There is renewed enthusiasm amongst the SAARC leaders over India’s positive pronouncements of its role in the region. This will give SAARC a new lease of life. For Modi’s foreign policy orientation, it is also a firm announcement that SAARC needn’t be hostage to India-Pak rivalry, says Nihar R Nayak

The dominant view in South Asia today is that SAARC is a lost cause, perpetually on crutches due to the rivalry between two of its members — India and Pakistan. One would assume similar helplessness in the latest edition of the SAARC Summit to be held in Kathmandu (November 25-26) with the recent India-Pakistan firings on the loC and the cancellation of foreign secretary level talks. But with the Narendra Modi Government’s continued emphasis on the neighbourhood, there seem to be a great deal of unaccustomed excitement that SAARC can be reinvigorated.

likewise, there is renewed enthusiasm amongst the SAARC leaders over India’s positive pronouncements of its role in the region. Clearly this will give SAARC a new lease of life and direction which it has much lacked. For Modi Government’s foreign policy orientation, it is also a firm announcement that SAARC need not be hostage to the India-Pakistan rivalry.

India is thus likely to push forward its engagement with the rest of the SAARC members, for example, the new initiatives taken by BINA (Bhutan, India and Nepal Ambassadors) are significant as it represents an important sub-regional formulation. Recently, the BINA travelled to all major border trading points in the eastern part of India along with senior foreign officials of Bangladesh to improve sub-regional trade and connectivity by mitigating the existing hurdles. Other than that, Nepal and India have already declared to operationalise bus services on three routes: Kathmandu-Bhairahawa-Sunauli-Gorakhpur-lucknow-Delhi; Kathmandu-Bhairahawa-Sunauli-Azmgarh-Varanasi-Delhi; and Pokhara-Bhairahawa-Sunauli-Gorakhpur-lucknow-Delhi. India will also sign an agreement with Nepal, on the sideline of the SAARC Summit, to use Vishakhapatnam port as a second transit point for Nepal.

While the upcoming SAARC Summit will focus on past issues like “terrorism, climate change, regional connectivity and common market, it will also bring to the table some fresh agendas such as launching of regional communication satellite, railway services, SAARC motor vehicle agreement and energy cooperation”. Nepal has reportedly drafted a 31-point Summit declaration, which would be subject to inclusion of inputs from other members. Other issues include making concerted efforts and cooperation to “contain communicable diseases like Ebola, HIV/AIDS, etc”. Interestingly, polio is missing from the list even when it has emerged as a potential hurdle in free movement of people between Pakistan and India due to more than 200 polio cases in Pakistan at present.

Besides, the Summit is also going to take some important decisions on readjustment of number of regional centres, initiating dialogue with observers, modalities of aid and assistance from observers, membership issues, revision of charter and frequency of SAARC summits, among others. Most importantly, the SAARC programme committee has agreed that any assistance from observers to the organisation will have to be ratified by all the member states.

NEIGHBOURS FIRST

For the Modi Government, India’s foreign policy journey begins through the neighbourhood. The invitation to all SAARC leaders to attend his oath-taking ceremony in May clearly sent a message that neighbours are more important than others. Soon after, Modi’s foreign visits to the two Himalayan countries further emphasised India’s neighbourhood priority and also signalled a shift away from Pakistan. Modi’s ‘B4B’ (Bharat for Bhutan) announcement with a B2B (Business to Business) model reflects that India is equally dependent on its smaller neighbours as far as security and unhindered search for energy and development are concerned. This is a stark departure from earlier thinking in India’s neighbourhood policy debate that smaller neighbours are more dependent on India and that the relations is essentially a one-way traffic.

The primacy of ‘neighbour first’ under the BJP-led Government was soundly articulated by President Pranab Mukherjee in June 2014 in Parliament. He said “…building a peaceful, stable and economically interlinked neighbourhood which is essential for the collective development and prosperity of the South Asian Region. We (India) will further work together with South Asian leaders to revitalise SAARC as an effective instrument for regional cooperation and as a united voice on global issues.”

