Why India is walking away from its tit-for-tat China policy

[ashok321]

Why India is walking away from its tit-for-tat China policy

After relations between China and India reached a new low during last year’s Doklam stand-off, New Delhi’s China policy has taken a sharp turn this year, in what could be interpreted as a reversal of its previous stance. In recent months, India has not only supported China’s vice-presidency in the Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental agency combating money laundering, but Delhi also withdrew its support from a commemorative event marking the 59th anniversary of the Tibetan uprising. And, in a bid to stabilise ties, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is expected to visit China next month.


The change in India’s approach has triggered a backlash in academic and strategic circles at home, with China sceptics expressing concern that Delhi was “surrendering” to Beijing. Such an observation isn’t entirely accurate.

First, it’s important to understand the factors driving this change. Last year, besides the tensions over Doklam, New Delhi’s invitation to the Dalai Lama to visit Arunachal Pradesh and its criticism of Beijing’s “Belt and Road Initiative” also significantly damaged bilateral ties. On its part, Beijing has been deepening its strategic ties with Pakistan, and it continues to oppose India’s entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group, as well as its attempt to get Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar added to an international blacklist of terrorists. This has prompted New Delhi to look for a counter strategy.

The agent of change has been India’s new foreign secretary, Vijay Gokhale, a former ambassador to China. Under his leadership, New Delhi realised that its aggressive tit-for-tat moves were self-damaging and could not be sustained for long.

Meanwhile, an intensification of geostrategic competition in the region is playing out in the background. In Nepal, the Beijing-friendly communist alliance easily defeated the traditional Indian ally, Nepali Congress, in elections last November. In Sri Lanka, the running of the Hambantota port was handed over to a Chinese company. And the Maldives became a new site for strategic competition, with the current regime aligning itself with China.

No wonder New Delhi is correcting course in its approach to dealing with China.

At the same time, it appears to be compensating for this tactical retreat by aligning itself with a larger regional alliance. India has thrown its weight behind the Quad grouping, also comprising Australia, Japan and the United States, in its quest to reshape the Indo-Pacific balance of power.

The China factor remains a focal point in India’s foreign relations. During French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to India this month, both sides welcomed a joint strategic vision for cooperation in the Indian Ocean. A bilateral agreement allowing reciprocal access to each other’s bases in the region was interpreted as a China-centric move.

To be sure, India’s scepticism of belt and road plan has not dissipated, and it is open to entering alliances which offer a credible alternative to the China-driven development plan. The Quad powers were reportedly mulling over the idea.

For now, India’s policy shift has raised some expectations as well. There are hopes, for example, that a friendlier attitude may earn New Delhi China’s support in its efforts to join the nuclear grouping and get Masood Azhar blacklisted by the United Nations.

Now that New Delhi is doing away with its reprisal-driven China policy and cutting down on irritants in their bilateral relationship, Beijing’s ability to deliver on New Delhi’s expectations would go a long way to defining the agenda for future relations.

 

[ashok321]

Modi has kneeled down in front of China.

One Doklam did it all.

But the shameless fellow is implicating senior Dalai Lama.

 

[Imran Khan]

India can not do it look Indian and Chinese defense budget . india will bankrupt if keep doing it .

 

[wiseone2]

Modi has kneeled down in front of China.

One Doklam did it all.

But the shameless fellow is implicating senior Dalai Lama.

you are hung up on Modi
India != Modi

 

[sankranti]

No need to play the games by chinese rules, we need to play the game with our rules. That is the only way we will win.

In any case, its in our interest to develop friendly relationship with china rather than get into a pissing contest.

 

[beijingwalker]

No need to play the games by chinese rules, we need to play the game with our rules. That is the only way we will win.

In any case, its in our interest to develop friendly relationship with china rather than get into a pissing contest.

It's Modi who got China, India and Pakistan further into this ongoing pissing contest.

 

[sankranti]

It's Modi who got China, India and Pakistan further into this ongoing pissing contest.

That is just silly name calling.

Modi will do whatever is in India's best interest. If he will challenge chinese narrative, he will also work with china to build a common narrative. (as he seems to be doing now).

The same charges can be thrown against china too. But that would be just as pointless.

 

[Nilu Pule]

Majority of young Indians are jobless. The economy does not create enough jobs. There will be mass IT sector lay offs.

Engaging China now will cause dis integration of India.

This is the right time for China to be aggressive.

 

[beijingwalker]

That is just silly name calling.

Modi will do whatever is in India's best interest. If he will challenge chinese narrative, he will also work with china to build a common narrative. (as he seems to be doing now).

The same charges can be thrown against china too. But that would be just as pointless.

So provoking China and Pakistan, stiring hatred in Kashmir and putting India's national security in jepordy is in India's best interest?

 

[sankranti]

So provoking China and Pakistan, stiring hatred in Kashmir and putting India's national security in jepordy is in India's best interest?

Do such silly rhetorical questions deserve any serious response ?

BTW I meant to invite you to the thread on talks by Indian intellectuals, only I invited chinese dragon by mistake Let me know your views on the ideas proposed by them. There is a bit about china too so maybe you can share your views on that.

https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/indi...n-two-intellectual-giants-of-our-time.551101/

 

[Kdpreddy]

Dalai Lama's 'Thank You India' event: Govt must rise above geopolitics, honour Tibetan contribution to the world

http://www.firstpost.com/india/dala...ntribution-to-contemporary-world-4412921.html

n 31 March, the Central Tibetan Administration will hold events in Dharamshala to thank India for being a gracious host to the exiled Tibetans over the last 60 years. The complexities of geopolitics have caused the Indian government to withdraw from participating in these celebrations – to avoid Chinese ire.

