Blending past, future

Computerised land records are just one example of how perceptions fail to keep pace with reality. In the land known for keeping out TV for fear of corrupting innocent minds, the authorities now look the other way when private individuals install little dish antennas. Even district administrations occasionally have TV broadcasts for specific events.

Change, controlled but unmistakable, is afoot in this country which external affairs minister Jaswant Singh is visiting this week for the first wide-ranging political contact since King Jingme Singye Wangchuk8217;svisit here last October.

That poses subtle challenges for Indian diplomacy in a bilateral relationship which some would describe as among the closest in the world.

The relationship, all elements of which will be discussed during Singh8217;s visit, remains unusually close. Nothing symbolises this better perhaps than Bhutan8217;s supportiveness in the aftermath of the nuclear tests in the UN and the Non-Aligned Movement. For a small, deeply religious nation preoccupied with environmental stability, that is understandable only in this context.

Unlike Nepal, Bhutan has not tried to play the China card in its dealings with New Delhi, another sign of the unflinching friendship that the King has displayed towards India.

Economic ties go deep too. Bhutan8217;s main resource, hydel power, is being developed with Indian assistance and power-starved India is to buy the surplus power generated from these projects, putting the relationship on a solid, need-based economic footing. During Bhutan8217;s eighth plan, of which thesecond year is just over, India is to offer a Rs 900-crore assistance of which Rs 400 crore is a no-strings-attached cash component, the remaining Rs 500 crore being project aid. The special relationship is highlighted by India being alone in offering assistance entirely on the basis of the priorities named by the Bhutanese government.

The majority of this is intended for three mega projects: the Rs 3,500-crore, 1000-mw Tala power project, the Rs 500-crore, 60-mw Kurichu power project, and the Rs 400-crore Dungsam cement project. This last has in fact not yet taken off because it is in an area adjacent to Assam8217;s Bodo-infested areas.

The two countries have had free trade for a long time. Ninety per cent of Bhutan8217;s exports are to India and some three quarters of Bhutan8217;s imports come from India. Indeed, Bhutan has opted for the smart policy of forgoing industrialisation and sourcing its consumer imports from India to maintain its focus on the environment which has brought it large internationalapprobation and assistance.

It is such clear thinking on the King8217;s part which has made Bhutan a success story in ways that India could envy. The stated aim of retaining 60 per cent of the country8217;s land under forest cover has been substantially exceeded with 72 per cent of the land being under forest cover. Some timber-based industries were even closed down in keeping with this aim.

There is no destitution in Bhutan, nor any visible illiteracy. There are incentives for basic education and disincentives for shirkers. There is a strong focus on basic health services, and India is involved in aiding the establishment of medical units in far-flung and inaccessible areas such as Luntshi in the centre-east.

These sensible social policies are combined with more openness to the world than used to be the case. And yet the focus on cultural integrity remains intact. The government may be willing to look away from dish antennas glinting in the sunshine, but Bhutanese may not appear in public except in thetraditional dress, kira and goh. The historical 17th century structures that used to house monks, the Dzhongs, are still-living, throbbing centres of activity that combines housing monks and district administrations side by side.

The cultural moorings of the Bhutanese people are not in doubt. Most who go abroad for education come back to the country and work for its development. Members of the country8217;s elite say in private conversations that they intend to make sure their children speak Dzongkhag, the national language.

In government, modernity has been in evidence but with interesting quirks. The King pushed through constitutional reforms last year that gave executive powers to a six-member cabinet with a rotating prime ministership, elected by the National Assembly which can ask the King to abdicate by a two-thirds majority. Such is the King8217;s personal standing however that there was some resistance to these reforms and the King8217;s aides had to invoke the weight of his word to push their acceptance.

Aproposal to introduce personal income tax is under much animated discussion these days, and has generated some resentment as an ill-considered move. The National Assembly, with a strong representation of local business interests, could vote this down.

These are far-reaching changes. The King8217;s measures to devolve power could mean a greater political participation of the national elite.

Such social and political developments which generate change aside, there are some elements of instability which should concern Indian diplomacy. One is the large Nepalese population in the country. After offering incentives for inter-marriage between nationals and Nepalese immigrants, the government of this country with a 6-lakh population was alarmed by censuses in the late 80s-early 90s that suggested a threat to Bhutan8217;s demographic integrity.

After that many Nepalese expatriates were expelled and about a lakh are living in UNHCR camps in eastern Nepal. This is a major issue between the two countries which otherwisehave a lot in common. India wisely has chosen to view this as an entirely bilateral matter in spite of Nepalese efforts to involve it.

The other factor of potential instability, which directly involves India, is of course the presence of Bodo and ULFA militants on Bhutan8217;s territory, which was first noticed in the early 1990s. This is the spillover of a domestic problem that has become an internal security threat for Bhutan. The militants have taken advantage of the difficult terrain to establish training camps in south-western Bhutan, with ULFA headquarters itself in Bhutan. The Bhutanese National Assembly debated this issue at length last year in Bhutan. The Indian approach to this is that it is for Bhutan itself to decide how to deal with this situation.

With these close links and strategic concerns, the challenge for Indian diplomacy is to maintain the close relationship while giving Bhutan space to grow as it changes from within and looks out to the world. These are big things, but small gestures canhelp.

Certainly the government could generate much goodwill among the people of Bhutan towards India in matters such as the access of Bhutanese to their religious symbols in India. This correspondent was told by sad Bhutanese monks about the tender mercies of National Museum guards in New Delhi who look pointedly at contribution boxes before allowing them access to some Buddha relics there.