For one and a half decades, India
unabashedly supported Sheikh Hasina’s
brutal and
dictatorial regime.
Not fair. The support given to Bangladesh before 2014 was perfectly justified by the ties that the Indian people, not simply the establishment, had to Bangladesh and its people, and its leadership. It was not the Indian government that effectively leaned away from its counterparts across the border; the chill and the leaning away came from the other side. Pushing the causes of the closeness, in latter years, unwarranted closeness, wholly onto a desire for hegemonic domination on the side of the Indians is simply monocular vision.
The 20-day-long
violent uprising that forced her to
flee to India in a military cargo plane, witnessed the death of
542 people in 20 days. Year after year, South Block turned a blind eye
A reminder - this was the action of a regime in India that was in no way connected to Bangladesh' own struggle for identity, and finally, in desperation, for freedom.
This regime had had no footing in government and in administration, and when it came to power, had no legacy of foreign policy or thinking on foreign policy, other than a hatred of the Muslim majority nations on its western border and its eastern borders, and a track record of trash-talking the social situation in both those neighbouring countries.
Finally, when a foreign policy kind of emerged from the toxic mess that was that ruling regime's confused and bigoted state of mind, it was a curious, a weird amalgam of bigotry and Islamophobia, and a remembered practice of bullying, intimidation and subversion of all who were not long-standing followers of their ideology.
The Awami League government should never have expected any consideration, cooperation or respectful regard for an independent, sovereign neighbour. But that AL government was blind to these considerations, just as it was blind to the grim resistance that it had built up within its own constituents, precisely the same blindness that allowed it to see the killing of 542 of its own citizens in 20 days.
It was a cynical and manipulative Indian government and a naive and narrow-minded Bangladeshi government that led to the one-sided relationship that is causing so much anger.
This kind of throwing figures around frisbees does not help. Until there are proper enquiries, and authentic financial figures are obtained, citing these is of use only to raise the political temperature. The citizenry is in no way benefited by this display, nor is the country.
India refused to hedge its bets in Bangladesh
even after repeated requests, especially over the past several years. During Hasina’s rule, the Narendra Modi government never tried to make friends with Bangladesh or its people; rather it was ready to risk India’s goodwill and enlightened national interest for the sake of Hasina and the Awami League.
Another fundamental mistake.
The Modi government did whatever it did, not to support the Awami League government, but to obtain undue influence over public policy discussions, most critically over decisions whereby its crony capitalists would make vast sums of money, and thus be enabled to place a portion within favoured party funds.
The kleptocracy was not merely in Bangladesh, assuming that it was kleptocracy that prevailed, but far more in India.
During Hasina’s rule, the Narendra Modi government never tried to make friends with Bangladesh or its people; rather it was ready to risk India’s goodwill and enlightened national interest for the sake of Hasina and the Awami League.
It was not about SHW or the Awami League. Nobody in the Indian establishment had the slightest feeling for the Bangladesh government, and nothing they did was for the sake of SHW or the League. It was for their own sakes, and for the sakes of their friendly neighbourhood crony capitalist. That is why risks were taken; the rewards seemed proportionally far more than the alienation of others not favoured, or overlooked.
When the United States tried to punish
human rights violators in Bangladesh, Indian lobbied withWashington so that the US gave Hasina some breathing space—
Delhi told the US that it “…can’t take us (India) as a strategic partner unless we (India and the US) have some kind of strategic consensus.”
Highly speculative.
On July 19, the day 75 people died mostly in police fire, Dr S Jaishankar, External Affairs Minister of the world’s largest democracy, called it“Bangladesh’s internal matter”
This has a simple explanation.
The outlines of Dr. Jaishankar's positions had been drawn up long in advance. Ignoring the realities of the situation in Bangladesh (or any other countries or cities. These Indian positions were formed out of a combination of concepts. One stream was the efforts of a foreign service that tried to create a foreign policy out of whole cloth that would not have too many uncomfortable reminders of the achievements in foreign policy of earlier years, The second stream was the toxic views that the ruling BJP had for neighbouring countries.