Ironically, it is the Indian people, along with the rest of the world, who need to thank the Tibetans. What is at stake here is not merely the fate of the Tibetan people, and their culture, but what they have gifted the contemporary world – a humane paradigm of power and creative ways of redefining both the 'modern' and the 'traditional'.

In October 1998, on the banks of the river Ganga in Varanasi, hundreds of scholars, activists and craftsmen from across India had gathered for the third Congress on Traditional Sciences and Technologies of India. This event was a culmination of over two decades of dedicated enquiry by a Chennai-based group known as Patriotic and People-oriented Science and Technology (PPST).

File image of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. PTI

Over four days, this event provided a platform for the creative and critical exploration of the Indian subcontinent's pre-modern systems of knowledge and their continuing relevance in our times. Samdhong Rinpoche, who at that time was heading the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath, was a co-chair of the event.

It was the Rinpoche, later prime minister of the Tibetan government in exile, who captured the crux of the cultural, economic and technological challenge of our times.

It does not matter whether a technology or social-cultural practice is modern or traditional, the Rinpoche said in his inaugural address. What matters is whether it conforms to 'dharma' – which means righteousness in the form of holistic and humane values, not religion as a sect or identity.

In saying this, the Rinpoche was conveying the essence of what has been the exiled Tibetans' unique contribution to the contemporary world.

Even though their efforts to reach out to the Chinese government with love and compassion have failed, the leadership of the exiled Tibetans is devoid of bitterness. Yes, there are reports of unrest among young Tibetans who question the efficacy of non-violence and stray incidents of violence during protests but, by and large, the movement for autonomy for the Tibetan people remains remarkably non-violent.

In an interview given to News18 on 10 March this year, the Dalai Lama said that he feels compassion for the Chinese authorities because they are driven by negative emotions. When asked why he feels this way even though the Chinese hate him, he said: "They are narrow-minded and short-sighted. I feel pity for the Chinese."

He went on to explain why it is possible to actually live this philosophy despite 60 years of being exiled from his beloved homeland. As a practitioner of karuna (compassion), he said, "I make no distinction between my nation and other nations. My aim is to prompt a sense of oneness among human beings. In my meditation, I visualise Chinese officials and I take their suspicion and hatred and give them love and compassion."


This moral commitment and spiritual practice tend to appear out of place in the corridors of power, be it Delhi, Beijing or Washington. And yet, it is also impossible to ignore.

That is why even the Tibetans' plans for functions to thank the Indian government and Indian people became a big enough issue in the fraught equation between India and China.


The Tibetan exiles' journey over the last 60 years is as much an inspiration for individuals across the world as it is an affront to those wedded to the dominant paradigm of power – in which there is unabashed manipulation of religious and ethnic identities.

Here is a theocracy that within one generation has persuaded its people to make a transition from rule by religious heads to a democratically elected body. Lobsang Sangay, the current prime minister of the Tibetan government in exile, was born in India in 1968 and is a lawyer by training, not a monk or religious scholar.

The Dalai Lama, traditionally the unchallenged leader of the Tibetans, has not only led this transition but also reached out to all religions of the world in friendship. He has done this partly by distinguishing Buddhism as a religion from the universal insights of Buddhist traditions. This most notably pertains to what the Dalai Lama calls 'emotional hygiene' – namely the ability to process and overcome the negative emotions of hate, anger, jealousy.

Above all, the Tibetans have been exemplars in how to be deeply anchored in traditional knowledge and wisdom while also embracing modern knowledge. Children of the Tibetan exiles grow up being trained simultaneously in both the old and the new.

This makes the Tibetan exiles a beacon in dark times when, globally, there is a proliferation of narrow and sectarian religious identity – often based on false or distorted claims about ancient achievements or 'wisdom'.

The Tibetan contribution is all the more significant because it is utterly unrelated to the European variety of liberalism which equates secularism with atheism or complete rejection of any religious identity.

This is the crux of the challenge before Indian civil society today – how to create a narrative on tradition and modernity that is based on an open-minded rather than obscurantist exploration of both. In the past, some efforts in this sphere, notably the now defunct PPST, have foundered.

One way to renew this endeavour is to study the Tibetans achievements more closely. We could start by finding diverse ways to convey to the Tibetans that it is the Indian people who owe them thanks for being inspiring exemplars.

****

Guess the OP and his fellow cheerleaders now know exactly what BJP is doing to China.
We all know the illegal relationship between Pappu Gandhi and Emperor Xi.

 

[sankranti]

If leveraged correctly, Tibetans in India could become the brand ambassadors of goodwill between china and India.

@beijingwalker how do you think this can happen ? A wise man can turn any threat into an opportunity.

 

[Crystal-Clear]

No need to play the games by chinese rules, we need to play the game with our rules. That is the only way we will win.

In any case, its in our interest to develop friendly relationship with china rather than get into a pissing contest.

lolz these type of bedic jokes always make me laugh .
is "Chinese Ship patrolling Maldives "a part of your plan ?

That is just silly name calling.

Modi will do whatever is in India's best interest. .

right now riots are happening in west begal under modi's nose . sparked by the rss aka bjp . .
just wanna know is it in the interest of india ?

 

[beijingwalker]

If leveraged correctly, Tibetans in India could become the brand ambassadors of goodwill between china and India.

@beijingwalker how do you think this can happen ? A wise man can turn any threat into an opportunity.

And Tibetan-government-in-exile can have diplomatic relationship with China. What India did to China when China needed friends the most will never be forgotten by the Chinese people and we surely will reciprocate.

 

[itachii]

Because today isnt the day to focus on wars. We have to focus on development of our nation and improving our economy.