We trust you, but we will ascertain facts: PM Modi to Pakistan

However, it’s the other Sharif – Pakistani army chief Raheel Sharif – who holds the key. Pakistanis themselves are asking how JeM could be so potent and active 13 years after it was officially banned.

In a statement quoted by the Indian media, Parrikar also said Pakistani investigation team will not be allowed inside the Pathankot airbase. It was the first visit by an Indian leader to Pakistan in twelve years.

The JIT comprises of officials from Intelligence Bureau (IB), Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Military Intelligence (MI).

Many in India have welcomed the steps taken by the Sharif government and the Indian government has also expressed satisfaction.

After the 26/11 attacks, Pakistan had raided Lashkar camps, placed founder Hafiz Saeed under house arrest, arrested alleged mastermind Lakhvi, detained 70 activists of Lashkar’s contemporary avatar Jamaat-ud-Dawa, and launched a probe.

Will Pakistan genuinely act against terrorists who target India? “I personally met General Zia on several occasions, demanding that Singh and others be handed over, but to no avail”, recalls the then High Commissioner to Pakistan, Natwar Singh.

The team chose to seek information from India about DNA reports and finger prints of killed attackers, he said.

The attack on the base in Pathankot has especially lurid implications.

In this January 27, 2000 file Maulana Masood Azhar, center, (wearing glasses and white turban), arrives in Islamabad, Pakistan.

Indian investigators have said that phone intercepts suggest that the gunmen in the assault came from Pakistan. Already in the aftermath of the Pathankot attack a message purportedly from Jaish chief Masood Azhar has described Pakistani government action against his group as a betrayal of the Muslim ummah and blamed Pakistan’s rulers for pushing that country into chaos. Formerly associated with al-Qaeda and Harakat-ul-Mujahideen that fought “jihad” in Afghanistan and Kashmir, Azhar came in the limelight after he was imprisoned in India because of militant activities in Jammu and Kashmir. First, the Pakistanis must register an FIR in their country like they did after the November 2008 Mumbai attacks.

I repeat, the choice is simple for Pakistan – either crack down on terror groups or be consumed by terror. The Pakistani military keeps backing militant groups, like Jaish-e-Mohammed, that keep pushing the subcontinent to the brink of war, and that keep undermining Pakistan’s fledgling democratic institutions.

In the tortuous history of Indo-Pak relations every time there is a ray of hope, Pakistan and, increasingly, the so-called non-State actors nurtured by it, intervene to bring the two neighbours back to square one.