Ishaal
Zehra
It all started with the visit of the
exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, ‘Dalai Lama’ to Tawang district in Arunachal
Pradesh earlier this month. For those who do not know the geographic importance
of Arunachal Pradesh, it is an eastern Himalayan state administered by India
but claimed by China as Southern Tibet.
China lodged a diplomatic protest
with India when the Dalai Lama began his visit to Arunachal Pradesh on April 4,
noticing that his visit will rather have a negative impact on Sino-India ties, visibly
cautioning New Delhi not to use the exiled spiritual leader to undermine
Beijing's interests. Iterating its displeasure at the visit almost a week after
it ended, Chinese foreign ministry clearly indicated it has not bought what
India has been saying– that the trip was religious in nature or the Tibetan
leader is free to travel and doesn’t plan his itinerary at the behest of the Indian
government.
As if this was not enough, the
Indian chief minister of Arunachal Pradesh, Pema Khandu, told Reuters on April
5 that he regarded the land on the other side of the border as Tibet, not
China. "As far as the boundary issue is concerned, I have also maintained
that we don't share our boundary with China, but we share our boundary with
Tibet," Khandu said.
This isn’t the first time India
provoked China. India has been repeatedly doing so over the past year. Last
year, in October, it was Modi inviting US Ambassador Richard Verma at Tawang
for the monastery’s annual festival. He even established the official nature of
the invitation by appointing minister of State in Home ministry, Kiren Rijiju as
his escort. This was the first time a US ambassador to India visited Arunachal
Pradesh.
In April 2016, again, China was deliberately
provoked with the statement of US consul general in Kolkata, Craig L. Hall who
said that “US is absolutely clear that Arunachal is Indian territory”. Chinese
foreign ministry strongly objected to it, saying “China is firmly opposed to
the US diplomat’s actions, which will damage the hard-earned peace and
tranquility of the China-India border region. Any responsible third party
should respect efforts by China and India to seek peaceful and stable
reconciliation, and not the opposite”. Here ‘peace and tranquility of the
border region’ was a clear diplomatic reference (or may be a caution) to the
Sino-India border agreement of 1993.
This provocation is not happening
again and again without intention. There is a reason why Verma visited the
northeastern state. The Dalai Lama did not suddenly woke up after a hibernation
of few years and realized that he should visit his birth place. This all
signifies at a time when New Delhi’s ties with Beijing have been strained not
only over the Chinese raising obstacles to Indian membership of the Nuclear
Suppliers Group (NSG), but also for the cover provided to Pakistan in
multilateral bodies – the OBOR – the CPEC.
Interestingly, China reacted back
to India on Wednesday after it announced that it has "standardized"
official names for six places in Arunachal Pradesh and termed the move as a
"legitimate action". Though Indian media dubbed this move as China's
revenge against Dalai Lama's visit to the disputed region, Long Xingchun,
Director at the Centre for Indian Studies at China West Normal University, said
the standardization of names demonstrates China is less likely to make
concessions in border negotiations with India. Writing in the state-run Global
Times daily, Long said Beijing was magnanimous in not retaliating against New
Delhi's provocations, rather it was a way to convey Beijing's resoluteness in
not making any concessions to New Delhi in border talks.
Prem Shankar Jha is his article on
the subject thoughtfully analyzed what India can conceivably gain from forcing
China to take a stand on an issue that would much rather bury Sino-India calm? “What
will India do if China decides to seize some part of Arunachal — the Tawang
tract for example — by force? Will it fight another border war with China in
terrain where, apart from having a much larger army, China enjoys all the
advantages of terrain and logistics? Given the hyper-nationalism that has begun
to grip the Indian middle classes today, Modi will have no option but to do so”,
suggests Jha.
Carrying the same thoughts in mind,
Long Xingchun said some "radical" Indians were naive in thinking that
New Delhi could out-do Beijing in armed clashes. In fact, India, which had more
advantages in the 1962 war with China, should learn from its "erroneous
strategic judgements".
This leads to the question, does
India has any chance of winning such a war? Jha says one does not have to look
far to see that a war against China is the very last thing that this war weary
and nearly bankrupt country now wants. So why is Modi taking India into such
dire peril? When logic fails to provide an answer, one must turn to illogic.
The only explanation that makes even a modicum of sense is a bruised ego. China
has ignored repeated attempts by India to make it withdraw its objections to
India joining the NSG. Apparently rejection is something that Narendra Modi is
unable to take. Now the real catch in all this scenario is that the question
which failed to strike Modi’s mind is, how it all will conclude if Xi Jinping might
also have the same problem?
