Eight foreign leaders from India’s near-abroad are attending Prime Minister designate Narendra Modi’s oath-taking ceremony in Rashtrapati Bhavan on Monday evening.
While the focus will inevitably be on Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the other guests, six from Saarc countries and Mauritius Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam, have their own relevance and importance for India. The others are: outgoing Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, Maldives President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Bhutan Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, Nepal Prime Minister Sushil Koirala, and Shirin Sharmin Chowdhury who is the Speaker of Bangladesh parliament.
Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Reuters
Here is a brief compilation of India’s existing relations with countries whose leaders have been invited by Modi for his inauguration and pending issues with each of these neighbours.
Pakistan
Of all the eight invited countries, Pakistan is the only country India has fought three wars with, apart from a limited war in Kargil in 1999. Therefore, Pakistan acquires crucial importance in the Indian strategic ethos.
The two nuclear-armed neighbours have traditionally had one-step-forward-two-steps-backward kind of a relationship in their chequered history. The major problem between the two is Pakistan’s propensity for using terrorism as an instrument of its foreign policy vis-a-vis India.
All Indian conversations with Pakistan are geared to having an environment free from violence and terrorism. India's template for Pakistan was last set at the highest level in April 2010, during the meeting between the then Indian and Pakistani prime ministers, Manmohan Singh and Yousaf Raza Gilani, on the margins of the Saarc Summit in Thimpu. At that meeting Manmohan Singh had spoken about India's willingness to resolve all outstanding issues through bilateral dialogue.
Follow up meetings were held by the two foreign ministers in Islamabad in July 2010, and the two foreign secretaries in Thimpu in February 2011. During the latter meeting it was formally agreed to resume dialogue on all issues: (i) counter-terrorism (including progress on Mumbai trial) and humanitarian issues at home secretary level; (ii) peace and security, including CBMs, (iii) Jammu & Kashmir, and (iv) promotion of friendly exchanges at the level of foreign secretaries; (v) Siachen at defence secretary-level; (vi) economic issues at commerce secretary level; (vii) Tulbul Navigation Project/Wullar Barrage at Water Resources Secretary-level; and (viii) Sir Creek (at the level of Surveyors General/Additional Secretary).
According to the Ministry of External Affairs, since then several efforts have been made by the two countries to enhance people-to-people contacts. Cross-LoC travel and trade across Jammu and Kashmir, initiated in 2005 and 2008 respectively, is an important step in this direction. Further, India and Pakistan signed a new visa agreement in September 2012 during the visit of then external affairs minister Salman Khurshid to Pakistan which led to liberalisation of bilateral visa regime.
Current Scenario
The Indo-Pak peace process has been stalled for well over a year; first because of general elections in Pakistan in May last year and then because Pakistan’s PML (N), which received a strong mandate in the 11 May 2013 elections, awaited a clear political climate from a poll-bound India.
All issues between India and Pakistan are currently pending. Nawaz Sharif’s upcoming visit and his meeting with Modi is expected to kickstart the bilateral dialogue process, though the Modi-Sharif meeting on 27 May would largely be an opportunity for the two leaders to familiarise with each other.
Afghanistan
India accords a very high degree of importance to this land-locked neighbour which is vital for peace and security in India. Afghanistan is preparing itself for three simultaneous political, security and economic transitions in 2014 and India has already sought to allay fears about the future by making a long-term commitment to the security and development of Afghanistan. India has already pumped in developmental aid and assistance worth $2 billion in Afghanistan, making India the largest donor nation from among the regional countries and among the largest overall.
Current Scenario
The entire Indian exercise in engaging with Afghanistan is aimed at insulating itself from possible adverse fallout after the American/NATO troops withdraw from Afghanistan by this year end. India, like China and Russia, is apprehensive of Afghanistan slipping back to Taliban control.
Bangladesh
India shares its longest land border with Bangladesh (over 4,100 kms). The importance of Bangladesh for India can be gauged by the fact that the Indian North East is Bangladesh-locked. India has enjoyed good political relations with India, except for the time when Begum Khaleda Zia ruled Bangladesh. India, which was the first county to recognize Bangladesh as an independent nation in December 1971, reaffirmed its strong ties with Dhaka on 7 August 2013 by announcing a billion dollars soft loan to Bangladesh, the biggest ever credit package India had ever earmarked for any nation. The two countries’ annual bilateral trade is over $5 billion.
