Chapter 146: Kabuliwala

South Block

9 October 1950

The Afghan delegation arrived by car from the Kabul flight, in a convoy of three black Packards with the green, red and black flag on the bonnet. They were shown into the Cabinet Room at four. The chief delegate was a short, bearded, impassive man named Sardar Mohammad Naim, the Foreign Minister and the King’s cousin, who had been educated in France and spoke excellent French and halting English. Behind him sat two secretaries, a colonel in Afghan uniform, and a thin young man with a notebook.

Ram received them with Nehru, Menon, and Patel. Kao stood by the window. A samovar had been placed on the side table, and Afghan tea was served in small glasses with cubes of sugar.

"Your Excellency," Ram said, in Sanskrit, which an interpreter translated to French, "you are welcome. I have known for a long time that Afghanistan is a country of old courtesy. I hope our tea will not disappoint you."

"The tea is excellent, Prime Minister." Naim’s French was fluent and dry. "I am told you wished to speak to us of the Wakhan."

"I did." Ram laid a map on the table, a large-scale sheet showing the northern frontier from Gilgit to the Pamirs. A long, narrow tongue of Afghan territory, sixty or seventy miles wide at its broadest, ran east between the Soviet Union and what had been Pakistani Kashmir, reaching toward China. "The Wakhan Corridor. A strip created in 1893 by the British and the Russians to keep their empires apart. It has no roads, little population, and no strategic value to Afghanistan except that it exists. I should like to propose something about it."

"I listen."

"First, a fact. In the winter of 1948, when our forces took Gilgit and the passes beyond, a few of our patrols crossed the Afghan border at the head of the Karambar valley and the Baroghil Pass. It was to pursue and destroy the remnants of the invading forces. We held no ground. We disturbed no Afghan trader. We took no Afghan lives. Your own governor at Faizabad reported it, I believe, and noted that Indian troops paid for their grain and their fodder, and that two of our doctors treated a number of Wakhi villagers for goitre. We withdrew as soon as the pursuit was finished."

Naim’s face did not change. "I am aware of this. His Majesty’s Government has not complained."

"I know, and I wished to say that we were conscious of it." Ram folded his hands. "The border is a line on a map. The mountains do not recognise it. Indian soldiers in those valleys will inevitably approach it from time to time, as Afghan shepherds approach ours. It would be better for both our countries if the line were treated, in that region, as something more than a line."

"You propose?"

"A free-trade corridor. The Wakhan, from the Baroghil pass to the Chinese frontier, to be designated the Afghan-Indian Free Trade Corridor, and leased in perpetuity to the Government of India for an annual sum. A road would be built through it, by Indian engineers, at Indian cost, from Gilgit to the Pamirs. It would be open to Afghan traders without toll or duty.

"It would remain Afghan territory under the Afghan flag, administered by an Afghan governor, with an Afghan garrison at Sarhad. The lease would grant India the right to build and maintain the road, to station a small number of engineers and a police detachment, and to use it for transit."

"The annual sum for the lease?"

"One million dollars."

Naim was silent. The thin young man with the notebook stopped writing. Nehru, beside Ram, looked quite still.

"A million dollars a year," Naim said slowly, "is nearly a tenth of the Afghan budget."

"It is; I thought it would be useful."

"For a strip of mountain that produces nothing."

"A strip of mountain that connects India with the Soviet Union, with China, and, if the Afghan Government wishes, with Central Asia. A road through the Wakhan would give Afghanistan its shortest route to the Indian Ocean.

"At present, your exports of wool, fruit, and carpets go to Karachi by way of Peshawar, over roads that Pakistan can close. They can be closed tomorrow, as they were closed in the summer. If you had a road through Gilgit and Srinagar to Delhi, you would have the sea without asking anyone’s leave."

Naim drank some tea. When he put the glass down, he spoke more slowly. "Prime Minister, I will be frank, as one is in my country. We have no love for Pakistan, whose government claims our Pathan territories and tells our people, in its broadcasts, that they are lost brothers. We have no love for the Russians, who are on our northern border. We have found in recent months that we are not entirely without sympathy for you. I will say that your Army did what mine could not. It broke the Durand Line. It has made it, in many places, a ruin."

"We did not intend it."

"I believe you. It does not matter." Naim’s mouth moved. "A free-trade corridor is a good phrase. A lease in perpetuity is a bad one. In Afghan memory, perpetual leases are what the British imposed. I should not wish to sign one."

"Then let us call it a lease for ninety-nine years, renewable by mutual consent."

"That is still a long time."

"It is the shortest time that will persuade an Indian Government to build a road. A road through the Wakhan will cost forty million dollars. We should not spend it for a lease of ten."

Naim considered. "Perhaps. There is also the matter of conditions. You will not be surprised to hear that His Majesty’s Government will not allow the Wakhan to be used for attacks on any neighbour."

"Of course."

"And Afghanistan will not be asked to take part in any attack on India. I do not say that as a threat. I say that the government of a country with a Russian border must be able to say, in Moscow, that it has made no military commitments to anyone."

"I understand perfectly," Ram said. "I should draft the clause myself. India will not use the corridor to attack any state. Afghanistan will not join, aid, or tolerate any attack on India from its territory. The corridor will carry commerce, and nothing else. If a neighbour asks Afghanistan to close it, you may reply that you have agreed with us that it is a free road, and cannot be closed."

"And if Pakistan asks?"

"You may refer them to the Council."

For the first time, Naim smiled. It was a quick, wry, unforced smile, and it made him look ten years younger. "Prime Minister, you are a dangerous man to negotiate with. You offer a country what it wants before it knows it wants it."

"I try to be useful."

"You are succeeding." Naim set down his glass. "I shall go to Kabul and speak to His Majesty. I think he will agree. I think, also, that he will wish the signing to be public, and to be accompanied by something to show his people that Afghanistan has not been robbed."

"A ceremony?"

"On a day of significance, perhaps. I understand that your Republic will celebrate the first anniversary of its Constitution in January, with a parade. It would be gracious if the Afghan Foreign Minister were invited, and if the agreement were signed on that day, with the King’s cousin at your side."

Ram looked at Nehru, who nodded very slightly. "The twenty-sixth of January," Ram said. "It will be our honour. I shall have the draft ready within a month. A million dollars annually, a ninety-nine-year lease, renewable, with the conditions we have discussed, and with a clause that the first payment be made on signing."

"I accept the principle, Prime Minister. I accept it subject to His Majesty’s consent."

"Naturally."

They shook hands. As the delegation was leaving, the thin young man with the notebook lingered for a moment at the door. He was perhaps twenty-six, with a long, serious face and ink on his fingers. He said, in careful French, "Prime Minister, I am the Foreign Minister’s secretary. I wished to say that I was at Kandahar when your doctors treated the Wakhi villagers. They sent me the report. I did not believe it. I have since met one of the doctors."

"What did you think?"

"I thought, if this is what the Indian Army does when it invades, I should not mind being invaded." He bowed hastily and went out.

Patel gave a short, wheezing laugh. "A diplomat who says what he thinks. I wonder how long he will last."

"Not long," Nehru said, "but I hope he is promoted before he is dismissed."

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