Srimanti Sarkar
(Srimanti is a Research Scholar at the Department of Political Science, University of Calcutta, and can be reached at s.srimanti@gmail.com)
Bangladesh today is fast
emerging as a vibrant economy with significant advancements taking place
especially in its development sector. It has a huge labour force, a potential
market, and a very significant geo-strategic location in between the three
major economies, viz. India, Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia. This
has attracted countries around the world and especially in the region,
including China, to take keen interest in Bangladesh. China also has been
regarded as a plausible regional partner and a “time-tested, all-weather”
friend by Bangladesh with whom bilateral relationship has been clear of the
contingencies of changing political regimes. Likewise, China even considers a
well-developed Bangladesh an “asset” for her with a potential to prosper as a
vibrant economy. The growing Sino-Bangladesh
synergy should be understood in light of the major cooperative measures
undertaken in sectors like trade, investment and infrastructural development,
defence, energy, culture and environment between the two countries.
But, whether China’s
increasing clout in Bangladesh is seemingly an ‘entente’ having major
socio-economic and geo-strategic implications is a matter to carefully ponder
upon. While China strives to realise, it’s so called, “Chinese Dream”[1]—it
will be judicious to assess whether Sino-Bangladesh interests converge to
affect India’s position in a negative way. The following section will try to
appraise whether Sino-Bangladesh ties pose an immediate and impending threat
upon India.
The fast normalisation and affirmative
conditioning of the Sino-Bangladesh bilateral relations though seem to be a
natural upshot of regionalism; when looked from a security perspective hints a critical
geo-strategic concern for India. Bangladesh’s growing closeness with China is, more
than often, seen as a tactic by the former to counter balance India out of,
what Keohane’s conceptualises as, the ‘Lilliputians’ Dilemma’. It implies that small
states primarily adopts three broad policies while acting alone vis-a-vis big
states—viz. a passive strategy
of renunciation, an
active strategy designed
to alter the
external environment in
their favour (e.g.,
subversion), or a defensive strategy helping them to preserve the status
quo (e.g., traditional diplomacy, deterrence)—in order to cope with their high
(and rising) costs of independence. Although Bangladesh cannot be literally
categorised as a ‘small’ state in terms of its geographical size and
population, it is perceptively a ‘small power’ compared to both India and
China. Accordingly, Bangladesh seems to adopt the third strategy of maintaining
a status quo with regard to India—as pursuing a passive strategy of
renunciation will be impractical given her unavoidable dependence on India
(which almost entirely surrounds Bangladesh from all the three sides), and
altering India’s pre-dominance in the region is literally not feasible (which
by virtue of her sheer size and huge repository of all kinds of resources is
the largest power in South Asia)—while fostering closer ties with China in an
attempt to diversify her over dependence on India. But, Bangladesh seems to be a geo-strategically
significant country for China as well, and the growing Sino-Bangladesh
relations is often perceived as an integral part of China’s, so-called, “Look
South and South-East Asia Policy” to which Bangladesh acts as a potential
gateway. Considering China’s keen policy overtures in South Asia, where India
is a core country, it is more than often apprehended that China is trying to
build a chain of influence around India – in her neighbourhood – in order to
lessen India’s geo-political clout in the region. China has been pro-active
regarding her ‘One Belt and One Road’ (OBOR) initiative, which has gained
significant traction. Through the OBOR initiative, China attempts to curve out
a continental geo-strategic[2]
and maritime realm[3]
which will have definite implications across regions of Asia as well as South
Asia. Under the OBOR initiative, the ‘Belt and Road’ are expected to loop and
branch and meet at critical points; and Bangladesh features in both the
overland component of the initiate–-via the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar
Economic Corridor (BCIM-EC); as well as in the maritime component—as a port hub
for the Maritime Silk Road.
For China, the BCIM Corridor is a key
corridor in its south-eastern region, just like the geo-strategically significant
China-Pakistan Economic Corridor in its west. For Bangladesh, the corridor is
central because it will help attract India’s $1.2 billion market in the west,
China’s $1.4 billion market in the north and Myanmar’s $70 million market in
the east. With Bangladesh literally posited in the middle and with its own
market pull of 160 million people it will be able to reap substantial benefits.[4]
However, with excellent connections developed among these huge markets, a
frenzy of economic activity will be inevitable among all the four countries as
well. India, off late has shown enthusiasm in taking ahead the
BCIM-EC which will link Kolkata with Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan
province, passing through Myanmar and Bangladesh, with Mandalay and Dhaka as
the focal points. But, for India some of the considerations have
been that, this route does not follow
the meandering Asian Highway-1
route from Imphal through
the Assam Valley and
Meghalaya to Bangladesh. Instead it cuts directly across the Barak
Valley through Silchar-Karimganj-Sutarkandi. This renders somewhat futile the
expectations of developing and connecting India’s north eastern region (NER) by
making the corridor pass through the states of Nagaland, Arunachal, Meghalaya,
Tripura and Mizoram, as well as Sikkim. However, the Indian government has
proposed to build roads and railway linkages which will pass through the
landlocked regions like Barak Valley, Tripura and Mizoram and subsequently join
the BCIM Corridor. This will then provide the much needed boost in developing
India’s NER
.
