India has to move fast on ties with neighbourhood

India’s neighbourhood is aflame with several developments, notwithstanding the Congress party-led UPA’s inability to hold the fort at home and the Bharatiya Janata Party’s determination to view even national interest through the prism of partisan politics.

And so Sri Lankan foreign minister Gamini Peiris arrived in Delhi last week to formally invite Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to attend the Commonwealth heads of government summit being held in Colombo in November.

Problem is, former UPA ally and DMK chief Karunanidhi has already advised the PM that he should not go, keeping the plight of the Sri Lankan Tamils in mind. Except that in the Northern Province, of which Jaffna is the political and cultural heart and soul, elections will take place next month, for the first time ever, in what seems to be a key concession to India as well as to the Tamil communities in both countries.
 

Now it is creditable that the Tamils of the Northern Province will finally have the chance to politically elect their leaders. However, the fact is that the governor of the province will continue to be a Colombo man, which means that President Mahinda Rajapaksa will continue to hold the reins of real power.

Should the Tamils then participate in what seems likely is a “controlled” election?  Will the PM’s presence in Colombo after the elections, qualify as a signal that India has come to terms with Rajapaksa’s treatment of its Tamil minority, over which subject India voted against Sri Lanka in the Human Rights Council in Geneva only this March?

Meanwhile, a $500 million container terminal in Colombo port built by the Chinese on a BOT basis was inaugurated in early August, allowing Beijing to significantly expand its influence in South Asia’s waters. The irony is that Indian ships can use this terminal for further trans-shipment to western markets, instead of relying on Dubai and Singapore, thereby cutting their own costs and boosting profits.

Up north in Bhutan, on the other hand, another significant development is unfolding, to resolve which its new prime minister, Tshering Tobgay is arriving in Delhi very soon. It seems that the Chinese have proposed to Bhutan that both countries conduct a “joint technical field survey” in the strategically sensitive region where Bhutan, China and India meet. Certainly this is a prequel to the settlement of the border between China and Bhutan that China so desperately wants – and which India has equally strongly resisted for years – because it would formally delineate the buffer zone between the “chicken’s neck” or “Siliguri corridor” in the Chumbi valley and the Sino-Bhutanese border.

Reports from Bhutan say that China has now offered to cede Bhutan 485 sq kms in return for 269 sq km in this sensitive buffer zone area. Naturally, Delhi is nervous. And so when newly anointed Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh went to Bhutan on her first trip abroad after she moved into South Block a couple of weeks ago, she was accompanied by National Security Advisor Shivshanker Menon.

The 21st round of border talks between Bhutan and China also took place last week. If Bhutan agrees to settle its own border with China, will this mean that Thimphu will ask the Indian Army to withdraw from Bhutan?

In comments to the Kolkata-based ‘Telegraph’ newspaper earlier this month, Tobgay admitted the tension in the tri-lateral relationship between India, Bhutan and China.
 
“...the fact of the matter is, China is a reality, they are our neighbour. We have a long border that is not demarcated for 120km, and to demarcate it, we have had 20 rounds of border talks already. But the fact also remains that we have to be sensitive to India’s security interests vis-a-vis China, and we are. And none of this is new. So, as far as I know and I understand, Bhutan has been extremely sensitive to the security interests of our friend and neighbour India vis-a-vis China,” Tobgay said.

As for Bangladesh, the bill on ratifying the Land Boundary Agreement between India and Bangladesh was sought to be introduced in the Rajya Sabha last week – but deferred when the lone Asom Gana Parishad MP and BJP supporter Birendra Baishya trooped into the well of the house and basically brought the discussion to a standstill.

Certainly, Bangladesh is looking askance as one Indian MP holds up the ratification of a Bill that could make the difference between victory and defeat for the ruling Awami League in elections scheduled to take place in Bangladesh in January. Reports from Dhaka say that prime minister Sheikh Hasina is already weakening, having lost the municipal elections in four cities recently. Observers point out that if she loses the elections to her opponent, Khaleda Zia of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), India’s eastern neighbourhood is likely to become far more fragile.

With Pakistan, on the other hand, the meeting between Manmohan Singh and Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif is likely to take place on September 29 in New York, on the margins of the UN General Assembly. While much is being made of the fact that Nawaz Sharif has gone out of his way to ask for a meeting with Manmohan Singh – and despite this request, Manmohan Singh is holding firm and not even giving him a meal – it seems that the possibility of returning to a semblance of an economic dialogue exists.  

India is still waiting for a team from Pakistan’s power and energy ministry to come to Delhi to finalise an agreement for the purchase of 500 MW of power from India’s Punjab. Delhi is ready and willing to go the extra mile and connect parts of the two Punjabs in India-Pakistan by the same electricity transmission line as well as do a deal on buying oil and gas. All this as the Indian foreign office denies any conversation between Foreign Secretary Jalil Jilani and her Indian counterpart Sujatha Singh on any subject, as was recently claimed by Sartaj Aziz, Sharif’s advisor on foreign affairs.

The monsoon session of Parliament has been extended by a week into September, so that the 15th Lok Sabha can take a considered view on a variety of legislation. Whether or not our elected representatives will rise to the occasion, fact is that India’s neighbourhood is coming to the conclusion that it has to move on, regardless of the continuing chaos and confusion inside the largest country in South Asia.