Calling for revival of Indo-Pak talks, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti on Thursday batted for taking cultural route too for the promotion of peace in the region. There is no doubt that cultural route can have ready acceptance because of the cultural commonality among the people living on both sides of the borders. Along with promoting cultural ties promotion of border tourism, opening up of more trade outlets for the cross-LoC business would help in bringing in normalcy. Developing tourism on the pattern of Wagah in Amritsar can be a small beginning and for this Suchetgarh just 45 km from the winter capital of Jammu and the nearest point on the India-Pakistan border offers ideal location for improving tourist footfall. Not only this Suchetgarh had the distinction of the entry point to India and was a trade and travel corridor before partition connecting Sialkot in Pakistan. Officially launched in 2010 the border tourism has failed to take off till date and the PDP-BJP combine dispensation headed by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had renewed the promise of reviving the dead project. At that time Chief Minister had called upon the tourism stakeholders “to compliment the undiluted efforts of the state government” to enable Jammu to gain a “firm foothold in the ever-expanding travel industry”. He had said Jammu’s emergence as a “top-end tourism destination” will depend solely on how “we diversify our travel-related infrastructure and facilities”. Most of the tourism related projects in Jammu like commissioning of Bahu Fort Ropeway, beautification of Tawi Riverfront, and restoration of Mubarak Mandi Heritage Complex are in a state of limbo and have run out of time frame of completion. Besides dialogue, it is futile to talk of strong action unless and until there is some provocation which needs to dealt with that way. No doubt a concoction of dialogue, cultural exchanges and trade can work in taking the peace initiatives further but the unique concepts are confined to official files and have fallen victims to government apathy. One wonders whether these steps would ever become realities or just part of wishful thinking of the government of the day.