In the maritime component of China’s OBOR
initiative also Bangladesh figures prominently. China’s investments in
Bangladesh’s maritime infrastructure, is seen in-tuned with the former’s
‘String of Pearls’[5]strategy–a
euphemism to explain China’s attempt to expand its naval presence throughout
the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) by building maritime civilian infrastructure in
friendly states. It is been apprehended that China might construct a submarine
base in Bangladesh, which in turn will earn a strategic base for her in the Bay
of Bengal.
However, Bangladesh being aware of India’s
worries has tried to refrain from being caught up in a tug-of-war between the
two Asian giants. Thus, when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited
Bangladesh in June 2015, the two sides signed an agreement to allow Indian
cargo vessels use the Chittagong port. This move is being symbolically read in
India as “plucking of ‘pearl’ from China's ‘String’ in Bangladesh”[6]—meaning
a reassurance, that the port will not act as a strategic base of China in the
Indian Ocean. In the past two years, Bangladesh has also seen long-standing
maritime and land border issues with India resolved in Dhaka’s favour, which
again may be seen as New Delhi’s eagerness to make sure its neighbour does not
tilt too far in China’s direction. However, Dhaka seems to be reaping tangible
benefits by courting both China and India. Nevertheless, debates negating the
‘String of Pearls’ theory provide tangible justification for not considering
China’s preponderant threat on India as an emergent one. In view of China’s
considerable discomfiture with regard to Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Bangladesh as well
as the tiny island states of the Seychelles and the Maldives leaving alone
Pakistan with whom China shares a better equation, it will be imprudent to
exaggerate China’s predominance in India’s neighbourhood.
However, India pins
optimistic hope on her rising neighbour China and their bilateral relations
stand on a cooperative footing with no immediate threat of outright invasion. But
New Delhi’s decision to station a full squadron of Sukhoi-30 aircraft in Tezpur
and another squadron positioned in Chabua in upper Assam reflects India’s
persisting suspicions about Chinese intentions in the region. Bangladesh, on
the other hand, does not pose such a territorial threat upon India; rather it
is considered as indispensible for the stability and development of India’s
NER. Both economically as well as geographically Bangladesh can serve immensely
to integrate NEI with the mainland. Transit routes
through Bangladesh can help reduce transportation cost of goods and services
significantly and in turn boost trade prospects of the region. But,
Bangladesh’s demand for similar transit facilities through India to access the
Himalayan countries of Nepal and Bhutan, in turn acts as a liability for India
as the ‘China Factor’ pose a constant threat on her national security. Thus,
de-securitisation and opening up of the NER seems far more intricate a
challenge for India vis-a-vis the development prospect of the region. The rise
of China and her increasing prowess in India’s neighbourhood thus have a seeming
impact on the region. It has helped in boosting the economies of small states
and at the same time provided them the power of manoeuvrability over India—the
most powerful actor in South Asia. So is also true for Bangladesh, which has
been increasingly trying to diversify her reach and establish links with other
countries in and around the South Asian region. But instead of overdoing on the
much anticipated Sino-Bangladesh ‘entente’ as an immediate threat for India, the
latter should consider it as a pretext ripe enough to re-envision her
neighbourhood relations carefully and especially with Bangladesh. India needs
to take her cooperative engagement with Bangladesh to a much deeper level,
since Bangladesh it is not only an indispensable neighbour but also a strategic
regional partner with whom India shares enduring ties.
[1] ‘Chinese Dream’ is a term
coined under the Presidency of Xi Jinping to symbolise a vision to make China a
great economic power whereby greater degree of economic progress will be
ascertained superseding domestic and international challenges. Marc Lanteigne, Chinese
Foreign Policy: An Introduction, (London and New York: Routledge, 2016), p.
8.
[2] The belt manifests
its continental geo-strategic dimension through a network of rail routes,
overland highways, oil and gas pipelines and other infrastructural projects, stretching
from Xian in Central China, through Central Asia and Russia, with one artery
crossing Kazakhstan and the other through Mongolia but both linking up
with the trans-Siberian railway and going on to Moscow, Rotterdam and Venice.
[3] The belt manifests its
continental maritime dimension through a network of ports and other coastal
infrastructure from China’s eastern seaboard stretching across South East Asia,
South Asia, the Gulf, East Africa and the Mediterranean, forming a loop
terminating at Piraeus (Greece), Venice (Italy) and Rotterdam (Netherlands) in
Europe and Mombasa ( Kenya) in Africa.
[4] Subir Bhowmik, “Bangladesh: The Key to India’s Look East through
Northeast” Policies and Practices
78, Logistical
Spaces III, Hubs, Connectivity and Transit, December 2016.
[5] China’s ‘String of Pearls’ strategy is an
ambiguous and much debated concept. The term was coined by an American, named
Booz Allenin Hamilton, who used the term in his report titled “Energy Futures
in Asia” published in 2005.
[6] By
definition each “Pearl” represents some form of permanent Chinese military
installation in a series of locations along a “String” stretching from Southern
China, through the Indian Ocean, to the areas from where China imports much of
its natural resources, such as Africa and the Middle East.
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