India has formally given up its stated position of not resuming talks with Pakistan until perpetrators of 26/11 massacre in Mumbai are brought to justice. India, the United States and pretty much the rest of the world agrees on the basis of evidence that the 26/11 massacre was planned and executed by the Pakistan-based militant organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba. Yet, Pakistan has spent 14 months oscillating between plain denial and proclaimed helplessness in the matter, asking India for more evidence and playing an even bigger victim of terrorism at the same time. Meanwhile, on the Indian side, Pakistan-sponsored terrorism never ceased, even as the business-as-usual encounters between security forces and militants in Kashmir rarely graduated from the scroll at the bottom of the news television screen to full-screen coverage.

Tellingly, just the day after India invited Islamabad to facilitate talks between the foreign secretaries of the two countries, supposedly banned anti-India terrorists were happily parading the streets of Lahore. Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani too, on his part, reacted to India's offer stating that India had only returned to the negotiating table under pressure from the international community.

Given the situation, then, does India stand to gain by resuming talks with Pakistan? Has anything changed since 26/11 to warrant talks with Pakistan?