Keeping the ‘neighbourhood first’ policy as a priority, Prime Minister Modi held bilateral meetings with his counterparts from Bangladesh and Nepal and also with Sri lankan President and discussed matters of “common concern, including terrorism, while affirming his commitment to make SAARC a strong regional block and a vibrant organisation by focussing on common challenges”. Addressing the nation on Independence Day, Modi appealed to all SAARC members to work together to remove poverty, a major challenge, from the region. “let’s fight together and defeat poverty.” India understands that despite its steady economic growth since 1991, poverty cannot be mitigated without the support of its neighbours. Despite having special resolutions on poverty alleviation for the last 22 years, the problem persists.

The attitudinal departure towards the SAARC can be attributed to India’s quest for development and energy needs. India now considers its smaller neighbours as partners in its economic growth and developmental goals. Second, India’s sphere of influence is now shared due to the presence of external forces, especially China, in the region. China has made massive diplomatic inroads in India’s neighbourhood by making huge investments in infrastructure, improving bilateral trade, defence and cultural cooperation and reopening maritime and land silk routes. Third, other than making India’s presence felt in international fora and deepening relationship with like-minded major powers, India could leverage SAARC and other sub-regional platforms to achieve its more immediate national interests. 

 FIllING THE GAP

A marked policy shift towards SAARC actually came about in 2003, corresponding with India’s economic upswing. While India continued its faith in SAARC to promote regional cooperation, poor connectivity was a major hindrance in further bolstering its economic growth with its neighbours. Therefore, while SAARC was trapped in Pakistan’s constant effort to stall the organisation’s progress and challenge India’s lead role, India initiated integration at sub-regional level through the BIMSTEC in 2004. In the first meeting of the BIMSTEC, the member countries signed a framework on trade and investment, connectivity and energy.

From a policy shift in 2003, India once again relooked its SAARC policy in the Summit in 2007, where it emphasised regional connectivity. India might have realised then that its passive role in SAARC was giving space to extra-regional powers in the region, especially China. India also might have sensed that if it continued to play a passive role, some member countries could pitch for China’s membership into the SAARC as a counter weight to India. Being the largest country in the region and given the high expectations of its smaller neighbours to see its leadership role, India felt that its participation in the SAARC should not be affected by Pakistan’s conspiracy.

India also understood that its economic growth and prosperity is very much linked with its friendly relationship and stability in the neighbourhood and SAARC could be a platform to reach out to the smaller neighbours, especially over those matters which could not be achieved bilaterally. The forum was thought to be a natural space to remove mutual insecurity. Also in the understanding came the fact that the region faces some critical challenges — natural disasters, terrorism and sectarian violence, proliferation of small arms, poverty and contagious diseases — which are impossible to deal with alone and therefore a need for cooperation among the SAARC countries to mitigate the common challenges.

EXTERNAl POWERS’ INTEREST

As a founding member, Nepal is expected to take some special measures to remove the tag of a non-performer. Nepal earlier played a crucial role in the expansion of SAARC membership by inviting China as an observer in 2005 during the Dhaka Summit. Nine years down the line, as the host of the 18th summit, the mantel falls on Nepal to initiate discussion about updating the SAARC charter on membership issue of extra-regional powers. In the meantime, China has been pushing strongly to become a full member and the EU member states are also aspiring to become observers.

In June this year, China tried to influence Nepal to propose its name as a member. It is learnt that on the sideline of Kunming visit, Nepalese Prime Minister Sushil Koirala unofficially asked China for financial support to organise the SAARC meeting. In the meeting, Chinese officials reportedly said that they expect concrete checklist of assistance that Nepal needs for the SAARC meet. It is also learnt that China has pushed for a special role for itself in the SAARC such as SAARC+ similar to ASEAN+3. In February 2014, at a meeting with a visiting delegation of Nepali Parliamentarians, liu Zhenmin, Chinese Vice-minister of foreign affairs, sought “Nepal’s role in improving Sino-SAARC relations” in view of Kathmandu hosting the SAARC Summit. This was obviously an indirect request for SAARC membership.

