ISLAMABAD: Vehemently reacting to his Thursday’s statement, Indian media has assaulted High Commissioner Abdul Basit on Friday for just doing his job in reiterating Pakistan’s historical stance on Kashmir as being top of the core issues between the hostile neighbors.

Mainstream Indian media has portrayed Basit as villain to India-Pakistan peace process.

Some media reports have even questioned the status of the High Commissioner as if he had done something beyond his purview. Yet some others have described him near to the so-called “establishment” and working against the priorities of the government.

High Commissioner Abdul Basit being a seasoned diplomat had summed up the entire whatsoever peace process between India and Pakistan by making it clear that it would hardly move forward by leaving the core issue of Kashmir behind. “There is a national consensus in Pakistan for seeking normal and peaceful relationship with India, but this could not be achieved by putting the issue of Kashmir on the back-burner,” he had stated on Thursday in New Delhi.

Sadly, the Indian media has described this statement as “calling off” the so-called peace process. Anecdotal view of the India- Pakistan relations would clearly indicate that Pakistan never stepped back from its stance on Kashmir irrespective of the military or the civil rule in place. It is also clear from various statements in this regard from the Indian side that they have assumed as if the issue of terrorism had pushed the Kashmir dispute on the back-burner. “That is why perhaps High Commissioner Abdul Basit felt the need to reiterate that it is meaningless for Pakistan to talk leaving the Kashmir issue aside or even behind any other matter,” a former diplomat observed requesting not to be named.

An Indian news agency have gone too far in questioning “How could a high commissioner call off; something way above his pay grade?”

It went on to write, “an ambassador's job profile explicitly makes it clear that he or she is posted to represent his country's views and to promote relations with the country to which he or she is posted. So, what was Abdul Basit exactly doing?

The Pakistan High Commissioner was invited to the Foreign Correspondent's Club as a guest. From the beginning to the end of the statement made by him, he said that unless Kashmir problem is "solved", relations between India and Pakistan will not improve.

According to the Indian media, ever since his appointment as Pakistan's high commissioner to India, Abdul Basit has shown that he is a hawk on Kashmir. “The grapevine has it that Basit's relations are stronger with the 'establishment' in Pakistan rather than with the elected government of Nawaz Sharif,” it reported.

 According to the hawkish Indian media, India is annoyed with Basit batting above his pay grade. There will be diplomatic fallout, but unfortunately what gets hit is the India-Pakistan peace process, which seemed to have been top-driven by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Not anymore, it seems.