India146;s diplomatic spring

The first to arrive will be Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao. The president of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf, will follow him. At the end of the month we will have Junichiro Koizumi, the prime minister of Japan. None of these visits can be termed routine.

For the first time since they fought a war in 1962, India and China are negotiating a set of guiding principles to resolve their boundary dispute. Wen hopes the principles will be finalised before he arrives in New Delhi and pave the way for an elevation of bilateral ties to the strategic level.

Cricket will not be at the top of Musharraf8217;s mind when he comes to India for his second visit. Having invited Musharraf, New Delhi should engage him on all subjects, including Kashmir, and get ready to make big new moves.

Koizumi, who has forced Japan to rediscover its strategic self, wants to explore prospects for a fundamental transformation in relations with India.

The political terms for India8217;s three most important foreign policy accounts 8212; the US, China and Pakistan 8212; are up for a radical renegotiation. And the Koizumi visit offers the prospect of adding Japan to that list of big-ticket items on India8217;s diplomatic front.

The objective conditions, as Manmohan Singh underlined, have never been as favourable to India as they are today. But is the Indian diplomatic corps ready for an intervention of the kind that is being demanded of it now?

Bureaucracies cannot be expected to either take the initiative or come up with innovative ideas. That is against their very nature. They are paid to oppose change, in particular, radical change. Blaming bureaucracy, however, is not enough. The media and the chattering classes on foreign policy have not shown enthusiasm for new ideas. They tend to carp at the new and clamour for the familiar slogans.

It is the political class that must accept risks. In the past, Rajiv Gandhi and Atal Bihari Vajpayee were willing to undertake bold diplomatic experimentation with America, China and Pakistan.

In the last few years, the Indian political leadership was way ahead of the bureaucratic establishment and the talking heads on foreign policy when it projected America as an ally, persisted with engaging Pakistan despite many problems and departed from the script on the boundary dispute with China.

If the leadership is willing to spend its political capital, professional bureaucracy has no option but to fall in line. The cheer-leaders outside can always be counted upon to clap when the leadership makes the big decisions.

It is the political risk-taking over the last decade and a half that has created the extraordinary opportunities for Indian diplomacy now. Converting them into lasting gains demands even bolder action by the Indian government.

Take for example the template that Rice left behind last week in New Delhi. Rice8217;s main proposition was that it is in Washington8217;s interest to strengthen at once Indo-US relations and India8217;s standing in the world. As part of this new approach, Rice has proposed three sets of talks 8212; on energy security, strategic cooperation and economic engagement.

On energy security, Rice offered to end the three decades old nuclear energy blockade against India. To clinch the American offer on selling nuclear reactors to India, New Delhi will have to come up with some bold ideas on changing its approach to non-proliferation. Similarly to grasp the promise of a long-term defence industrial partnership with the US, India will to have to significantly change the ways in which it has conducted its defence business over the last four decades.

Systemic scepticism is even stronger when it comes to China. While Beijing seems set on a strategic partnership with India, New Delhi seems trapped in self-doubt. There is also the growing danger that the present opportunity for a breakthrough on the boundary dispute would be lost. Conservatives within the system and outside will offer conventional wisdom in large quantities 8212; avoid making any big moves on the boundary question. Manmohan Singh needs to push the system to think out of the box on engaging China, especially on the boundary dispute.

On Pakistan, the system is trapped between politics and protocol. Unable to overcome the burden of the Agra summit, the establishment was not enthusiastic about inviting Musharraf to India. When it did so under Manmohan Singh8217;s goading, they want the prime minister to discuss with President Musharraf the relative merits of Virender Sehwag and Shahid Afridi as attacking batsmen. The meeting with Musharraf should instead be seen as a moment to review and consolidate the fragile peace process and find ways to make the dialogue on Kashmir more productive.

If the Rice visit has given an opportunity for New Delhi to reposition itself on the global stage, innovative approaches to the negotiations on Kashmir with Pakistan and the boundary dispute with China would allow India to go beyond the burdensome territorial imperative and focus on promoting regional peace and prosperity.

Movement on any one of these three fronts will improve India8217;s leverage on the other two. If India can move on all the three, it could radically alter India8217;s security condition. And Koizumi8217;s Japan is a huge strategic bonus.

Relying either on the bureaucratic caution within or the barren conventional wisdom without means squandering the many diplomatic opportunities at hand.

If Manmohan Singh and his foreign policy managers are prepared to gamble a bit, they could reap rich dividends on the foreign policy front for the Congress-led coalition and the nation.