Opinion Gaming the East

For all its significance,Dr Singh’s visit is only about clearing the detritus from Partition more than six decades ago. There are much bigger challenges awaiting India as a rising China transforms the Great Game in the east.

The Great Game never just about Afghanistan to the northwest. It was about managing the entire periphery of the Raj,by bringing many of its remote border lands under control and keeping other great powers at arms’ length.

In the northwest the Raj sought to prevent Russia from extending its influence south of the Amu Darya,and made Afghanistan a British protectorate and buffer. In the north it was about extending India’s influence into Tibet,and negotiating favourable terms with the nominal rulers in Beijing. In the east it was about containing the influence of France and the Netherlands and occupying Burma (now Myanmar). Once the European powers ceased to be a threat,the Raj took its military eyes off the east.

The Raj was surprised by the speed with which a rising Japan ousted its forces from Singapore and showed up at the northeastern gates of India in the 1940s. It took much blood,sweat and tears from the Indian army to push the Japanese back and liberate Southeast Asia.

Like the Raj,independent India too has been obsessed with the northwest. While Dr Singh has begun to take corrective action,much remains to be done as China surprises us by the rapidity with which it has begun to alter the geopolitical landscape to our east.

Sonadia port

As it builds a natural gas pipeline from Myanmar’s Arakan coast to the Yunnan province in southwestern China,begins work on a railway along the same alignment,and plans to develop transport corridors into Bangladesh,Beijing appears all set to bag the contract for the construction of a new deep sea port in Bangladesh,at the Sonadia island off Cox’s Bazaar.

Reports from Dhaka say the Sheikh Hasina government is close to approving an MoU between the shipping ministry and the China Merchant Holdings,a state-owned construction company. The first phase of the port is expected to be ready by 2016 and facilitate trans-shipment of goods from Bangladesh to eastern India,Bhutan,Nepal,Burma,China and Southeast Asia.

Naval interest

China’s construction of civilian ports in our neighbourhood need not be seen as automatically threatening.

The challenge for Delhi’s policymakers is not about blocking Beijing’s economic entry into the region,but to ensure that India can take advantage of the Chinese infrastructural development in the civilian sector.

India’s policy problems are very different when it comes to China’s growing maritime interest in the Bay of Bengal and its role as a major arms supplier to Bangladesh and Burma.

As it seeks to limit the vulnerability of its vital sea lines of communication through the Malacca Straits,it is inevitable that China will seek to intensify its naval engagement with Burma and Bangladesh.

In responding to this reality,

India will have to look beyond the current emphasis on counter-terror cooperation with the two countries and focus on developing substantive military and maritime security partnerships with both Myanmar and Bangladesh.

The writer is a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Research,Delhi