De-hyphenate thy neighbour

India is caught in a trap of its own making. While the BJP may find it convenient to play on insecurities, it gives Pakistan and Bangladesh leverage in our politics

Compared to about two years ago, India’s immediate neighbourhood now looks more fraught. 

The important outcome for India is that these neighbourhood crises or broken relationships have also become central to our domestic politics. We argue that it brings its own pitfalls, and that this internalising of foreign (neighbourhood) affairs harms India’s national interest. 

A stocktaking first. Ties have stabilised with Nepal, and greatly improved with Sri Lanka and the Maldives. With Bhutan, they remain solid as ever. 

The situation with Pakistan has worsened with the rise of Asim Munir and his ideological view of religion, ideology, history, politics and geography. Bangladesh is a new challenge with the fall of Sheikh Hasina and the rise of Tarique Rahman. 

 Mr Rahman’s sweeping majority is riddled with withering contradictions. The biggest: It’s  accompanied by the mainstreaming of Jamaat-e-Islami. It has historically been pro-Pakistan. Marginalised so far, it walked into the Opposition space in what became a one-party election. 

Here’s one way of looking at our two large, terrestrial neighbours. In each, a challenger won an election after disqualifying the previous incumbent. Shehbaz Sharif and Tarique Rahman won single-party elections. That lack of legitimacy undermines both. It matters more in Dhaka. 

To that extent, both “elected” governments are weak and under-confident. Pakistan at least has a clear power structure, such as it may be, with the army on top. Bangladesh is different. 

That’s why Mr Rahman has to constantly look sideways and backwards for the Jamaat. It’s a cruel irony, but he appears to be a weak Prime Minister despite his humongous majority. 

This reflected in his hesitations so far in engaging with India, or visiting his most important neighbour. He knows that Ms Hasina’s extradition is an impossibility. He isn’t willing to learn from the Chinese, who might protest each time the Dalai Lama speaks up but haven’t let his presence ruin their post-1988 engagement with India. There are two important differences between the Dalai Lama and Sheikh Hasina situations. One, the former is given asylum by India. Second, Ms Hasina didn’t escape here stealthily. She came on board a Bangladesh Air Force helicopter, helped along by the powers that be on that day of tumult in Dhaka (5 August, 2024). 

Look at the picture from Mr Rahman’s vantage point. That he feels threatened by the Jamaat and the mood in “the street” is a reality. He can’t afford to suddenly declare normalcy with India, and definitely not when Ms Hasina keeps making statements, even holding online press conferences attacking his regime. But, he can complain, with good reason, that India, especially its domestic politics, isn’t helping him. Elections in Assam and West Bengal were fought against “Bangladeshi infiltrators”. And this factor remains central to the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) politics elsewhere in the country too. 

On top of this, establishment-friendly influential voices on Indian social media treat Bangladesh as no less an adversary than Pakistan. The language used is also similar. If Pakistan is called “Bhikaristan” (a nation of beggars), Bangladesh is called “Kangladesh” (a nation of paupers). 

 Admittedly, it’s only social media. But nationalist public opinion lacks the patience to make that distinction. Combined with the “smaller neighbour syndrome”, it infuriates Dhaka. It’s also widely believed that this has larger political sanction, if not encouragement. Pakistan, we may not bother about for now. But do we want Bangladesh in the same basket?

Compulsions of our domestic politics, or rather the choices we make in our constant electioneering, have resulted in hyphenating Bangladesh with Pakistan. However angry the public and the Indian establishment might be at the ouster of Sheikh Hasina, her return to power can’t dictate the normalisation of ties. 

A regime change in Bangladesh isn’t on India’s agenda. The Modi government understands this. It shows in many of its moves, including the choice of Dinesh Trivedi, a consummate politician, as India’s High Commissioner to Dhaka. But, how does India reconcile this larger strategic wish of normalising the ties with Dhaka while the (“illegal”) Bangladeshis remain at the heart of its domestic politics? 

India is, therefore, caught in a trap of its own making. Pakistan has been central to the BJP’s electoral politics since the failure of Mr Modi’s first outreach (2015). The BJP swept Uttar Pradesh in 2017, and 2019 general election riding on the anger post-Uri surgical strikes, and Pulwama. Pahalgam and Op Sindoor will carry on into Uttar Pradesh next year, unless something new and awful happens again. Bangladeshis are a latter day addition. This fits neatly into the idea that India is a nation under siege, with two big, hyphenated Muslim-majority strategic threats on its western and eastern borders. 

Now, reverse the equation to see who this benefits. While the BJP finds it convenient to play on these insecurities, it gives Pakistan — and by association Bangladesh — leverage in Indian domestic politics. That India hardly ever matters in Pakistani electoral politics, is a fact of post-1988 (after Zia-ul-Haq) history. 

It’s also true that electoral politics doesn’t matter in Pakistan because the Prime Minister, even when elected with a vast majority (Nawaz Sharif, 1997), doesn’t control policies relevant to us and the army doesn’t contest elections. However, the fact is that the only time the Pakistan Army loses its domestic sway is after a period of relative calm with India. It was seen between 2003 and 2008, for example. That’s when the popular cry rose on the streets: “yeh jo dehshatgardi hai, uss ke peeche vardi hai” (The terrorisism you see, the uniform is behind it) rose. The ISI “corrected” the drift with 26/11, created paranoia over a likely Indian attack, and the army reclaimed its pedestal as the sole protector of Pakistan. Munir did exactly that with Op Sindoor. 

He knows he now has leverage to play inside Indian politics, with the Modi government pre-committed to respond to his provocations by force. And if it does, his job is confirmed for another decade. He doesn’t care how many battered airbases his country is left with — because, in a short conflict, partisan public opinion will almost always buy your story. 

Bangladesh doesn’t have the same leverage in our internal politics as Pakistan does. But both making common cause hurts India. In any case, this argument isn’t about party politics. It’s about India’s strategic interest. How well does it serve India if the largest neighbours on both wings are hostile and hyphenated? India’s imperative should be to break this. And it can’t be done by taking Pakistan away from Bangladesh. We have zero incentive to offer Munir. Nor does he deserve any. 

For decades, there were two competing schools of thought in India. The first, and the dominant one, insisted that foreign and strategic policy remain de-politicised, in the sense that everybody treats it as national policy. The public opinion also mostly accepted this, especially in the Cold War era. The second school said that foreign policy should be a function of and factor in domestic politics. That’s the true spirit of democracy. With humility, I submit that I too shared this argument. That strategic thinking couldn’t be politically anodyne. 

The rise of Atal Bihari Vajpayee changed the status quo. Since then, we’ve seen policy shifts with political change in India. This is a good thing. Voters should be aware of the issues larger than free grain or direct benefit transfers when they press the button on the EVM. What we have right now is the opposite of this. 

By positioning neighbourhood policy centre-stage in our polarised politics, we’re giving them leverage. It’s a game they, especially Pakistan, know they can play. It also narrows India’s options and room for manoeuvre. This needs correction. It can begin with something as small as accepting Bangladesh’s invitation for a cricket tour there.

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