Grand Trunk Road - New Corridor of Asia

Originally published Sept. 4, 2007 on Desicritics

Road traffic may bottleneck at the Wagah border, but bilateral trade is booming between the two countries. The Economic Times (indiatimes.com) reported encouraging news on 10 Apr. that the bi-lateral trade has "...swelled from $235.74 million in 2001-02 to more than $1 billion last fiscal year." This increase in trading between the countries bodes well for improved means of moving goods. Many goods which come into Pakistan by land must be transshipped at the border. I was told that it took passenger buses about one and a half hours to get across the border. But infrastructures are improving. Electronic communication has greatly enhanced the trade across the borders and businessmen can more easily buy and sell using computer orders.
Though economic protectionism exists, both countries are trying to remove barriers to improve trade. India and Pakistan have opened banks in each other's territories. All this bodes well for the establishment of an international land corridor.

There are visionaries around who see not only the India-Pakistan links but an APIBM CORRIDER! (Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar)
Imagine being able to zoom along such a corridor as a tourist, researcher, as a trader or transporter of goods on roads that form a corridor all the way from Afghanistan through Pakistan, to India, the hub, to Bangladesh and Myanmar, a new silk road in Asia! Imagine the boon this would be to landlocked countries that border India, particularly Nepal that could tie into the linked roads.

RIS Policy Brief No. 30, March 2007 for the SAARC Summit held in Delhi on April 3-4 outlines a visionary look at ground transportation networks, that is, overland travel routes which if developed would make India the hub for commerce and trade in Asia. One item mentioned is "Strengthening Infrastructures at Borders." Reading the list of things needed to be done makes one wonder if all this is possible, however, there were similar thoughts years ago in a non-unified Europe and look what happened there. The Grand Trunk road is a reality, a somewhat uneven continuum that covers a distance of over 2,500 km. Imagine if it were easy for Indians and Pakistanis to cross their international border, what it could mean to families that have been torn apart for decades. Imagine how the information from an APIBM corridor would change the perceptions of the youth, in all of the countries.

Pakistan, looking into its future, has done its own smaller version of the road. They have developed the New Grand Trunk Road, also called the National Highway 5. I have traveled on many parts of it and there are some sections that are very fine. It begins in Karachi in the Sindh province, moves north to Thatta, Hyderabad, Moro, Multan, Sahiwal, Lahore, Gujaranwala, Gujrat, Jhelum and Rawlpindi. Then it turns east and crosses the Indus River and moves into the NWFP where it goes through Nowshera and Peshawar before reaching the town of Torkham crossing into Afghanistan. Regional cultural exchanges are occurring. People are mixing it up; Sindh, Punjab, NWFP; Baluchistan residents are meeting each other in Peshawar and Lahore. Afghani people are now a significant part of Pakistan's cultural experience through population movement of vast numbers of refugees coming from across northern borders, yes, some on the old Grand Trunk Road.

I looked up the record on the current SAFTA '2006 Agreement'. I was amazed at the number of "Sensitive" trade items Pakistan and India list. It is hard to imagine the bureaucracy that will be needed to enforce such trade exchanges. These are mere economic trade barriers. There may be detours, diversions of a socio-religious-cum-political nature which will hamper the establishment of a corridor; however, improved bi-lateral trade, people making lots of money may move the political policy makers of both countries toward more liberal trade policies. Money squawks.

The historical Grand Trunk Road could once again function as a corridor for commerce, trade and cultural exchange. It could be a mechanism to link Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and Myanmar in a new Silk Road of Asia, not moving silk but cultural ideas. The SAFTA mentioned above could become the impetus for such a development. In the good old days of the Silk Road trade was confined by and large to movement of material across land. Now with global communications and air and sea transportation, land traffic may very well not be the major means of enhancing trade, however, six lane highways that tie southeast Asia together could create a vibrant Asian community, much like what has occurred between the European countries. But creating a corridor will be a complicated process.

India and Pakistan celebrated their 60th birthday last week! Congrats. Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post wrote an article, "A tale of two South Asian Nations" which appeared in the San Diego Union Tribune this morning, August 20th. 2007. "New Delhi had the air of the capital of an emerging world power looking ahead into a promising if complicated future. Pakistan marked the same occasion by sinking deeper into the past. The corrupt backroom dealing between military rulers and politicians that has produced a cycle of disasters for the Pakistani nation resumed-- aided by the hidden hand of U.S. diplomacy working to pressure President Pervez Musharraf's dwindling power in Islamabad." Bring back Benazir? This does not look good for Grand Road construction or repairs. It does not look very hopeful for open negotiations to create a functional land corridor.

Tragic as it may seem, the Grand Trunk Road Wagah international border displays may well be a thing of the near future. Posturing, high kicking, fierce appearance, Inshallah, will do the trick for now. But let's dream of a corridor.