SAARC portrays a regional identity which should be promoted to develop a better understanding and thinking of the region as a whole. The countries came together due to commonalties in many issues and the presence of an external power as member of the organisation could alter its ethos. Being extra-regional powers, they may not have feeling or ownership of the region and at best can be accommodated in SAARC as observers or dialogue partners. It has been argued that if they are really serious about economic and human development in the region, then membership issue alone should not be the only means for attaining those noble goals.

YET TO IMPlEMENT

Despite agreeing on myriad issues in the previous SAARC meetings, some important ones are yet to be implemented. For example in 2006, it was agreed that national airlines may use SAARC flag along with their own. Another agreement was that the Head of Mission representing the Chair of SAARC will organise special events in celebration of SAARC Charter Day on December 8, with focus on promoting tourism. None of these resolutions have seen the light of day. Further, the resolution related to people-to-people contact is ambiguous with no specific action.

The decision of promoting people-to-people contact by introducing a visa-free movement or easy access to seek visa to any SAARC counties by the citizens of the member countries is restricted to limited people like judges, Parliamentarians and sportsmen, not for ordinary citizens (currently the list includes 24 categories of entitled persons). Information dissemination is an important exercise but the SAARC website provides news only till the year 2012. There is a need to make SAARC website up to date and interactive.

NEW AGENDA

Although the SAARC was established with the objective of achieving economic growth, it has failed to achieve its goal in the 29 years since its birth in 1985. The major weaknesses within SAARC have been trust deficit, territorial/border disputes, and an inability to implement its own directives. That resulted in poor trade relations between the members. The intra-regional trade is less than 4.5 per cent, which is much lower in comparison to ASEAN and MERCSOR.

However, India-Pakistan relationship alone cannot be blamed for the poor implementation of SAARC resolutions. Many a times, smaller states do not use the SAARC development fund.

Further, some member states do not even enjoy diplomatic representation and direct air connections between each other. For example, Nepal does not have diplomatic missions in Bhutan, Maldives and Afghanistan. The irony is that when India tries to take initiatives, smaller countries brand it as being hegemonic.

EXPECTATIONS

The 18th Summit is expected to emphasise on ‘deeper integration for peace and prosperity’. The theme is timely as members suffer from trust deficit and many countries are still reeling under economic crisis. The members need deeper cooperation on security issues for unhindered development. In this regard, the Kathmandu summit is expected to bring some revolutionary changes in thinking beyond bilateral problems, new techniques on faster and effective implementation of resolutions, restructuring of SAARC institutions and redefining the role of observers.

Some expectations from the upcoming Summit are as follows:

• SAARC should not be held hostage to bilateral issues. Therefore, strengthening the SAARC secretariat will help speedy implementation of projects. In this regard, appointing technocrats as directors and empowering the secretary general is very important.
• It is also desired to establish SAARC disaster management corps for prompt action during natural disaster in any part of SAARC region.
• There is a strong need of ‘SAARC cultural foundation’ in each member country to strengthen regional unity. The foundation may play an important role in disseminating information about other country’s history, culture and political systems.
• There is demand for sharing policy implementation with civil society and private sector of the region. There is a need of an annual SAARC dialogue with participation of people from different walks of society, which can remove many misgivings. A format has already been initiated in the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) since October 2014. However, this needs to be reframed in consonance with SAARC objectives.
• There is also a need to clarify the role and functions of observers since some of them are already active at bilateral level and are contributing to the development programmes of the regional countries.
• Focus should be more on bringing out policies to expedite intra-regional trade in goods, services and investments. Emphasis should be on trade and investments rather than preferential tariffs. There is also a need for synchronisation of domestic economic policies with bilateral and multilateral trade policies.

Today, South Asia is the single biggest middle-class market in the world, yearning for prosperity, stability and integration into the world economic system. Surely SAARC needs an institutional revamp, propelling it to work collectively towards the betterment of the people.

The author is an Associate Fellow at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), New Delhi