Special Relations or Equi-Distance Concept

Dr. Ram Kumar Dahal, T.U

During the period of the interim government India emphasized on its "special ties or relations" with Nepal and had strong disliking of the latter's policy of equidistance or balanced relationship. Indian Ambassador to Nepal, S.K.Sinha and Indian Foreign Minister I.K.Gujral made remarks emphasizing on India's special relationship with Nepal and rejecting Nepal's policy of balanced relationship or equidistance: that is a policy of keeping India and China on equal distance without making any discrimination.

Before mentioning about how and in what way, Indian leaders stressed on its special ties or first rate behavior with Nepal in comparison to China and other countries of the world during the interim government of Nepal, one fundamental issue may be raised in Nepal's Foreign Policy. "Why does India repeatedly emphasize on its special ties with Nepal? Why does it want first rate behavior from Nepal in comparison to China and other countries? What are India's valid grounds for such claims? Attempts would, thus, be made here to answer these queries.

The people of the Indian origin living in Nepal's southern plains, Terai, with open border with India-become a subject of great concern to the leaders in New Delhi in emphasizing India's age-old traditional and special ties with Nepal. Political leaders in India, since many decades, have been repeatedly stressing on the fact that India and the people living in Nepal's plains of Terai and even in the hill belts are the inheritors of a common heritage and common traditions. Both the countries share similar culture, language, religion and broadly speaking, both are akin in almost all the socio-cultural characteristics. Not only the people of the Indian origin living in the fertile plains of Terai, the people in the hill belt of Nepal, as the Indian leaders repeatedly stressed on, also share the same socio-cultural values which have its root sources in Indian soil. Sociologists and anthropologists have claimed that most of the tribal groups in Nepal (in the hills and in the Terai) had their initial dwellings in India or had migrated from India (9 like the Lichhavis from Vaishali, Muzzafarpur, the Brahmins from North India, to mention a few). Both the countries share the same religious values of Hinduism-which is considered as the most influential factor in binding or bringing together the people of the two countries. India or Hindustan, the land of the Hindus, has also taken it as a great benefit in becoming or coming closer to the people of Nepal in exercising its influence through non-political channel. The top-most Indian leaders, in course of their visit to Nepal visit most of the important Hindu temples of Nepal like Pashupati Nath, Mukti Nath, Janaki to mention a few. Similarly, the visit of the important Hindu temples of India by the Hindu Kings, Prime Ministers and important political leaders of Nepal and the people of the world's only one Hindu State, had further brought the two countries closer to special ties on which India wants to take special advantage. The matrimonial relations between the peoples of the two countries and Nepal's Hindu King marrying Indian girls before 1951 had made the situation more on India's favor. Nepal's open border in the southern plains of Terai and the big volume of trade and other economic transactions carried on between the two countries had led India to overemphasize on the age-old traditional special ties with Nepal.

Since the 1980s, visiting Indian dignitaries used to visit Nepal Terai and had exchanged their views openly with the people there and let their problems known. Visiting Indian president had even donated to construct the Ram Janaki Vibah Mandap in Janakpur, the birthplace of Goddess Sita who was married to Rama, the Prince of Ayodhya, India. Indian Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar, during his visit to Nepal on February 13-15, 1991, visited Terai. When asked to define his mission there, Prime Minister Shekhar stated that he was not apologetic about his visit to the Terai region because it was inhabited by people of Indian origin and the people living in the region had requested him to visit there. Thus, he was taking the opportunity to know their problems known to him. There was no politics or political motive involved in visiting the region. (Asian Recorder May 13-19, 1991).

The leaders in India stressed on India's special relationship with Nepal. Indian external affairs minister I.K.Gujaral, in an interview with the representative of the Rising Nepal stated that the size and levels of economic growth of Nepal and India were such that reciprocity in the strict sense of the word was neither feasible nor possible in their relationship, that was the reason why he had often said that the relation between the two countries was bound to be asymmetrical and the only point was how to make that asymmetry more beneficial to both sides. (9The Rising Nepal June 1, 1990).

India's unwillingness to accept Nepal's equidistance approach in its relations with its immediate neighbors-India and China was expressed by the then Indian Ambassador to Nepal, S.K.Sinha who, addressing at a function organized by the Rotary Club of Biratnagar, statedthat it was not practical for Nepal that it would maintain relations based upon equidistance with which India had special relations in all fields. Nepal could not have relations with China, which were similar to those with India. He had made similar other remarks in other places as well. Indian scholars and academicians like Bhawani Sen Gupta also openly emphasized on India's special relations with Nepal. (Spotlight March 32, 1991).

During the Panchayat period Indian leaders had even charged the Nepalese leaders of using China cards against India.

India continued to emphasize on its special ties with Nepal during the period of the interim government. But what about the interim government of Nepal? Did it openly support or oppose India's "special relations" stand? What about the leaders of the Nepali Congress and the party itself? It would be appropriate to study their stand on the issue.

