Deeper trend pushes Indian vote on Lanka censure

 

The government and a part of the ruling United Progressive Alliance are ranged on different sides of the vote for or against Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva later this month.

The government believes censuring Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa in Geneva would make him lose face and worsen the plight of Tamils in that country. But, with both the DMK, a partner of the UPA alliance, and its AIADMK political foe, presently ruling Tamil Nadu, hoping to win the hearts and minds of people in that state in preparation for general elections next year, the Congress party has little choice but to defer to this mood.

Thus, for a second year running, India is preparing to vote against Sri Lanka, a reminder of how the power of regional politics is over-ruling the big picture that foreign policy stalwarts have for decades been used to drawing in Delhi.

For years, foreign affairs was seen as a sacred cow, somehow divorced from the rough-and-tumble of everyday living. As politics becomes increasingly federal, it makes far more sense for parliamentarians from all sides to get much more involved in the politics of foreign policy, especially with the neighbourhood.

Delhi's biggest concern is that Rajapaksa's humiliation in Geneva might anger him into deferring elections in the Northern province, as well as postponing greater economic integration with India. There is concern that he might taunt India by inviting the Chinese to take greater part in the economic reconstruction of his country.

But if Indian parliamentarians of all colours were to interact much more intensively with their counterparts in Lanka and in other parts of the neighbourhood, it might help both sides understand each other's compulsions. Getting much more involved, not less, is a sign of India deep embrace of its neighbourhood.

In the run up to national elections next year, political parties will realign and rejig alliances with each other. At last, foreign policy will be part of the main menu, not above it as has been the case all these years.