India is unwilling to resume dialogue with Pakistan unless Pakistan takes "stringent action against the militant outfits". Our foreign minister has rejected the precondition in a statement on September 18. In the past, there has been little progress on the Kashmir dispute as India goes into each dialogue with an 'oyster shell' mindset. Indian officials keep repeating the same old blinkered perspective (atoot ang) virtually ensuring there is no progress at all. There could be progress on Kashmir issue only when India tells us why it considers the demand for plebiscite to be so antiquated. India backed out of the plebiscite commitment through a perverted interpretation of the principle rebus sic stantibus (a fundamental change of circumstances). But New Delhi needs to place its presumptions, or at least a rational set of observations about this fundamental change, in an across the table negotiations with the Pakistan side. At present, India rues the fact that Pakistan did not withdraw 'all' of its forces as per UNCIP resolutions and the McNaughton (of 1949), or 'bulk' of its forces as per4 the Frank Graham proposal (of 1951). Pakistan could explode the cobweb of India's view by reminding New Delhi of the facts that: (a) McNaughten's proposal called upon India to reduce its troops in Kashmir to somewhere between 12,000-18,000 and Pakistan to somewhere between 3000-6000 for internal security. Pakistan accepted the proposal, India rejected it. India kept insisting on keeping more than 21,000 troops in Kashmir. India flouted the UN resolutions forbidding accession through the occupied Kashmir's 'constituent assembly'. The hundreds of thousands of Indian troops stationed at present in the vale of tears are a travesty of both proposals. That is why the dialogue, even if resumed, is likely to end up in zero sum. -A. J. MALIK, Rawalpindi, September 28.