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Premier Koirala’s India Visit

By Dr. Mohan Lohani

PRIME Minister Girija Prasad Koirala’s official goodwill visit to India beginning next week has not only received wide publicity and media attention but has also engendered a lot of enthusiasm as well as stimulated public debate and discussion among politicians intellectuals, the business community and members of civil society organisations.

Consultations

It may be noted that PM Koirala, ever since the formal announcement of the date for the official visit, has started interaction and held consultations with leaders and representatives from various political parties, former diplomats, foreign policy experts and representatives from the media and the business community. The Prime Minister is keen, during the visit, to apprise his counterpart in New Delhi and other Indian leaders of Nepalese concerns, interests and sensitivities. There is no doubt that success in building a national consensus on outstanding issues in Nepal-India relations would certainly facilitate the Prime Minister’s task in seeking an amicable settlement of these issues during the official talks in New Delhi.

It is common knowledge that a cold war atmosphere developed in Nepal-India relations, otherwise warm, initimate and cordial, soon after the hijacking last December by some Muslim terrorists of an Indian Airlines plane a few minutes after it took off from the Kathmandu airport. Indian security concern led to the suspension of all its flights to Nepal from Delhi and other cities for over five months. The problem has been resolved to mutual satisfaction followed by the resumption last month of all flights from India. Meanwhile, the hijacking incident prompted a section of the Indian media to hurl abuses on this country for alleged security lapses at the Tribhuvan International Airport. Nepal refuted these allegations by saying that security arrangements at the Kathmandu airport were in conformity with ICAO norms and guidelines.

A prerequisite to the easing of tensions and uneasiness in bilateral relations confidence building. The role of confidence building measures (CBMs) in normalising, improving and strengthening inter-state relations has been recognised in recent years as an effective strategy in international diplomacy. In this context, Foreign Minister Chakra P. Bastola’s visit to India last May served a two-fold purpose: it was a confidence building exercise and, at the same time, laid the groundwork for the Prime Minister’s forthcoming visit to India. The foreign minister’s visit to India was followed by the meetings in Kathmandu of senior officials from both countries. Mr. Brajesh Misra, Principal Secretary to Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Bajpayee, led his country’s 5-member delegation to attend the Chief Secretary level meeting in the first week of June in Kathmandu. The Nepalese delegation was led by Chief Secretary Mr. Tirth Man Sakya. The senior officials deliberated upon wide-ranging issues of mutual interest and concern such as tourism, trade, transit and water resources. This was also a CBM meeting aimed at sorting out differences and expediting the implementation of agreements already reached. Besides, it has helped create a congenial climate for PM’s visit, despite the wrong timing chosen by a weekly Indian news magazine for the publication of a lengthy intelligence report on alleged ISI activities in Nepal. The Nepalese media would be well advised to exercise restraint so that relations between the two countries are promoted in a friendly and cordial atmosphere.

A unique feature of Nepal-India relations is the approximately 1800-km long open border spanning three states of India, namely. West Bengal, Bihar and UP. While the open border has significantly contributed to the promotion of bilateral friendship on different planes-social, religious, cultural and economic. It has also been misused for criminal and other undersirable activities such as cross-border terrorism, trafficking in drugs and women, smuggling or illegal trade and large scale unaccounted migration creating imbalance in this country’s demographic composition. It has been realised that it is high time some concrete and practical measures were urgently adopted and carried out to meet mutual security concerns by regulating the border which has remained open for centuries.

The recent agreement between the home secretaries of Nepal and India, which makes it mandatory for citizens of both countries to carry travel documents such as passport, voter’s ID and citizenship certificate while flying to each other’s territory, is a welcome step as it serves as a prelude to the joint planning, management and regulation of the open border. This arrangement, however, leaves out the over two dozen border points used by both sides for the cross-border movement by land of their people and goods. Since Nepal and India do not have the visa system, it is all the more necesary to regulate the open border through systematic registration and strict record keeping, computerised if possible, of Nepalis and Indians crossing each other’s territory or border by land.

Needless to point out, any mechanism likely to be set up to regulate the open border cannot remain insensitive to existing realities such as geographical proximity, cultural affinities in the border area and, above all, cross-border trade and other economic activities in which people on both sides of the border have been actively engaged on a regular basis for centuries. Experts have also suggested the application of CBMs to generate goodwill and mutual trust as well as to promote mature inter-personal contacts between the people of Nepal and those of the bordering states of India, e.g. Bihar, UP and West Bangal. Goodwill at the people-to-people level is, no doubt, a minimum condition for the maintenance of peace and security in the border area between the two countries. Goodwill and mutual trust generated through CBMs are no less important at the official level for a comprehensive look at and resolution of all issues ranging from the review of the 1950 treaty, the border dispute including the Kalapani issue, delay in the implementation of the Mahakali Treaty, differences over bilateral trade to the harnessing of water resources to mutual benefit and inundation of Nepalese land from Indian embankment of Laxmanpur.

The cornerstones of democracy are accountability and transparency. Prime Minister Koirala, who is visiting Nepal’s closest neighbour after a gap of 4 years, has already informed the parliament that he will make all the matters transparent throughout the nation including the parliament following his goodwill visit to India. The Prime Minister is confident that face-to-face high level talks between the leaders of Nepal and India will help dispel clouds of misunderstanding, if any, and create an enviornment of trust.

The forthcoming visit to India will enable the democratically elected Prime Minister of this country to see for himself changes that have taken place in the neighbouring country during the last four years. India, which detonated its first nuclear device in 1974, has established itself as a nuclear power after it conducted a series of nuclear tests in May 1998, Pakistan followed suit and became a rival to India in conducting similar tests. India is ahead of most of the countries of the Third World in science and technology, particularly in information technology (IT). The IT industries in the United States have absorbed a large number of computer specialists from India. The vast potential of Indian market has attracted foreign investors and businessmen. American President Bill Clinton spent five days in India last March and one of his main objectives during the visit was to promote his country’s economic interests in this highly populated South Asian country.

Common Desting

Nepal and India as close neighbours share a common destiny and have stepped into the new century to face its challenge and opportunities. While both can take legitimate pride in the strong bonds of friendship dating back to the ancient past, neither of them can afford to bask in the glory and legacies of the past at the cost of emerging constraints, challenges and promises of the new century. They must look forward and agree on a broad framework within which bilateral friendship can be redefined, revamped and revitalised to benefit from each other’s potentials and complementarities in diverse areas of social, economic and technical cooperation.

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