But it will be a tightrope walk for India as it must deal with China on the way
Chinese foreign minister Qin Gang was in India this week for the Shanghai Cooperation organisation’s (SCO) foreign minister’s meeting. This is his second visit to India as foreign minister, the first being in March to attend the G20 foreign minister’s meeting. As expected China insisted on normalcy in the bilateral ties with India even though the Indian side vociferously disagreed and made a sharp point on the border situation being anything closer to normal. It may be recalled that the Chinese defence minister Li Shangfu was in New Delhi last week to attend the SCO defence minister’s meeting where he reiterated the normalcy in the border situation narrative. However, India’s defence minister Rajnath Singh in a stern message, put the border situation, and unilateral violation of existing sovereign agreements by China, as the central piece of bilateral relations between the two nations. He went further and suggested disengagement of forces on both sides to be the key criteria for restoring any sort of normalcy, in the bilateral.
His Chinese counterpart downplayed the situation suggesting India take a “long-term” view and put the “border issue at an appropriate place in the overall bilateral”. The message was clear, India and China have moved miles apart in their bilateral journeys. The Chinese state-owned media reported Li Shangfu’s statement to mean a “stable border situation”. To an Indian audience and perhaps to the rest of the globe, nothing could be further from the truth. The top military leadership of India and China met for the eighteenth time in the run of the SCO defence minister’s meeting, with no significant outcomes. A Ministry of External Affairs short press statement released, post the 18th round of the corps commanders meeting stated “The two sides had a frank and in-depth discussion on the resolution of the relevant issues along the LAC in the Western Sector so as to restore peace and tranquillity in the border areas, which will enable progress in bilateral relations”. Later external affairs minister, S Jaishankar mentioned India China relations as “abnormal” and suggested that it goes against the grain of India’s current foreign policy fabric, which is more towards building warmer relationships with all countries, an oblique reference to the Chinese way of approaching diplomacy.
The China rhetoric on normalcy at the border is a copybook agenda-pushing doctrine, it has been practised with several nations while trying to unilaterally and forcefully alter their sovereignty. It takes the form of economic coercion, starting with opaque, binding financial loans for critical infrastructure projects, leading to a debt trap for smaller economies, resulting in the complete takeover of critical strategic assets by Chinese state-controlled firms. Chinese state-owned China Merchants group has recently announced building the largest logistics hub in Sri Lanka’s Colombo port with an investment of $391 million. It may be recalled that China already owns Sri Lanka’s Hambantota port, whose close proximity to Indian critical nuclear sites is a major concern. The playbook dictates China, and makes incremental advances by usurping the sovereign’s economic, and geographical spaces, changing reference points and then negotiating with the nations from the altered “Chinese vantage point.” The recent narrative from China, on stability on border issues with India, fits into the same playbook.
However, India which holds the SCO and G 20 presidency for the year is moving cautiously to strike the right balance. It knows it has US support for now, on most disputes related to China, however, it continues to maintain warm relations with Russia, which is now increasingly being seen as China’s shadow in international circles. Further Chinese premiere is expected to be in India in July to attend the SCO leaders meeting and may even come back for the G20 leaders summit in September. These are tough tightropes for India to walk.
(The writer is a policy analyst)
