Relationship between India(ns) and Pakistan(is) can be precisely understood by a very popular line in a U2 track…'I cant live….. with or without you'.
We love to fight, we love to hate, we love to abuse, we love to blame each other for most of our problems, we see each other as enemies and we vow to defeat each other come what may in every possible encounter. Everyone, whether a cricket follower or not, would be glued to TV during an Indo-Pak encounter just to see the other lose. We’ll take great pride talking about the wars that we have fought, both sides claiming to have won each one of them. We would leave no stone unturned, in this case no news piece unread, to show the other ones about the shortfalls of their country. So much so, that we even talk about rooting each other out from our very existences. In nutshell, it seems, as if we cannot live with each other.
But on the other hand, no discussion in Pakistan would be complete without citing India as an example, good, most of the times. You would hardly find an Indian who wouldn’t want to visit Lahore or at least hasn’t heard great things about the city. Pakistanis have grown on Indian films and film music, and Indian shake hips on Pakistani popular music. Pakistanis would debate as passionately about how Aamir Khan is a superior actor to Shahrukh or how Sourav Ganguly was being treated unjustly among each other as Indians would. Atif Aslam’s feud with Jal would be the talk of the town among Indians as if it happened in India. No matter what the intensity of conflict, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan or Lata would always be owned by both. No matter how much a Pakistani talks ill about Sachin in online debates, he still admires him to the core and Wasim Akram enjoys as much popularity in India as he does in Pakistan. Expatriate Indo-Pakistanis would live like families in foreign countries that even the ‘goras’ won’t be able to tell them apart.
When we meet in person no body can tell that we are actually the bitter nuclear rivals with a number of bloody wars under our belts. In fact an Indian visiting Pakistan would have hundreds of tales of love to share back home… and vice versa. It is this bittersweet relationship because of which we can’t live with or without each other.
