Still people talk about democracy all the time as if the end of the army rule is round the corner. However, there must be a bit of defiance in their psyche. Their elected representatives, who were screened by the military before the polls, have made President Pervez Musharraf promise to quit his position as the chief of the army staff by the end of this year. This does not mean that the military is ready or willing to go back to the barracks. It has developed a vested interest in power and has roots reaching even the countryside. Yet, the fact that Musharraf will abandon the uniform speaks volumes about the limited National Assembly and the Senate the country has.

Ungrateful religious parties whom Musharraf gave support during elections to push out the political parties were in the forefront of the demand. Never before did they win more than five to six seats. But today their combination of six parties, the Majlis Muttahida Amal (MMA), is the largest group in the National Assembly. The MMA also rules half of Pakistan, the North West Frontier Province and Baluchistan.

Musharraf probably rues the day when he allowed the religious parties to fill the vacuum that displacement of former Prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif created. The MMA is openly combining politics with religion. It is supporting religious seminaries and at the same time giving the Al-Qaeda all the assistance to needle Kabul.

The religious parties are doing still something worse: they are spreading fundamentalism within the country. Many in the upper middle class have discovered to their horror that either a son, nephew or the son-in-law in their family has become a jehadi. The Punjab chief minister's son is proud to be a maulvi.

Such a scenario has made Musharraf's position untenable. America's pressure to curb fundamentalism is not the only reason for his discomfiture. His own life is in danger and the last two attempts to kill him have shaken Musharraf. He has found that the religious ragtag he once encouraged is after him because he has changed his track.

But what could he have done after the 9/11 attacks? He was given 24 hours to choose between the Taliban's Afghanistan and America. As then foreign minister Abdus Sattar in the Musharraf cabinet told me, they had no alternative and they communicated their full support to Washington in less than 24 hours. But Musharraf's dilemma is that he has to give space to politicians if he wants to confront the deeni (religious) forces.

Benazir may be willing to accept some part of military rule or Musharraf in some shape. But Nawaz Sharif is uncompromising on the subject. He wants the military to go back -- lock, stock and barrel. Musharraf cannot allow even Benazir to return until he has established a Turkish pattern of polity -- a permanent role of the armed forces in the governance. His political options are limited.

In the circumstances, conciliation with India was the best choice before him. Harassed by zealots, he had to agree to make Kashmir as one of the items for a composite talk to break the logjam and not insist on having a solution on Kashmir first before moving further. His words of welcome for talks between the Hurriyat and New Delhi fitted into the change. He realised that the breakaway group which Islamabad supported was not in the good books of New Delhi.

Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri on whom Musharraf depended immensely gave a better formulation while talking to me in his office at Islamabad for one and a half hours. He said that the joint statement had generated hopes in Pakistan, India and Kashmir about the commencement of a dialogue process. He equated Kashmir with India and Pakistan as if it was a separate country. Even when he listed the outstanding issues he kept Jammu and Kashmir as the first item.

This may do for the time being. But New Delhi would

have to move quickly on Kashmir. In the perception of the Pakistanis the concessions which India made on the problem would determine how sincere it was in its efforts to make up. At whatever levels the talks between the two countries beginKasuri prefers the political levelKashmir will have to be discussed in depth and soon, even though New Delhi's first item is reportedly Sir Creek, something left from the Kutch award.

The ruling BJP's own compulsions as well as elections may not allow the Atal Behari Vajpayee government to go beyond dotting the i's and crossing the t's. But I found the Pakistani intelligentsia resenting even the lapse of time between now and the assumption of power by the next government. It is, however, taken for granted that Vajapyee would be the Prime Minister after the polls. He is not only popular in Pakistan but also trusted, unlike the BJP which is considered anti-Muslim.

Musharraf can manage the mercurial mood -- Pakistan's trait -- for some time. But he would feel let down if nothing "visible" emerged on Kashmir after a few weeks of the formation of the government at New Delhi. He too has a responsibility that cross-border terrorism is not resumed after the snow melts on the Kashmir hills. But if he is able to stop infiltration, he will be on a stronger wicket to demand from India that it makes good the words in the joint statement: "to the satisfaction of the two countries." Musharraf's job is, however, arduous when India's chief of army staff says that some 85 militant camps are still in existence in Pakistan.

Musharraf can achieve much by harnessing the goodwill which the joint statement and the people-to-people contacts have generated in Pakistan. His priority should be to relax visa restrictions and do away with reporting to the police. In fact, India should take the lead and initiate these steps unilaterally. But this can only be possible if the Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani's home ministry does not insist on screening visa applications.

When Kasuri uses the words "imposed conditions to discontinue," he probably has in view the impediments in the way of free travel and trade. He fears that the dialogue "can run into a deadlock and impasse" because of "our mutual acrimony" which I believe can disappear with free contact.

Kasuri warns against any "breakdown" in the talks because he dreads that the failure would begin "the blame game syndrome once again." His fears are not totally unfounded. Some top members of the Pakistani establishment told me that the joint statement was like so many declarations and agreements in the past. They came to naught and so would the joint statement. What they miss is the change in the mood of people who want to befriend India and begin a new chapter of amity and peace.

Kuldip Nayar is an eminent Indian columnist.