To understand the vast gap between India and Pakistan -- and to assess what can be done about it -- one needs to understand the history behind their emergence as independent states. That history is extremely complex, but one should start
with a fundamental fact: there is no parallel in history to the modern Indian state. Never have so many diverse groups -- linguistic, racial, regional, and religious -- in such huge numbers, been encompassed within a democratic framework. Because no such state had ever existed, many said India could not succeed. In particular, those demanding Pakistan's creation claimed that the Muslims of India were a separate "nation" and could live only in a state in which Muslims were the majority. (They also demanded that Muslim-majority areas should be part of Pakistan; hence their claim to Kashmir.) Opposing this was the nationalist belief that Indians were all one people, whose varying faiths and practices enriched a common culture. We must recall that initial difference because it persists in a baleful new form: Pakistan alleges that India is not reconciled to the two countries' partition in 1947 and is still seeking to undo it, whereas India increasingly believes that Pakistan's use of terrorism is actually part of an effort to destabilize India as a whole.