Therefore the glib answer, dictated by a clumsily put together foreign policy, infused with the cynical and manipulative thinking of the politicians involved.
The day after Hasina’s fall in a mass upsurge that Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus called Bangladesh’s Second Independence, Jaishankar, in his speech to parliament, failed to see why the people of India’s next door neighbour had risen in unison against India’s closest ally in South Asia.
Not surprising.
Under this regime, Indian foreign policy became a matter of responding to what the political leadership thought to be appropriate behaviour, with no regard for reality.
Instead of soul searching, some in
the Indian media found the usual suspects behind Hasina’s fall—
Pakistan, China and the US. It is indeed ironic that China and the US, both rivals in the formation of Cold War 2.0 in the Pacific, are seen as an ally in tiny Bangladesh. The involvement of Pakistan is also ludicrous. Last December
Bangladesh edged past both Pakistan and India in per capita GDP, and the country’s
median age is 26. Members of the
Gen Z who spearheaded Hasina’s ouster don’t have 1971 and the Independence War in their collective memory— India and Pakistan, to them, are just two countries, about whom an
array of memes are usually made.
Quite an obvious blindness, given the mental processes that dictated the Indian stance. Built out of a rudimentary creation of the professionals and the desire to dominate neighbours of the political leadership, it was impossible to admit any fault on the part of the Indian side, therefore, it had to be various shadowy entities. Whether those entities actually interfered or not, whether those entities were in any way aware of the motives attributed to them was not important. Finding excuses for failure of policy was important.
Some in the Indian media
even exaggerated the scale of attacks on Hindus in post-Awami League Bangladesh to serve their own agenda. Coverage like this trivialises the bigger issue of the oppression of the minorities in the sub-continent as a whole.
Again, this warped viewpoint is due to inherent traits in the DNA of the Indian government, traits handed over to the Godi Media. Sadly, the question of minorities in the sub-continent has been reduced to a question of 'rescuing' the Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist and Jain members of neighbouring populations, and of ignoring all calls for moderating their political and administrative misbehaviour towards their own minorities.
Like its media, the Indian establishment is also failing to see why keeping Hasina in Delhi is a burden. The deposed dictator faces a slew of charges.
According to Unicef 32 children were killed in the protests: the youngest child killed had yet to turn five. Of them,
Riya Gop, whose parents were Hindu, was shot in the head by a stray bullet while she was playing on a rooftop. It is impossible to defend and give shelter to a person whose command responsibility in these inhuman acts is undeniable.
Having assumed the responsibilities of a foster-parent, even this regime found itself unable to step away from the responsibilities of a foster-parent.
Then there is the risk of alienating Bangladesh’s youth by harbouring her in India and pushing hundreds and thousands of
young Bangladeshis towards China. This is a mess that evidently India’s inefficient and lethargic bureaucracy has brought upon itself.
Of course this is bound to happen. What the political masters want to hear is what is formulated and implemented, where does reality stand a chance?
One big step towards solving a problem is accepting the fact that there’s a problem. It’s high time India engages with the people of Bangladesh and stops ‘leasing it out’ to its old chums. South Block has to find new friends in Bangladesh, and it has to realise that its old policy has failed and its old friends in Bangladesh are despised by the public.
Impossible.
That would be to accept that the professional staff and the political masters were both wrong about Bangladesh, and that would never do.
The country also needs to change the way it sees Bangladesh. India’s help during Bangladesh’s independence war is a part of our shared history. But the help given 54 years ago isn’t enough to make Bangladesh feel indebted forerer. The US liberated half of Europe, but the EU isn’t the US’s colony, neither does Washington try to throttle democracy in France or Italy or Germany. If India wants to become a regional superpower, its foreign policy actors have to work like one.
Again, one has to look beyond the superficial.
The memory of India's aid to Bangladesh slowly faded away, and was replaced by the wish by the current regime to deal with a weak and subservient government.
Ordinary Bangladeshis aren’t India’s enemy. The problem is the Indian establishment.
Very clearly so. And in the toxic Islamophobia of the politicians now in power.
