DR SANAT KAUL
Daily Mail
July 1, 2014
The Vice-President Hamid Ansari paid a visit to Beijing to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Panchsheel Agreement with China.
It may be recalled this Agreement trumped by Nehru has been the source and beginning of the greatest disaster of Indian Foreign Policy results which we are still suffering.
Claude Arpi, an expert on India-China-Tibet affairs named his book Born in Sin: The Panchsheel Agreement shows how we lost our advantage because of this Agreement.
The story starts with the Lhasa Convention of 1904, signed in the presence of Chinese Amban, the Bhutanese Representative and Nepalese officer, which opened India’s relations with Tibet and allowed India to have trade marts in Gyantse, Gartok and Yartung in Tibet along with British Trade Agents.
By 1910 the British had 11 rest houses on the road between Sikkim and Gyantse, and also a telegraph line to India.
The Chinese contention that they had sovereignty over Tibet proved to be an illusion as even the Tibet Trade Regulation of 1908 was signed in Simla between Britain China and Tibet.
Agreement
This was confirmed in 1914 when the British invited China and Tibet for a Conference in Simla to determine the borders as independent sovereign nations. Each side came with Letters of Credentials from their governments and sat as equals. The Chinese delegation came to India by the sea route.
The 1904 Agreement and the 1914 Agreement had paved the way for Tibet to be given the de jure status of an independent nation, which it always was, and resented any overtures from China to claim sovereignty over it.
The British, however, wanted a cloak of cover over Tibet by giving China the suzerainty over Tibet to ensure that then all-powerful Russia under the Czar does not hobble up Tibet like it did Mongolia.
As a matter of fact, the British wanted to divide Tibet into Chinese and independent Tibet like the Russia did to Mongolia in 1902.
The 1914 Simla Agreement was initialled by the plenipotentiaries of the three governments but immediately after the Chinese Government reneged on it and did not ratify it. British India went ahead and signed another agreement with the Tibetan Representative.
The next step was a backward step taken by independent India in 1954.
On independence on 15th August 1947, the British Mission in Lhasa became the Indian Mission with Indian flag though Hugh Richardson continued to represent India.
However Nehru, who had started the non-alignment movement, welcomed Communist China in 1949 into the club in a patronising way, claiming the leadership of this infant body, much to the dislike of China.
The Chinese government was clear in its views and staked a claim to the entire of Tibet. At this point Nehru relented in spite of Deputy Prime Ministers Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s apprehension, and now-famous letter of November 7, 1950, on Chinese intentions.
Patel died soon after writing the letter and his apprehensions got discarded.
Nehru now wanted to go for a formal trade agreement between India and Tibet, which already existed between India and Tibet, but wanted to get it ratified by China.
He therefore decided to send a delegation to Beijing to sort this out, but at the same time, did not want the Indian side to discuss the border issue unless the Chinese proposed it.
The delegation went to Beijing in January 1954, stayed for four months and came back with the Famous Panchsheel Agreement.
Reality
Nehru believed this agreement was the most outstanding of his achievements. The reality was the opposite.
The Panchsheel Agreement stated that Tibet is a region of China, which implied its sovereignty. With this, India abandoned the cause of Tibet’s independence which the Tibetans were perusing all along.
He also gave up India’s contention, which he himself had stated in the Parliament, that China does not have sovereignty but only suzerainty over Tibet.
Negotiations
Moreover, India gave up all its rights in Tibet without a quid pro quo.
At that time India had a Mission in Lhasa, and trade agents in Gyanse, Gortok and Yartung. India also had limited forces to protect are offices in these locations.
We also handed over a telegraph line running all the way from Tibet to India which provided the information highway of those days.
With this Agreement, India abandoned its interests in Tibet.
The Panchsheel agreement had lofty ideals in its preamble like non-interference in each other’s affairs and settlement of disputes by peaceful means. The Agreement was valid for six years and it is to the political acumen of China that they invaded India in 1962 in war only after it had lapsed and was not renewed.
The Vice-President is a former IFS officer. I am sure he is aware of this background. In spite of this, India attended the celebration of 60 years of the Panchsheel Agreement in Beijing.
Since the last 60 years we have seen Chinese borders come up to ours, claims on our territory, a defeat in 1962 and any number of border incursions along the LOC since then.
We have never bothered to negotiate the border from a position of strength. It is not clear what is there for India to celebrate?
Instead we should celebrate the centenary of the Simla Agreement of 1914 also falling this year.
The writer is attached to the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses.
