Flagging off irrelevance

So much ado about nothing.
As if flagging off buses across the border meant any thing. Between India and Pakistan, the drama continues. The rightist power claims that solves the problems which persisted throughout the five decades of the existence of the countries as political democracies (or whatever).

The drama has reached a stage when its painfully funny. People are clearly missing from the pictures since the ministers are eager to credit themselves for this new era of friendship (or whatever).

Apparently, a bus would be flagged off at 6 a.m. IST from Lahore today. About the same time a bus from New Delhi would start for Pakistan. (for the records, it takes 11 hours to cover the distance of 500 kilometres including immigration and customs clearance).

A fortnight ago when the Indian side claimed that the bus would be seen off by the External Affairs Minister, Yashwant Sinha, Islamabad dropped the idea of seriously pursuing it. When asked, Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman, Masood Khan reportedly told press that from Pakistan, the Tourism Minister would flag off the bus. He would not say whether the minister was “reluctant” to do the needful because of their collective feeling that the peace process was heading nowhere.

So much for a feeble Vajpayee claiming strength at bridging gaps (or whatever).