Opinion The great game folio

The Great Game is normally associated with the rivalry between the Raj and Russia that played itself out for nearly a century in the north-western marches of the subcontinent. The organising principle was much the same in the north eastern frontiers of the Raj — making sure the territories and kingdoms bordering India were tightly bound to Calcutta and had enough incentives to repulse the advances of other powers,and not just Russia.

That the legacy of the Raj can’t be sustained in the old form is well understood in Delhi. That is one of the reasons India agreed to rewrite the very unequal 1949 treaty of friendship with Bhutan and sign a new one in 2007. Delhi says it is also prepared to review a similar 1950 treaty arrangement with Nepal,once there is someone credible to negotiate with in Kathmandu.

If Calcutta,the capital of the Raj until 1911,was focused on the Russian challenge to the ring fence,Delhi must now focus on China,whose rise has begun to undercut India’s presumed primacy in the subcontinent.

India must get its act together as the rising Chinese power envelops South Asia and breaks down the old geopolitical order in the region. Delhi’s ponderous and incremental approach to regional integration seen during the last quarter of a century in the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation now stands in contrast to a dynamic Chinese economic and political outreach to the Subcontinent.

In Thimphu,this week,senior Indian officials have ruled out any expansion of SAARC to include China,amidst efforts by a section of the association to press for Chinese membership. It is already an “observer” to the regional forum.

Having become the most attractive economic partner for all the South Asian countries,Beijing’s focus is now on converting this new commercial weight into diplomatic,political and security leverage. Realising that objective does not require full membership of the SAARC.

Trilateralism

China has sent a vice foreign minister,Wang Guangya,to participate in the Thimphu summit. Pakistan Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani received him in Thimphu and proposed trilateral economic cooperation between Beijing,Islamabad and Kabul.

According to the Pakistani media,Wang eagerly backed Gilani’s proposal. Beijing which is undertaking major projects in both countries should be quite interested in bringing a measure of strategic synergy between them.

At a time when the United States and Europe are debating how to exit from Afghanistan,China’s is moving slowly but deliberately to put down lasting economic roots in the northwestern subcontinent. If it does materialise,China’s trilateral cooperation with Afghanistan and Pakistan will underline India’s own inability to use the framework of sub-regional cooperation to tighten economic integration with its neighbours.

The SAARC allows smaller groupings within it to embark on regional collaboration. One would have thought this would be of great interest to India to move things forward with its neighbours to the south,east and north. Clearly,the dead weight of ‘bilateralism’ in India’s approach to its neighbours has not been easy to shake off.

Post- colonial Raj

As it pushed for Afghanistan’s membership of SAARC during the Dhaka summit,India encountered stiff resistance from Pakistan which was pushing for Chinese membership in the regional forum. As part of the compromise India agreed to welcome China and many others as observers.

Besides the United States,EU,Japan,Korea and Australia,SAARC has attracted a number of regional countries as observers. The presence of Mauritius,Iran and Myanmar makes the SAARC look a lot like the Raj,at least in a geographic sense.

The challenge for India is to convert the SAARC into geopolitical centre of the Indian Ocean and reclaim leadership of the littoral as the motor of economic growth and the provider of regional security. That requires a very different vision of SAARC than the one Delhi has articulated all these years.

raja.mohan@expressindia.com