Munir’s backward march: When rant fuels hate

After the havoc inflicted by Covid-19 — and the continuing damage wrought by climate and conflict — at a G20 assembly not too long ago, here in India, there was a synchronised clarion call: “The world is one — one planet, one people, unity in diversity." It resonated. It then seemed that it would take a peculiar kind of person to preach division. As we now know, it did not take long for a Munir to surface.

And yet, Pakistan’s Army Chief, Asim Munir, in invoking the ghost, has done precisely that. With chilling certainty, he claimed that “our ambitions, traditions, customs are different from Hindus" and that

this distinction must be ingrained in the minds of generations to come.

What he fails to grasp — or perhaps fears to admit — is that while traditions and customs may vary, the essence of humanity does not. Beneath the robes of religion, the veils of culture and the uniforms of power, we are the same species — seeking dignity, safety and meaning.

When a man is possessed by the accident of his birth, he becomes not a leader but a prisoner — bound not by reason, but by the myth of blood. Munir is not leading his people into the future; he is marching them backward, into history’s darkest corners, where identity was weaponised and difference made deadly. If there is any shred of doubt, rewind not only what happened in Pahalgam — dastardly in itself — but also the sequence, the actions, the utter disregard for every value espoused by the holy book.

To divide humanity along lines drawn by history’s most violent architects is to reject the soul’s greatest truth: that we are born not as nations, not as faiths, but as humans.

Let us be clear: this is not a critique of faith, culture or pride in one’s heritage. These are deeply personal — often beautiful — aspects of human identity. But when wielded by men in uniform to justify division, to foster suspicion, or to draw arbitrary lines of “us" and “them," they become tools of tyranny, not tradition.

Strip away the uniform, the rhetoric, the rehearsed pride and you’ll find a man just afraid to be free of his illusion.

The subcontinent has paid in blood for these illusions. The Partition tore through families, friendships and centuries of shared existence. To echo its logic in 2025 is not only irresponsible, it is dangerous. Munir’s words are not merely outdated; they are an assault on the progress that millions have fought for.

Unless it is his intention to do another — in line with his ilk: first in 1947, then in 1971 by Yahya Khan in East Pakistan, and now in 2025. God knows what his target is for his imagined hat-trick.

Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official, used a blistering metaphor referring to Pahalgam: “It was shocking, but this just goes to show you that you can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. You can pretend that Pakistan isn’t a terror sponsor, but it remains a terror sponsor, no matter how much we try to normalise."

He went further: “The only difference between Osama bin Laden and Asim Munir is that bin Laden lived in a cave and Munir lives in a palace. Beyond that, they are the same," Rubin told ANI, calling for strict action against Pakistan.

The people of South Asia deserve more than this. They deserve leaders who dare to see beyond inherited hatred — who recognise that difference is not a threat, but a strength. And that peace does not come from separation, but from understanding. If Munir has a plan, he should hear the voices of the teeming millions in his streets, who have long lived on the wrong side of the guns-and-butter divide.

Let this moment serve as a mirror for the people of Pakistan. Munir, apparently questioned by veterans over his ineptitude in handling internal threats or eminently jealous of the goings-on in Kashmir, was playing a fear card. His tirade — laced with incendiary language and a call to reclaim lost dignity — circulated widely online. He was perhaps smarting from an internal threat — internally abetted. Time will tell.

The global response was swift and mournful. US President Donald Trump called it “a crime against humanity." Russia’s Vladimir Putin condemned it as “a brutal and unforgivable act." Former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak mourned “lives stolen in joy and innocence," while South Korea, the UAE and Nepal, all issued statements of solidarity, denouncing the attack in unequivocal terms.

This chorus of global anguish underscores a deeper truth: violent rhetoric, left unchecked, metastasises. The world mourns not only the victims but also the erosion of a fragile moral boundary between speech and slaughter. For every leader, every citizen tempted by the comfort of division, remember: humanity is not built on the lines we draw, but on the bridges we build.

Lt Gen SS Mehta (retd) is former Western Army Commander and founder Trustee, Pune International Centre.

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