Menon, Kayani, Zardari on same wavelength on internal threats

ISLAMABAD: What do former Indian national security adviser Shivshankar Menon, who served as India’s ambassador to China and Pakistan, have in common with former army chief Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and former president Asif Ali Zardari?

On Thursday, Shivshankar Menon said that the real threats to India are "internal" and emanate from communal and social violence, not from outside forces such as Pakistan or China.

"In terms of national security, I think the real threats are internal. There's no existential threat to India today externally, unlike in the 50s or when we were formed. And for many years till late 60s there were actual internal separatist threats, not any more. I think that we have actually dealt with," Menon told PTI.

Asked to elaborate what he meant by internal threats, he said: "If there are real threats to India, to the idea of India, India's integrity, today they actually come from within the country."

"If you look at violence in India, deaths from terrorism, from left wing extremism, declined steadily throughout this 21st century until 2014-2015. Even now the basic trend for terrorism, left wing extremism is down. What has increased is since 2012, communal violence, social violence, internal violence has increase. That is something we need to find a way in dealing with," Menon said.

"This is not a traditional law and order problem, which our traditional instruments, the police, the states know how to deal with. You look at violence against women, communal, caste violence, if you look at those firms of violence, these are all a result of tremendous social and economic change of uprooting of population, urbanisation... various forms of change, which we still need to learn how to deal with," he said.

Menon said those are the threats, which in the long run, has a "potential to make real difference". "India has changed. It is normal. It happens to most societies where there is change. But you also have to learn new ways of dealing with," he said and attributed the new threats to the rapid and fast development of the country.

When asked that some people attributed this to the BJP coming to power, Menon said even that is a consequence of the change that the Indian society is undergoing now.

Much earlier that the real threats to Pakistan were internal and not external were echoed by former army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani who in an address had said, “While the external threat to Pakistan continues to exist, it is the internal threat that merits immediate attention,” said General Kayani, according to a military statement. It was terrorism that, he said, “Pose a threat to our national security and stability”.

Even former president Asif Ali Zardari had commented in Brussels, “I do not consider India a military threat; the question is that India has the capability. Capability is what matters. [With regard to] intention I think we both have our good intentions. India is a reality, Pakistan is a reality, but Taliban are a threat, an international threat … to our way of life. And at the moment, I’m focused on the Taliban. It’s something that has been going on for a long time and of course went unchecked under the dictatorial rule of the last president,” he said.