There were filmstars to add glamour to the trip and we have heard stories of how grand the welcome had been. We also saw footages on television of how overwhelmed some border residents were during the trip and that nostalgia was one of the foremost features which stood out as perhaps the only enduring feature of the bus ride. Actually, the trip to Lahore was nothing more than a joy ride and if any global political equations have emerged out of the exercise, they can flatter only to deceive.

Nostalgia can be good stuff of poetry, indeed some prose too. But in the world of realpolitik, any right-thinking person will vouch for its inefficiency in a world which now swears more by nuclear bombs than teardrops which come from fond memories and apparent opening up of borders. Going to Lahore by bus and returning by a plane makes no sense either in terms of economics or politics; if Vajpayee and his government, with a little help from their Pakistani counterparts, have taken it upon themselves to only rub the raw social nerve of this subcontinent by striking emotional chords without any tangible political upshot, then the exercise should be dubbed to be one of the biggest hyped failures of this government.

Significantly, Vajpeyee made good copy for the newspapers when he visited memorials which no other Prime Ministers of India had ever done before . He made good photocopy too. He managed to hog the headlines for a couple of days only to return home to find the Opposition baying for his blood on a very legitimate issue. While there can be absolutely no harm in talking with broad smiles all around, the most obvious point is whether these smiles will be permanent fixtures in two countries which do not exactly have a history of great evenings together. Which brings us to the main question. What did the trip achieve? To be honest:nothing. Was the thorny Kashmir issue even raised? We do not know and a media, beguiled and enamoured by the somewhat clinical hospitality of protocol and diplomacy, conveniently forgot this too. Even as the guns continued to fire at each other on the border, diplomatic smiles _ for whatever they are worth _ were exchanged between Prime Ministers who tried to edge each other out of the photographs and the singlemost important issue vexing relations between the two countries continued to remain as unsurmountable as ever. That, in a nutshell, has been the final upshot of all that the bus achieved.