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India has reason to be anxious about China stance on J&K — foreign policy analyst Raja Mohan

C. Raja Mohan says underneath the principle of India-China non-intervention lies mutual concerns about issues relating to territorial sovereignty.

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New Delhi: India has reason to be anxious about China’s position on the Jammu and Kashmir issue with Pakistan, given the Narendra Modi government’s 2019 decision to alter the constitutional status of its territories, according to Dr C. Raja Mohan, director of the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), National University of Singapore.

Raja Mohan made these remarks at the K. Subrahmanyam Memorial Lecture organised by the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA) in New Delhi Thursday, while explaining the complexities behind the principle of non-intervention.

The foreign policy analyst and China expert used the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence or the Panchsheel Treaty, signed by India and China in 1954, as an example of a policy that has been followed “more in breach than in its observance”.

“India was deeply riled up by China’s support to various insurgencies in India during the 1960s and 1970s,” Raja Mohan said, adding that underneath the principle of non-intervention lie mutual concerns about issues relating to territorial sovereignty.

His statement comes at a time when India-China tensions at the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh have started to cool, and their troops, which have been in a stand-off since last May, have begun disengaging.

The virtual event was held in the memory of K. Subrahmanyam, the international strategic affairs analyst who served as the IDSA’s director in its formative years. Mohan worked alongside Subrahmanyam when the latter served as director in the 1980s. Subrahmanyam was the father of India’s current External Affairs Minister and former foreign secretary S. Jaishankar.


Also read: India, China must rebuild trust gradually after ‘great negative impact’ of Ladakh, experts say


‘Dual approach to sovereignty, intervention not unique to India’

In the lecture, titled ‘When to Intervene: Using Force Beyond Borders’, Raja Mohan commented on what plagues India and China’s long-term relationship.

“Soaring rhetoric on big themes could not hide the deeply contested territoriality of the two nations across the Himalayas that continues to derail efforts to build a sustainable relationship,” he said.

He further explained that this “dual approach to sovereignty and intervention” is not unique to India, but followed by large nations, especially the major powers, too.

“The US’ Monroe Doctrine, the Russian conception of near-abroad, and China’s current effort to nudge the US out of the First Island Chain in the Western Pacific are part of the same tradition,” Raja Mohan said, adding that these reveal a strategic objective on regional dominance.

Similarly, Panchsheel — which, contrary to public conception, was initiated by Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai and not Jawaharlal Nehru — was “not about non-intervention in absolute terms, but about China demanding an end to India’s special relationship with Tibet”, he explained.

Raja Mohan also pointed out that in the aftermath of the Cold War, when the “Soviet Union had disappeared and China had not yet risen”, the US enjoyed a “free run” in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). At the time, there was strong resistance to this in many countries, including India, that was “fending off the new international attempts to meddle in Jammu and Kashmir, actively supported by Pakistan”, he said.

Evolution of India’s foreign policy, regional intervention

Raja Mohan opined that India should try to act alone and set its own terms of engagement regarding territorial defence and interventions in the “immediate neighbourhood”.

He noted that past regional interventions have included sending troops into East Pakistan to liberate Bangladesh in 1971, and attempts to “keep peace” in Sri Lanka during 1987-90. But today, India has evolved from a lack of strategic thinking, or the ‘Panipat Syndrome’, to a more active effort to go beyond the borders and attack the source of the threat, he said.

Raja Mohan averred that “a rising India” will face more imperatives for intervention due to globalisation of the Indian economy. Another factor will be the “growing impact of the external world on India’s prosperity and peace”, he said, adding that if India doesn’t shape its environment, it will be subject to “rules set by others”.

Peacekeeping interventions may serve military and strategic purposes too, he suggested, noting how China has stepped up its international peace operations in order to “overcome the PLA’s lack of operational experience beyond borders”.

‘Modi govt has transcended taboos surrounding use of force’

Raja Mohan said the current government of India, headed by Narendra Modi, has been “trying to transcend some of the taboos that shaped Indian thinking on the use of force”.

Citing PM Modi’s 2015 speech in Mauritius as an example, he said there is fresh determination in India to shape the geopolitics of the Indian Ocean. “But India’s maritime strategy is clearly work in progress,” he added.

However, earlier in the lecture, he also pointed out how the use of force can have an effect on a country domestically, as seen in the case of the Indian intervention in Sri Lanka.


Also read: Quad stresses on ‘rules-based order’ in Indo-Pacific amid India-China troubles, Myanmar coup


 

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2 COMMENTS

  1. “Soaring rhetoric on big themes could not hide the deeply contested territoriality of the two nations across the Himalayas that continues to derail efforts to build a sustainable relationship,” …policy that has been followed “more in breach than in its observance”.
    The article is just a trigger for my thoughts. Not the absolute. The idea of sovereignty in the twenty first century is the same it was in the eighth century or prior, so to speak. Expansionism was always about money, wealth and bounty. Only occasionally was there a battle between just for prestige and territory. Even so they were subsumed by the aim of wealth and power to achieve wealth.
    I can hear someone whispering “Hitler”. To them, I say, when a Nation is to be rallied for something big, the deliverables has to be now and here. The obvious may not always be the final aim.
    So it is, even now. Aggressions and expansionism is for power and wealth. In this context we may ask the question whether China’s territorial aggression is just a smoke screen for economic expansion.
    Tail piece: Most times, what we see is not what it is. Whatever it is, a mighty military is imperative to be a strong Nation, else Nations will be forced to suck up to some other Nation who has a mighty military).

  2. There is no need of another hard lesson to Peking; They have learnt a hard one at LAC aim last 10 months. They are very mindful of lessons they get. Their prestige is at stake. You professional writers should learn that.

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