A symbolic moment can become more striking when the intricate ironies of history are turned around towards a positive future. Opening up roads and bus routes between Pakistan and India is always charged with symbolism and emotion. But the prime minister, Mr Manmohan Singh, imbued the recent flagging off of the Punj-Aab Express with extra meaning. The bus will run between Amritsar and Nankhana Sahib, Guru Nanak?s birthplace, in Pakistan, linking two holy places of the Sikhs. Mr Singh seemed to assert the closeness of the two places, reducing the distance caused by Partition. This bus will link the holy places of one religion, while the region had been split along the difference of two others.

As a result, the prime minister?s offer of a ?treaty of peace, security and friendship? to Pakistan gained an extra emotional charge. The inauguration of the bus route was another confidence-building measure, but the speech also made explicit the nature of India?s approach to the Kashmir question, through a search for ?pragmatic, practical solutions?. The prime minister?s focus was on the dignity, self-respect and social and economic development of the inhabitants of Kashmir on both sides of the line of control. This is again a prickly issue, ever since the comments of the president of Pakistan, Mr Pervez Musharraf, had implied a redrawing of lines, which Mr Singh had categorically rejected. He said that the LoC could become ?irrelevant?, with free movement of people and goods across it. Although unassumingly put, this is a vision of peace akin to his earlier image of the Siachen glacier as a mountain of peace. Metaphors for the prime minister are not empty words; they are words with a specific political purpose. By gently reminding Mr Musharraf that although he has done much, he still needs to do more about cross-border terrorism, Mr Singh has emphasized the practical purpose of his treaty of peace. It is important for the world to see that India is moving on with the peace process, but in its own way. After the civilian nuclear deal with the United States of America, and the US president?s mention of the ?historic opportunity to work towards lasting peace?, Mr Singh?s offer is perfectly timed. It is also fine-tuned ? to the sensitivities of the people on both sides of the LoC, without whose cooperation and participation no lasting solution will be possible.