Pakistan and India:Will Reunification Ever Happen? Part Three-By Harsha Sankar(July 2020)

 

Pakistan and India:Will Reunification Ever Happen? Part Three

I really believe that most Pakistanis would accept the following provided certain conditions that I listed in Part Two were met.

1. The provinces in Punjab and Sindh along with the territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan can join India as three separate states. Since there is a Punjab state in India, the former Pakistani Punjab Province can be renamed as something else.

2.a. The provinces of Baluchistan can possibly join Iran. It can also join with the Iranian province of Sistan and Baluchestan, and the southern areas of Afghanistan, including Nimruz, Helmand and Kandahar provinces, to form its own nation. Of course, both Iran and Afghanistan would have to agree to secede these areas to that new nation.

b. The third option is allow the Pakistani province of Balochistan to form its own nation. It may have only 12.5 million people but several former Soviet Republics are just as small.

c. The fourth option is for it to join India as a state. If the Balochis desired secularism, joining India would be preferable than joining Iran, a Shiite Islamic state. Balochis are Sunnis.

3. The province of Khyber Pakthunkwa could either form its own nation or it could join India as a state. It has close to 40 million people. Joining Afghanistan would make very little little sense since Afghanistan is highly fractured.