Despite its vigorous ‘Neighbourhood First’ policy, India has struggled to maintain stable and lasting relationships with neighboring countries
Ironical as it might seem, despite a vigorous pursuit of a ‘Neighbourhood First’ policy in tune with its strategic imperatives, India has floundered to build lasting and steady bilateral relations with countries in its backyard. The pendulum of India’s fortunes continues to swing up and down with regime changes in the neighbourhood.
Despite intense diplomatic engagements and regular outreach at the highest political levels in its neighbourhood, India often finds itself out in the cold each time a party or leadership not so inclined towards it sweeps to power. Nepal, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and even Afghanistan are cases in point. And now, with the ignominious exit of the Awami League’s Sheikh Hasina as the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, India has lost the only loyal and steadfast friend it had in the neighbourhood for over a decade. Indeed, so heavily was New Delhi invested in Sheikh Hasina’s prime ministership that it was even accused of interfering in the country’s elections to favour her when she won a fourth consecutive term this January.
If her ouster took Sheikh Hasina by surprise, it also caught New Delhi completely unawares. India was blindsided, even though the Sheikh Hasina government was being accused of increasing authoritarianism and a ruthless decimation of the Opposition with backsliding of democracy. New Delhi saw no reason to complain with Sheikh Hasina delivering on what it wanted — connectivity, crackdown on north-east insurgents sheltering in Bangladesh, not making too much noise about the unfulfilled Teesta waters agreement and keeping India’s interests in mind while building ties with China. Under Sheikh Hasina, the cordial bilateral ties were not impacted even when the Indian government brought in the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, which fast-tracks citizenship for persecuted non-Muslim minorities from neighbouring countries, though it created considerable disquiet in Bangladesh.
Likewise, she chose not to make a fuss over the controversial National Register of Citizens in Assam, which was seen as targeting illegal Bangladeshi immigrants. For sure, India’s ruling party’s hyper-nationalism does not help the country’s cause in its neighbourhood either, especially in Muslim-majority Bangladesh and the Maldives. Moreover, India’s propensity to openly back a particular regime often works to its detriment. It leaves not only the government of the day open to charges of being India's lackey but equally helps the Opposition there fuel anti-India sentiments. In Bangladesh where the Opposition had briefly initiated an ‘India Out’ campaign, India will face an uphill task in building ties with the new government once elections are held. Likewise in the Maldives, the Opposition had launched an ‘India Out’ campaign, which helped propel current President Mohamed Muizzu and his party to power.
Along with its required development initiatives, India threw its entire weight behind Muizzu’s predecessor, Ibu Solih and his Maldivian Democratic Party, but failed to see him win a second term. Given these experiences, It’s time India extended support to its neighbours in a more discreet and calibrated manner instead of being seen as an emperor doling out largesse to subjects. India may like to be seen as a close friend, benefactor and net security provider in the Subcontinent and the Indian Ocean Region, and it does do a lot for all this, but there is a marked shift in how it is now perceived.
For one, neither the polity nor the people of these nations want to be seen as mere appendages of a big neighbour even though their countries seem inevitably tied with India owing to their geographical location.
Second, small as they may be, there is a growing assertion of national identity and sovereignty among them. Third, they know that India isn’t the only big power they can turn to for financial and other assistance.
China, with far greater financial muscle, after all, is only too happy to step in. Indeed, with China’s expanding footprint in the Subcontinent and beyond, India has considerably stepped up its financial assistance for infrastructure projects and sought to forge strong economic linkages and trading ties with its neighbours, among other things. It has also sought to be the ‘first responder’ when they require humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. Even so, those days when India was seen as the sole provider for its smaller neighbours are long gone. In Nepal, the Kalapani border dispute was drummed up as a sovereignty issue by then Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli to rally public support for his government. Oli even altered Nepal’s map to show the disputed area as part of Nepal.
New Delhi could have simply prevented matters from escalating by holding a meeting at the foreign secretary level as was demanded by Kathmandu to discuss the territorial dispute. But India looked the other way instead of addressing Nepal’s concerns. Consequently, Kalapani remains a major irritant in the relationship. India did something similar with the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) report prepared jointly by a team of experts from the two countries, with one of its mandates being to review the Nepal-India Friendship Treaty of 1950 that Kathmandu wants revised in keeping with present times.
It’s been ready since 2018 but has been given a quiet burial by New Delhi even though Kathmandu had been pressing that its findings be made public. In Sri Lanka too, India’s fortunes change with the change of guard. The going was difficult with the Rajapaksas in power, though India now appears to have regained some lost ground after it provided the island nation with loans after its economy was badly hit during the pandemic.
However, this does not mean that India will enjoy the goodwill of all political parties there for all times to come, given that relationships in the neighbourhood appear to have acquired a transactional character. Going forward, India will do well to not put all its eggs in one basket and seek to engage more vigorously with parties across the political spectrum in its neighbourhood, while continuing to help the countries with financial and other assistance. It should come across as a benevolent friend, not be perceived as an overbearing bully.
(The writer is a senior journalist; views are personal)
