts to provoke the battle. Finally, on 21st April, the Ibrahim Lodi moved to attack Babur's lines. Babur's plan worked perfectly and he won the battle by noon.

Repercussions of the battle:

• The foremost consequence of the battle was that it led the foundation of the Mughal empire which later became one of the biggest empire in the world.
• It shifted the political interests of Babur from Kabul and Central Asia to Agra and India.
• The battle of Panipat initiated the use of artillery in India. Till then India was not familiar with gunpowder. For the first time it was used on the Indian plains and since then it had been used in many important battles.
• Tulghma strategy became popular in India after its successful use by Babur. Almost all Indian Rulers later on started adopting the policy of keeping a reserve army. The Indian Rulers were greatly impressed by the swiftness and movability of horses and gradually the place of elephants was taken by horses in the army.
• It gave birth to the new struggles. As Satish Chandra writes in ‘History of Medieval India’: “In north India, Babur smashed the power of the Lodis and the Rajput confederacy led by Rana Sanga. Thereby, he destroyed the balance of power in the area. This was a long step towards the establishment of an all-India empire” 
• Even from the cultural point of view, establishment of Mughal Empire amalgamated the Indian culture and Central Asian culture.

Overall battle of Panipat had long-term effects on Indian history. And this is what makes it one of the most important battle in the history of India.

References:

• http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/battles_panipat_first.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Battle_of_Panipat
• http://asianhistory.about.com/od/warsinasia/a/FirstbattleofPanipat.htm
• http://www.mapsofindia.com/on-this-day/21-april-1526-the-first-battle-of-panipat-was-fought
• http://blog.mapsofindia.com/india/the-first-battle-of-panipat-the-beginning-of-the-mughal-empire-in-india/
• http://www.preservearticles.com/2012030925935/effects-of-first-battle-of-panipat.html