Author highlights India’s failing ‘Look East’ policy

by Mungpi
Wednesday, 11 November 2009 23:20

New Delhi (Mizzima) - In order to achieve peace and stability in India’s North Eastern region, India must reverse its ‘Look East’ policy, and stand firm in its support towards democratic reforms in neighbouring military-ruled Burma, a prominent Indian journalist said in a newly released book.

Subhir Bhaumik a senior journalist and academic researcher, in his recently released book titled “Troubled Periphery: Crisis of India's Northeast” published by Sage, details how India’s policy towards Burma and Bangladesh have overlooked the practical implications in North eastern India.

Bhaumik, BBC’s East India correspondent, has been following India’s ‘Look East’ policy and the change in its approach towards the Burmese military generals, whom India in the late 1980s shunned.

But with the formulation of the ‘Look East’ policy, India in the early 1990s changed its policy towards the Burmese generals, who came to power in a military coup in 1988, and began courting and appeasing them.

But Bhaumik, in his book, describes that India is following a failed policy for over a decade and is playing a catch-up game with China in order to gain a foothold in Burma.

“Unless we have a truly federal and democratic Burma and a secular and democratic Bangladesh, the stability of the Northeast cannot be ensured. The Burmese generals have made a fool of India -- and why should we play a catch-up game with China in Burma,” Bhaumik said.

Rather Bhaumik said India should stand firm in its support for a democratic movement in Burma, which will in the long run serve the interest of India.

India has proclaimed that the change in its policy towards Burma is in its national interest – countering growing Chinese influence in Burma, seeking the Burmese generals’ support in flushing out North Eastern rebels, and fulfilling India’s growing energy demand by seeking to get a foothold in Burma’s natural gas.

But Bhaumik said, in contrast to India’s objectives, India is losing out on the Burmese natural gas to China, and the Burmese generals had never kept their promise of flushing out Indian rebels from their soil.

China’s National Petroleum Corporation on November 3 announced that it is beginning the construction of a dual gas and oil pipeline in Kyaukphyu town of Burma’s western coastal state of Arakan. The pipeline will connect Burma’s western coast with China’s South-western Yunnan Province.

The pipeline will be used for transporting natural gas from Burma’s offshore Shwe Gas fields, for which China won the sole purchasing right, while the oil pipeline would be used for transporting oil purchased by China from Middle East and African nations.

India claims that insurgencies in North-east India has caused severe set-backs in developmental projects, and have time and again urged the Burmese military to flush out Indian rebels from its soil.

But Bhaumik argues that none of these has happened and Burma’s military rulers are playing with India. He added that India cannot afford to have too many military regimes in its neighbourhood, and thus should support the democracy movement in Burma and join forces with the West on this issue.

“India’s only alternative is to back the movement for democracy -- what have we gained by backing the generals for 10 years -- neither has India's security concerns been addressed, drugs flow into India from Burma as ever before, so do Chinese arms,” Bhaumik argues.

India in the early 1990s formulated the “Look East” policy with the aim of integrating with the growing Southeast Asian economies. And with Burma being the immediate Southeast Asian neighbour, India made a drastic change in its policy towards Burma and shook hands with the military regime, whom they had condemned for brutally crushing student protesters in 1988.

But Bhaumik said, “If Burma remains a basket case, India’s Look East will bump into the Great Wall called Myanmar [as Burma is now called] and go no further. All the grandiose transport links through Burma will remain on paper.”

“India not only has to overcome the democracy deficit in its northeastern region. It has to play a decisive role in overcoming the democracy deficit in the immediate neighbourhood,” Bhaumik said in his book.

The author also strongly suggests that if India is worried about the rising Chinese influence in the neighbourhood, particularly in Burma, that is all the more reason that India should wholeheartedly support the cause of democracy in Burma.

“We should not play a catch-up game with China, we should play a major role in giving to our Burmese brothers, what every Indian enjoys in some measure -- fruits of democracy, however limited,” Bhaumik added.