Prime Minister Bhattarai, soon after he became the Prime Minister, made an official statement on April 1990 which stated that Nepal was "brotherly and close to India and friendly to China". The Chinese Prime Minister, Le Peng, in his congratulatory message to the Nepalese counterpart, expressed his dissatisfaction over the statement made by Nepalese Prime Minister and emphasized, like India's, on China's brotherly and traditional ties with Nepal. (Spotlight, Feb.28, 1991). Ganesh Man Singh, the supreme leader of the NC, had expressed that NC gave more priority to its relation with India than any other countries of the world which was a reality for Nepal. Politically both countries believed in the same form of democracy; both were close in terms of culture, economy, geography and social conditions. Any attempt to ignore that reality must be described as hypocritical. The joint communiqué signed at the end of the three-day official visit of Prime Minister Bhattarai on June 10, 1990 stressed on the unique friendly and brotherly relations between their peoples. Bhattarai, addressing the Indo-Nepal Friendship Association in New Delhi on June 9, 1990, and delivering an impressive lecture in Hindi, had stressed that both the countries were inheritors of a common heritage and common traditions. He also urged to use the water resources of Nepal for the use of common benefit. He had also coined some controversial terms like common rivers, common market, common currency, common culture and tradition and "common security".

The question of equidistance or Nepal's balanced relationship with its immediate neighbors became a subject of great controversy among the nationalist and the leftist forces who repeatedly stressed on this point. R.K.Shah, considering Nepal's policy of equidistance impossible and impracticable, stated that the question of Nepal's equidistance with its two immediate neighbors was "false". There had never been such equidistance nor was it possible to maintain it. It was an outright nonsense. Equidistance neither existed nor it is feasible now.( Nepali Awaz, Nepali Patra and Spotlight).

Similar views were expressed by other NC leaders also. A left wing daily, Jana Jagriti, had even published reports of anti-China campaign and pro-Indian movement launched by the NC. Bharat Shamsher and other leaders also stressed on special relations with India.

Nepal's geo-political situation has compelled it to adopt a balanced policy with its neighbors-India and China while dealing with foreign policy matters. During the Panchayat period, Nepal had emphasized on the policy of equidistance. Some scholars on Nepal's foreign policy, emphasizing on the concept of equi-proximity, have proposed that, with the changing time and situation, old foreign policy habits should be replaced by new ones.

Observers of the Nepalese foreign policy have come forward with the concept of equiproximity instead of equidistance to resolve the dispute between the traditional equidistance maintained by Nepal and the special relationship advocated by India.

The term "equiproximity" which was first forwarded by Dev Raj Dahal in his article "Old habits, new times: Whither Nepalese foreign policy?" is gaining currency these days. An elaborate analysis of the concept is provided by Prof. Dhruba Kumar, CNAS, TU, in an edited book, Nepal's India policy that says "one fundamental issue confronting Nepalese decision makers is the term "equiproximity" defined inversely as a conception guaranteeing a balanced relationship with both India and China. Sovereign equality remains central to this proposition. In so doing, Nepal should advisedly undertake and effort to review all the previous treaties and discard the ones that had proven unfavorable to the country's interests. The thrust of the argument conclusively points towards ending the special relationship with China and India which restrict Nepal's freedom to obtain a meaningful relation with China. Nowhere this feeling been reflected concretely in recent memory than in the case o Chinese arms versus Indian economic blockade. The protagonists and the proponents of equiproximity therefore opt to keep Nepal out of the bounds of any ties either with India or China that could be construed as uncongenial to each other. This view is unanimously approved. Journalist Madan Mani Dixit and Members of Parliament-Raghu Pant and H.L.Shrestha too have elaborated this concept in their articles published in various newspapers.

A brief discussion of the foreign policy of Nepal raises a lot of fundamental issues: Should a leftist government in Nepal be "pro-Chinese?" undermining its ties with India and caring less to the world? Or for that matter a rightist or centrist government should follow "Pro-Indian" policy? By implication anti-Chinese in behavior? Probably not. The Nepalese geo-politics compels any government of Nepal not to be either "Chin-mukhi" or "Bharat-mukhi". It is believed that equiproximity is a flexible policy designed to respond to the requirement of interdependence that characterized today's global affairs. It is the only option attuned to the nation's need to adopt smoothly in world affairs and re-correct the prevailing ambiguities brought by 'neutrality', 'special relationship', 'equidistance' and so forth. Inconsistencies in foreign policy of small state as Nepal can ferment "credibility gap" and insecurity dilemma to the neighbors and instead of eliciting cooperation from them inject mistrust. As the growing regionalism in the world emphasized on cooperation behavior, cooperative development and strategy against it is counterproductive and harmful.

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