Srikanth Kondapalli
The Times of India
February 3, 2015
External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj has stated in Beijing that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit China before May this year. The much anticipated visit of the PM was reportedly postponed several times from last November, when he was invited to visit Beijing coinciding with the Apec meeting, and again this February.
The proposed visit is being watched not only for its ‘outcome-driven’ bilateral agenda, but also for signals for global and regional powers. At the bilateral level is the unresolved territorial dispute that sapped diplomatic and military energies of both countries — reflected long ago in the 1962 border clashes but also the recent Depsang Plains incident in 2013 just before Premier Li Keqiang’s visit to India and Chumar military buildup during President Xi Jinping’s visit last September.
Military confidence building measures between the two ushered in a modicum of peace and tranquility but do not guarantee against fresh intrusions. Countering the decades-old Chinese policy of leaving the territorial dispute to ‘next generations’, Swaraj prodded her Chinese counterpart to think out-of-the-box to resolve this dispute now.
China’s interlocutors’ excuse that India is weighed down by a coalition government since 1980s is no longer valid as BJP holds majority in Lok Sabha and is poised to gain majority in both Houses of Parliament.
More pressing is the widening bilateral trade deficit — pegged at about $38 billion in 2014 and cumulatively over $200 billion in the last decade. Indian pressure on China since 2010 to bridge deficits by observing market economy norms, permitting entry of Indian software and pharmaceutical firms and other measures have fallen on deaf ears in Beijing.
While some agreements during President Xi’s visit in September last year, inviting investments into manufacturing zones in India, have elicited a positive response, progress in this regard needs to be watched as China’s investments in India so far do not exceed $1.1 billion.
All eyes also will be on Modi’s China visit in the backdrop of his visits to Tokyo, Washington and the just concluded visit by President Obama to New Delhi. Modi, during these visits, expressed concerns on ‘expansionist’ tendencies as well as on problems faced by India on freedom of navigation in South China Sea.
Modi-Abe and Modi-Obama statements alluded to these concerns in South China Sea and Indian Ocean. With more than half of Indian trade transiting through South China Sea, Beijing needs to be reminded how crucial this region is for India’s rise.
With these visits abroad, Modi is indicating that actual progress on the ground in bilateral relations will be monitored closely and diplomatic cliches will be ignored.
