New Delhi: Given the political unrest in Pakistan following the arrest of former Prime Minister Imran Khan from outside the Islamabad High Court, Tilak Devasher, a member of the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB), an author, and a security expert on Pakistan, on Wednesday, in an exclusive interview with ETV Bharat said, “This has been a major turning point in Pakistan. The arrest of Imran Khan is an inflection point as the kind of protest that we are seeing in Pakistan after his arrest since Tuesday and for the first time that the Pakistan army has come face to face with the citizens of Pakistan”.
“They have attacked the co-commander’s house, and the general HQ and looting, burning, and a lot of violence against the army institution and government institutions. Whether they expected this or whether they anticipated that this is going to happen, the fact was that it has happened. I don’t think this has ever happened before”, he said. He underlined that for the next couple of days, Pakistan is in a period of turmoil till the army and the authorities get a grip on the situation.
“Last year, Imran Khan was removed democratically through a vote of no-confidence, but he is such a person that he did not accept that he could be removed. He has such a highly inflated opinion of himself that he could be removed. So, he used this conspiracy theory. First, he talked about the American conspiracy, where he claimed that the Assistant Secretary of the US state department had threatened that if Imran Khan is not removed, the US-Pak relations will go downhill.
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Devasher, who was a top former RAW expert on Pakistan said that there was no threat, and five to six months later, Imran Khan took a U-turn and said there was no such American conspiracy. "But the former army chief Gen Bajwa sought to remove him from power. But, the narrative that Khan has sold-first the American narrative helped him tap into a deep-seated anti-American feeling in Pak… then he sold the deep-seated anti-establishment feeling amongst the people….people lapped it up. So, it added to his popularity”, Tilak Devasher explained.
“And Imran Khan is a person, who even if he tells a lie, people think it to be true. He has a kind of cult following and so much so that he now today believes that he is above the law”, added Devasher. He opined that Imran Khan quite likely will get disqualified. It may lead to greater turmoil, or it may just subside. We need to wait and watch”.
When asked about India-Pakistan ties especially now when the political situation has taken an ugly turn, the security expert said, “The government in Pakistan will be so caught up in internal domestic issues that they will not want to spend any political capital on Indo-Pakistan relations. For the moment, India and Pakistan relations are in a deep freeze.
Commenting on Bilawal’s threat to India during the SCO FM last week, Tilak noted that the mask dropped when the Pakistan Foreign minister was seen talking about how Pakistan was against terrorism for their own sake and that his mother was a victim of terrorism, but yet he threatens India saying, "We will show you and give you a lesson that you will never forget," which is an open terror threat.
“Given the fact that Pakistan is so caught up in different issues, I don’t think that stability is going to be there in the next few months or year or so. They will continue to be on ventilators economically begging for money. Pakistan is in a very difficult situation until and unless the structural changes require rescheduling of debt”, he told ETV Bharat.
Meanwhile, Former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, a day after his arrest, on Wednesday was handed over to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for eight days in the Al-Qadir Trust case.
Earlier in the day, Khan was indicted in the Toshakhana case, according to sources. It is pertinent to note that in August 2022, the coalition government led by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), had filed a case against Khan, claiming that he didn’t disclose information on gifts presented to Toshakhana and the proceeds from the illegal sale of some of the gifts. There are multiple charges from treason to blasphemy against the 70-year-old cricketer-turned-politician.
