M Serajul Islam
Dhaka Tribune
July 3, 2015
There is no scope for complacency for Bangladesh in terms of what is happening in our region as it gets sucked into the India-China rivalry with the US in attendance. It is time, therefore, for its government to wake up.
Was there a silver lining to the Modi visit?
Connectivity is the buzzword coming out of those quarters that see New Delhi and Dhaka moving on the right track for what is good for the sub-region comprising Bangladesh, the Indian Seven Sisters, Nepal, and Bhutan. In fact, connectivity that was introduced craftily by New Delhi to replace the land transit during the Congress term to make it palatable in Bangladesh has been furthered a long way during the recent visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Dhaka.
He laid the foundations for improving the land and rail network for land transit between the Indian mainland and the Seven Sisters, which are still not ready. Meanwhile, Bangladesh has signed an MOU to give the Seven Sisters the use of the Chittagong and Mongla ports.
Bangladesh is now living with the hope that land transit or connectivity would bring the country immense economic benefits by making it the regional connectivity hub. It was also promised by the Congress government but fell through during the visit of Manmohan Singh in September 2011, as Bangladesh declined to go ahead with the land transit once New Delhi withdrew the Teesta deal. This time, Bangladesh gave India permission to use the ports as a guarantee for land transit.
For unexplained reasons, Bangladesh was not even concerned by the fact that, before Narendra Modi came to Dhaka, New Delhi had informed Dhaka that the Teesta deal would not even be in the agenda of the Indian PM’s talks with his Bangladeshi counterpart Sheikh Hasina.
One, therefore, has to scratch one’s head really hard to find out what made Bangladesh so generous during Narendra Modi’s visit. You may remember that all India needed to bag land transit during Manmohan Singh’s visit was for the two sides to sign the additional protocol to activate the land transit provision in the 1972 India-Bangladesh Trade Agreement.
The letter for that was ready for signature, but was withdrawn at the proverbial eleventh hour after India withdrew the Teesta deal from the table. This time, with Bangladesh in a generous mood, India could have had the protocol signed and the land transit in its bag if it just wanted. Narendra Modi, however, did not ask for the protocol and he had good reasons. As the quintessential politician, he knew that the Teesta for the land transit deal would be wasted because of Bangladesh’s current political climate.
Thus, he encouraged Bangladesh to improve the road/rail infrastructure and promised to finance much of it on soft loans so that the Teesta-for-land-transit deal could be struck with a democratic Bangladesh that would allow the whole country to accept the deal as a friendly gesture from India.
Meanwhile, dark clouds are gathering in the Seven Sisters, particularly in Nagaland. Most recently, India and Myanmar violated each other’s territories to deal with Naga secessionists after an incident in April in which 18 Indian soldiers were killed by Naga extremists who have a base inside Myanmar, the most dangerous incident of a secessionist attack in recent times in the region.
Although it was later stated in the media, based on Indian sources, that the Indian military attack inside Myanmar was undertaken after diplomatic talks between the two countries, two additional developments related to the Seven Sisters suggest that the dark clouds could have dangerous repercussions for Bangladesh and its fond hopes of becoming the regional connectivity hub.
First, the Indian Junior Minister for Information Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, has said, following the Myanmar incursion, that India would not hesitate to enter a neighbouring country in pursuit of terrorists/Indian separatists in line with US’s argument of “pre-emptive strike” to invade Afghanistan. Second, Indian sources have stated that Indian intelligence found evidence of Chinese PLA presence in the April attack on Indian soldiers.
The minister’s message was a clear one: India does not consider any of its neighbours’ territory, including that of Bangladesh, inviolable. If that was not a bad enough message, that China was physically present in the Indian northeast was even worse. Together, these developments underline the fact that the region was moving towards a violent security situation where connectivity would have little chance of survival.
An article recently written by K Subramanian, former director-general of police in northeast India, underlined the resurgence of secessionist/terrorist activities in the Seven Sisters. The writer stated: “India was ‘waging a war with itself’ in its strategic and sensitive northeast region.” He further stated that “the region, surrounded by China, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal, is also enmeshed in multi-national systemic crime networks of espionage, terrorism, arms trafficking, drug trafficking, and money laundering with explosive possibilities.”
The Bangladesh government appeared to be oblivious to these dangerous developments in its excitement over connectivity. China’s recent utterances about South Asia are also alarming. It warned India not to consider the Pacific Ocean to be its own backyard. Aware that India and the US had joined hands to keep it out of South Asia, China is now showing a renewed interest and resolve, not just to fight being left out of South Asia, but also to fight for its presence in the region. China has a claim over a large chunk of Indian land, for example in Aksai Chin and Arunachal Pradesh, one of the Seven Sisters.
Thus, there is no scope for complacency for Bangladesh in terms of what is happening in our region as it gets sucked into the Indo-China rivalry with the US in attendance. It is time, therefore, for its government to wake up. The Seven Sisters are witnessing a resurgence of some of the old insurgencies that many had thought were extinct, where China would no doubt be tempted to interfere, and perhaps are doing so already.
If the security situation in the Seven Sisters deteriorated in the future, India would only be encouraged to use the rails and roads that it is helping Bangladesh improve in the name of connectivity for military purposes, as indicated by what Minister Rathore has already stated in no uncertain terms.
The more alarming prospect, however, is the threat of political violence that looms large over Bangladesh because of the path that the government has chosen in order to deal with it. Continuing to deal with the opposition by systematically withdrawing all democratic space from it could send Bangladesh over the rails and into the lap of the Islamic fundamentalists and their international collaborators. The fears in many quarters that Bangladesh could see an ISIS-type movement may not be very far-fetched.
Therefore, to deal with the dark and threatening clouds over connectivity would be as follows: First, Bangladesh must opt for the democratic path to deal with its own political problems. Second, India must dismiss Minister Rathore’s statement as rhetoric and take lessons from Kuldip Nayar’s article on Narendra Modi’s Dhaka visit, and act accordingly in dealing with Bangladesh, particularly in encouraging it to return to democratic governance. Finally, India must not impose itself on Bangladesh to move it from the Chinese orbit — it should allow Bangladesh to deal with both for furthering its interests.
Only then would connectivity become the magic wand in the hands of New Delhi and Dhaka to disperse the dark clouds above, and serve the genuine interests of all the countries in the region, including China.
