| Rashtrapati Bhavan's loss is South Block's gain. The thought occurred while listening to Pranab Mukherjee confidently outlining India's regional destiny without boasting of being a world power in his distinguished public lecture in Singapore. Not only did his sound ideas and philosophical depth suggest India's most sophisticated political thinker since PV Narasimha Rao, but his unsuspected skill in handling questions also reminded me of Narasimha Rao's Singapore Lecture in 1994. |
| Two points deserve mention. First, having presided as finance minister over India's escape from the shackles of the so-called Hindu rate of growth to achieve 5.6 per cent growth, Mukherjee acknowledged the primacy of economics in shaping foreign policy. Second, he did not mention Subhas Chandra Bose who is synonymous with Singapore for many elderly Bengalis. There was only a passing reference to "an understanding to examine the viability of the reconstruction of the INA memorial in Singapore." |
| I was agreeably surprised because only the day before Mukherjee had paid eloquent tribute to Bose at a function to release Chalo Delhi, the 12th and final volume of Bose's collected works, lovingly edited by his grand-nephew who was also present. It was an occasion for reverential nostalgia. It's only in Singapore that you come across such relics of a stirring but sad chapter of history. An elderly scientist of my acquaintance loves to tell people how Bose selected his brother for the Imperial War College in Tokyo. Predictably, other Indians rubbish his claim. Similarly, a Malaysian Tamil told me that though an INA veteran, he had never sought pension or tamrapatra because so many "bogus fellows" pose as INA heroes. |
| I am glad, therefore, that whatever Mukherjee might have been constrained to say at the book launch, he struck a more realistic note in his main speech. Foreign policy cannot be based on a failed mission, however romantic it might appear in retrospect. While Bose espoused worthy principles and inspired the Indian diaspora throughout Southeast Asia, his Japanese connections did not make the INA popular with Singapore's Chinese who are the overwhelming majority. We don't speak of it in India but Japanese soldiers behaved with the utmost cruelty to all Chinese, both in the parts of China they overran and in Singapore. |
| That brings to mind what our fate might have been if the fortunes of war had been reversed. We know how brutally the Japanese treated their prisoners, including Indians who would not join the INA. Would a dependent Bose have been able to ensure greater humanity for a conquered India? One doubts it. |
| However, Singapore does have a memorial to the INA. It's not the one Bose built and Mountbatten destroyed. It's smaller and more elegant affair, erected by the Singapore government in the nineties. I attended the inauguration ceremony and wonder if replacing it with a replica of Bose's monument would achieve anything. |
| Skirting all this, Mukherjee spoke of what matters. "The real significance of our ties," he said, "lies in the role of Singapore as a restorer of connectivity between India and East Asia." Of course, Singapore, a Chinese island in a Muslim sea, and comparing its geopolitical situation with Israel's, courts secular, non-ideological, status quoist India for its own reasons. But those reasons help India too. Hence Narasimha Rao's Look East policy which led, several prime ministers later, to the 2005 Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement whereby India gave Singapore firms "" and foreign companies operating through Singapore "" pre-establishment national treatment guarantees not extended to any other nation. |
| Mukherjee called CECA "a pioneering effort" that "also provided a template to address the requirements of a more encompassing relationship, including quality and standards, investment protection, recognition of qualifications, air services, movement of people, science and technology, as well as education and media." Thanks to CECA, tiny Singapore ranks among India's "top five" trading and investment partners. |
| I mentioned the Q&A session. Mukherjee deftly diverted a question about "containing" China by quoting Hu Jintao on there being enough space to grow together. Apparently, the Chinese president had stressed the "together." On Kashmir, he said India hoped that the connectivity it was trying to establish between the two parts of the state would defuse insurgency. I was relieved that his mention of "Pakistani occupation" did not have Pakistan's high commissioner, sitting in the front row, leaping angrily to his feet. |
| What he said on Myanmar or Tibet cannot have pleased everyone present. But Mukherjee was not playing to the gallery. That in a politician commands respect. He gave credible replies to those who wanted visa-less entry into India. The "role of non-state actors" "" a delightful euphemism for terrorists "" forces India to be circumspect. He presented the national point of view with quiet dignity. Mukherjee might be disappointed at not becoming president. But we are probably better off with him in an effective political role. |
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