India should network closer home

Gatherings of Heads of States/Governments, regardless of the significance or otherwise of the outcome, and held under whatever banner, are invariably grand occasions, generating a palpable sense of euphoria mixed with a liberal dose of déjà vu.

Each Head of State/Government participating in the summit comes with his or her own sizable retinue and entourage. They bustle about creating the illusion of something earth-shaking happening.

All the mountainous labours and sometimes long hours put in by the mandarins and the minions in the run-up to the meeting usually end up in grandiose pronouncements almost identical to the ones churned out of other confabulations of the past.

The Heads of States/Governments of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa who met on March 26-27 at Durban plugging the lofty theme ‘BRICS and Africa: Partnership for Development, Integration and Industrialisation’ had their usual share of banquets and basking under klieg lights, reading set speeches prepared weeks in advance and holding bilateral meetings on the side which also merely echoed sentiments expressed in the plenaries.

Strangely, this time there was no mention of the customary retreat at some exotic location far from the madding crowd where the Heads are supposed to sport native gear and let their hair down. The retreat is meant to provide the soothing setting hopefully leading to on-the-spot, out-of-the-box, resolution of issues befouling relations.

TATTERED PLATITUDES

The expectations aroused by the so-called bilateral pow-wows are also routinely falling flat in every summit. Both sides strictly adhere to their respective scripts and play with time-worn, tattered platitudes.

For instance, it is by now clear that without resolving of the border dispute between India and China, the chances of mutual cooperation and trust are slim. It is equally clear that fielding bureaucrats from both countries, going by whatever highfalutin titles, will never do, because it is not a mere matter of drawing the line on the ground. What is needed to break the stalemate is a political settlement at the highest level. The bilateral talks could have been used by both Xi and Singh to break new ground. Instead, what happened?

According to Xinhua , Xi said, “China and India should improve and make good use of the mechanism of special representatives to strive for a fair, rational solution framework acceptable to both sides as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the two sides should continue to safeguard peace in their border areas and prevent the issue from affecting bilateral relations.”

According to the same Xinhua , Singh said, “India will abide by political guidelines set by both sides and seek a solution to the bilateral border issue from a strategic height with a commitment to safeguard peace in their border areas”.

Nothing dramatic there, is there? But what Hu said, and Xi said and Singh said is the same as that had been said so many times.

There was a tremendous hoo-ha in advance about the BRICS summit setting up an analogue of the Asian Development Bank. But apparently, the Finance Ministers got mired in differences over China’s offer of filling the gap in the contribution of some of the BRICS countries to the bank’s capital, admission of industrial countries as members, modalities of lending (whether concessional or at prevailing rate of interest), nature and categories of projects to be funded, quotas and voting rights and the like.

FUNDAMENTAL QUESTION

With the result, all that the summit had to show for all the effort and expense were some minor deals between South Africa on the one hand and Russia and China on the other, which could have been signed by some middle-level officials in their respective country headquarters.

I want to raise a fundamental question. What is the point in India getting mixed up in all sorts of bizarre combinations of nations which have very little in common amongst themselves, other than vaguely calling themselves ‘emerging economies’? India is in a genre all of its own, fitting the description of neither developed nor developing. The complexities and diversities it faces, with various parts of it in various stages and paces of development, are also unique.

It should function in a focused manner as a regional power, moving closer to countries such as China and Japan.

Without frittering away its capabilities and resources, it should proactively work through the already existing networks such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to exploit the potential of enormous proportions that are still lying untapped in this part of the world in terms of economic development, social capital and cultural heritage.

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