According to the Information Minister, Sheikh Rashid Ahmad, the President assured the Kashmiri leaders that they would be taken along in the quest for peace, and that Islamabad would accept no solution to the Kashmir problem which is unacceptable to the Kashmiris.
This should put at rest the misgivings that are being expressed by some regarding Pakistan's stance on Kashmir, even though India clearly stepped back from its stated position when, as per the joint statement issued in Islamabad, it agreed to resolve all outstanding issues, "including Kashmir, to the satisfaction of both sides."
The Kashmiri leaders came out of the meeting with the President apparently quite contented, saying they supported him in his search for a just settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
Sheikh Rashid Ahmad also quoted the President as having told the meeting that once the peace process reaches the stage from where the exercise of finding a solution to the Kashmir dispute begins, Kashmiri leaders from the other side of the fence would also be taken into confidence.
In fact, while welcoming the Islamabad process, prominent Hurriyat Conference leader Mir Waiz Omer Farooq has expressed the hope that soon the Indian government would allow leaders from the occupied Kashmir to travel to Pakistan in order to hold discussions with Islamabad.
That, though, is expected to happen, as the President pointed out, only when the composite dialogue gets going.
The Pakistan-India joint statement mentioned February as the month when the composite dialogue was to start.
However, reports coming out of New Delhi indicate that though the process will be set in motion in February, a structured dialogue will have to wait till after the national elections in India.
They say that the BJP leadership is thinking of calling an early election. Interestingly, unlike the last elections when the BJP based its election campaign on the Hindutva plank, this time the party is reported to be planning to use the slogan of Friendship with Pakistan.
The decision to make meaningful peace with Pakistan, no doubt, is born out of long-term foreign and economic policy considerations.
But it is also expected to win for the BJP the support of Muslim voters, who have tended to vote against it for fear of its religious extremism.
It is worthwhile to recall that during the recently held four state elections, the BJP had won in three states, ousting the Congress rule.
And that victory was widely attributed to its pro-development slogan of 'Bijli (electricity, Sarak (road) and Paani (water)." Which must have given it an instructive understanding of the people's preferences.
As it is, the percentage of people living below the poverty line in both India and Pakistan is about the same: 40 percent. It is not surprising if these people want economic progress, which has been held hostage, to a great extent, by the Kashmir conflict.
The peace card, therefore, may actually work to the BJP's advantage. Nonetheless, Kashmir is a complex issue which touches the core sensitivities of people on both sides of the border.
On the Indian side, the more than half a century of open hostilities coupled with a new-found arrogance of power may have a restraining effect of their own.
So far as Pakistan is concerned, barring a few voices of dissent, there is a general support for the Islamabad peace process.
If it leads to a solution that takes into account the basic concerns of both Pakistan and India, and is acceptable to the Kashmiri people, as President Musharraf has been stressing, it would be a victory of all sensible and peace-loving people living in the Subcontinent.