NATIONAL7Spotlight Weekly)]

Ground Realities

By acknowledging that India wants Nepal to maintain close ties with China,the southern neighbor may be sending positive signals

By BHAGIRATH YOGI

Within a fortnight of the visit by Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji, Indian Ambassador to Nepal Dev Mukherjee has said India would not object to closer ties between Nepal and China.

Addressing a 'Face to Face' program organized here last Saturday, Mukherjee rejected media reports saying that India had objected to the agreement between Nepal and China to open a new trade route along Rasuwa-Syaprubesi to the Tibet autonomous region of China. Nepal shares a 1400-km border with China and a more than 1700km common, open border with India. When the Kodari highway, the only link with Tibet, was constructed in the sixties, India was said to be unhappy though it had not registered any formal complaint. Within a few months, Nepali Congress leader Subarna Shumsher, while in exile in India, raised arms against the then Panchayat regime.

Things may not be the same four decades down the road. With both China and India trying to improve relations, Nepal is bound to benefit from new developments, say analysts. "One should not look at great states like India and China in terms of their military strength only. Both India and China are emerging economies and must develop economic ties between them," said Yadav Kant Silwal, former secretary-general of SAARC. "The enhanced trade between India and China would also benefit Nepal. Moreover, this may indicate some shift in Indian perception."

Such shift is also evident in the recent proposal by Indian Premier A. B. Vajpayee to invite Pakistani military ruler, General Musharraf, to discuss the issue of Kashmir, among others. Though critics warn against too much optimism about the tete a tete between the two rivals expected to take place sometime late next month, the political significance of the meeting for the whole region could not be understated. "The state of Indo-Pak relations is very crucial for the entire South Asia," said Silwal. "Though long-standing issues like Kashmir may not be resolved overnight, the very fact that General Musharraf and Vajpayee are going to talk directly is a quite significant development."

According to Silwal, given the supportive international situation and internal compulsions India and Pakistan can't harbor enmity against each other for long. "With menaces like international terrorism and drug trafficking shifting to South Asia from the central Asia and Middle East, India and Pakistan must come closer," said Silwal. "Culturally, linguistically and ethnically, South Asia is one. China knows it quite better and is behaving accordingly."

Indian ambassador Mukherjee also hoped that easing of tensions between India and Pakistan would help re-start the now stalled SAARC process. "Though I can't tell exactly when the summit will reconvene but I am sure it will take place soon," said the envoy. He also pointed toward different ministerial level meetings taking place under the SAARC umbrella.

The 11th SAARC Summit, due to be held in Kathmandu in November 1999, had been postponed at the request of India. Obviously, India did not want to share a forum with the military ruler of Pakistan. "Our commitment to democracy remains firm but it is in the interest of all to improve bilateral relations (between India and Pakistan", Mukherjee explained.

Coming back to bilateral relations between Nepal and India, Mukherjee expressed hope that border disputes between the two countries would be resolved after a joint technical team completes its works by 2003. Reiterating his government's sensitivity toward anti-India activities from the Nepali soil, the envoy said there had been several cases of foreign diplomats caught in Kathmandu with fake currency notes and explosives. "So, all this is not only the creation of media," he added. He, however, did not say anything about the role of the Nepalese government in curbing such activities. Nepal has been saying that it will not allow its soil against any of its neighbors.

Responding to another question, the Indian envoy said India too was suffering from Maoist insurgency in the states including Bihar and Andhra Pradesh. "We hope Nepal will be able to resolve the problem internally," said Mukherjee. Nepali officials say Maoists here are receiving training and supplies from Nepal and have been making use of the common, open border to their best. The deployment of Royal Nepal Army personnel along the Nepal-India border is seen as a measure to cut off such channels the efficacy of which is yet to be assessed.

Analysts say Nepal's geo-political situation would continue to give her strategic importance in the region. No leadership in Nepal can commit the folly of playing one neighbor against the other to fulfill its vested interests. But as long as major military powers in the region continue to flex their muscles for military and political supremacy in the region, instability in this Himalayan kingdom is least likely to subside, they say.