Pending Issues
Land Boundary Agreement and Teesta River Water Sharing Accord are two game-changing bilateral agreements that Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is keenly looking forward to. Neither has materialised though both are done deals but the state government of West Bengal, led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, has spiked both.
Bhutan
Ever since establishment of diplomatic relations between India and Bhutan in 1968, Bhutan has been the closest and virtually zero-problem neighbour. From Indian perspective, Bhutan has been a model neighbour. India is the largest and development partner of Bhutan.
Pending issues
Bilaterally, there are no major pending contentious issues. But New Delhi is worried about China establishing direct diplomatic ties with Bhutan and setting up an embassy in Thimpu. Thus far, India has been the sole foreign policy manager of Bhutan. But the entry of China in the Bhutan picture may radically change the strategic calculus.
Maldives
India has traditionally had close and warm ties with Maldives and was among the first to establish diplomatic ties with Maldives after its independence from Britain in 1965. India established its diplomatic mission in Male, the Maldives capital, in 1972. India has the second largest expatriate community in Maldives with strength of about 26,000.
Pending Issues
There are no major differences between India and Maldives but the increasing influence of China, and also of Pakistan to some degree in this Islamic nation located in the Indian Ocean-Arabian Sea area, is a strategic concern to the Indians. Also, in the past couple of years the Maldivian domestic politics has increasingly challenged the Indian clout in this country of a double chain of 26 atolls.
Nepal
India has a porous 1,850-km-long border and visa-free regime with Nepal. This predominantly Hindu nation borders five Indian states -- Sikkim, West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Over six lakh Indians are living in Nepal. India has been and continues to be Nepal’s largest trade partner, source of foreign investment and tourist arrivals.
Pending Issues
Because of the long porous border between India and Nepal, Pakistan has been using Nepal as a conduit for funneling fake Indian currency into India and also using the Nepalese territory as a launching pad to smuggle in terrorists and weapons into India. As if the increasing influence of Pakistan in Nepal were not enough, India also has to contend with a rapidly increasing presence of China in Nepal. Because of the rapidly rising Chinese influence, the Nepalese politicians have often played the China card with India in their political discourse with India.
Sri Lanka
India’s relations with Sri Lanka are traditional and the island nation figures prominently in Hindu scriptures like the Ramayana. Sri Lanka is India’s largest trade partner of India in South Asia with bilateral trade over $4 billion in 2012. India is among the four largest overall investors in Sri Lanka with cumulative investments of over $800 million.
Pending Issues
Though the relations between India and Sri Lanka go back to more than 2,500 years, the bilateral relationship has been a roller-coaster ride, primarily because of the over quarter century civil war in the island nation that culminated with the defeat of the LTTE in May 2009 and the widespread allegations of human rights violations by Colombo against the ethnic Tamils. The plight of ethnic Tamils in Sri Lanka has been a prime political issue raised by all Tamil Nadu political parties and a major headache for the Central government in New Delhi. Steady increase of Chinese and Pakistani influence in Sri Lanka is another bugbear for India.
Mauritius
Though diplomatic relations between India and Mauritius were established in 1948, Mauritius has had strong connections with India since the 1820’s when Indian workers started coming into Mauritius to work on sugar plantations. From 1834, large numbers of Indian workers began to be brought to Mauritius as indentured labourers. About half a million Indian indentured labourers are estimated to have been brought into Mauritius between 1834 and the early decades of the 20th century, out of whom about two-thirds are settled permanently in Mauritius. Ever since Mauritius’ independence on 12 March, 1968, the first Prime Minister and the Father of the Mauritian Nation Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam accorded centrality to India in Mauritius’ foreign policy. Subsequently, successive Mauritian leaders ensured that India occupies a position of significance and importance in the foreign policy orientation and activities of Mauritius.
Current Scenario
There are no major contentious issues between India and Mauritius. The importance Mauritius attaches to India is made clear by the fact that Mauritian government contacted the MEA and conveyed their prime minister’s keenness to attend Modi’s inauguration. Though Modi wanted to invite only Saarc leaders, he could not ignore the request of Mauritius.
The writer is a Firstpost columnist and a strategic analyst who tweets @Kishkindha.
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