India needs to repair its damaged regional presence
Earlier this month, two well-known American South-Asia hands, both having served as top US envoys in the region, made a strong plea that Washington should now steer India's passage into the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec).
India, they believe, has overcome the problems that blocked its entry when the Apec was formed. India's economic policies were now forward-looking instead of looking inwards, as they did then, and now fall in line with the organisational goal of free and open trade. They cited the giant strides the Indian economy has made after adopting economic liberalisation. Like any expansion of international economic integration, Apec membership would involve additional policy innovations by India, and thus reinforce the strategic and economic interests of the US, the two believe.Today's truth is that the Indian economy is in the doldrums, with foreign investment hitting a low as exports have dropped substantially. Worse, India's foreign policy, which had for decades stood the test of time, even through internal turbulence, including Indira Gandhi's "Emergency", and major operations in the west and east of the country, is under severe internal strain.
Lack of initiative has shown policy-makers in a poor light, and the pace of developments in the region - with China occupying the high diplomatic and economic ground - does not add up to India's desired pre-eminence as a regional power.
Much of India's diminished status was on evidence at the recent BRICS meeting in South Africa. India may have endorsed the proposal to set up a BRICS Bank, on the lines of the World Bank or IMF, but understands that it may not have much of a say in its current straitened circumstances to acquire a major voice in the proposed bank.
China, with several hundred trillion dollars in its kitty, will obviously call the shots; it would thus increase its burgeoning role in Africa, even as it continues to needle its neighbours in Asia with its posturing in the South China Sea, which it claims as its own.
Yes, the Indian delegation that visited Vietnam recently did make some noises supportive of that country's claims in the sea, including its right to explore for oil, but that support remains an expression of intent only. The Americans and Japanese too are concerned about the Chinese claim to the sea as its territorial waters.
There are many other irritants in the countries of the region, not least of these being India's own festering border dispute with Beijing, which despite the odd friendly word, refuses to go away - as witnessed by China's refusal to accept Arunachal Pradesh as an Indian state. In its present shaky condition, it would be silly to expect the UPA government to take corrective steps to restore the imbalances that have crept into the foreign policy arena.
In Afghanistan, which the US is set to leave soon, leaving the country to Hamid Karzai and his possible allies from the Taleban, India has committed heavily to reconstruction of the country. However, it may have to reassess its commitments, which run into hundreds of millions of dollars. India-Pakistan relations have slid back into limbo, bilateral relations having reached a new low in recent weeks. Pakistan is due to hold a general election next month, as the government completes an unprecedented five-year term. With an interim administration in charge until the poll is completed, one can only hope and pray for peace to prevail, to permit peaceful elections for the national and provincial assemblies.
The Maldives is also due to hold elections, with the deposed pro-India president and the incumbent both in the fray. The former president had sought asylum at the Indian High Commission before returning to his own place to try his luck; he was arrested and released a few days later. Meanwhile, his successor cancelled a contract awarded to an Indian firm to build and run the nation's biggest airport.
And there is big trouble brewing as we go down the coast to Sri Lanka. The once friendly atmosphere between the two countries has been turned foul over the past few weeks by the two major Dravidian parties in Tamil Nadu, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the All India Anna Dravidian Progress Federation (AIADMK). These parties have declared virtual war on the Sinhala-led Sri Lankan government. The Tamil Nadu parties, with the AIADMK in power in that state, have unleashed a vicious campaign on behalf of the Tamil population of Sri Lanka, accusing the Rajapakse government in Colombo of having inflicted atrocities (genocide) on Lanka Tamils.
New Delhi, predictably, has turned a blind eye to the Dravidian parties' vituperative campaign, with the Tamil Nadu State Assembly unanimously passing a highly questionable resolution against Sri Lanka. Instead of urging the immediate implementation of various rehabilitation programmes for the Sri Lankan Tamils displaced as a consequence of the civil war imposed on the country by the Tamil terrorist outfit, the V Prabhakaran-led Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Chennai politicians are insistent that a separate Tamil Eelam (homeland) be formed in Sri Lanka. It's also forgotten that among the ameliorative steps already indicated by Colombo and New Delhi is the Indian-financed rehabilitation package.
The Chennai Tamils have not even spared the Sri Lankan cricket players participating in the Indian 20-20 cricket league. The unprecedented fuss created by Chief Minister J Jayalalitha of Tamil Nadu over the inclusion of Sri Lankan players in the league has caused the other jingoistic outfit, the Board of Control for Cricket in India, headed by fellow Tamilian cement baron, N Srinivasan, to lend a disgraceful helping hand. Instead of reassigning all the matches in Chennai to other states, the board has chosen to bar Sri Lankan players from playing in Chennai. But then you are reckoning without the fact that Srinivasan is also the franchise owner of the Chennai team. He dare not defy the DMK-AIADMK writ. The anti-Sri Lankan venom has poured out relentlessly through the media, the TV networks acting as cheer-leaders.
The Manmohan Singh government can continue to live in a make-believe world. It's on its last legs and is yet unwilling to show strength of will or purpose to govern. The day may not be far when the Indian government will cease to be taken seriously by its neighbours, big or small.
To go by the recklessness with which responsible parties like the DMK and the AIADMK are toying with our relations with a friendly neighbouring country, one wonders whether the Tamil parties are questioning our long-held belief that the conduct of foreign policy falls within the domain of the federal government and not of the states or their opposition parties.
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