The Hindu : Moment of opportunity?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 26, 2003

Opinion

Opinion - Leader Page Articles

Moment of opportunity?

By Rajmohan Gandhi

The moment that has to be seized is one where, spurred by India, the world may save itself and America from an unwise continuation of a unilateral bid by the U.S. to reorder the world.

THOUGH SET off by the Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee's August 15 speech, by exhortations that India should now seize "the moment" that is said to have arrived, presumably for some kind of world leadership, and by fresh soundings for an Indian role in Iraq, this article airs thoughts stirring for some time in my mind.

What is the connection, I have been asking myself, between an India that has emerged as a significant power and a world asked to choose between a risky new interventionism and old sovereignties destructive of human rights? If the United States asks India and other nations to support its effort to redesign the Middle East, and its global war on terror, others hope that India will not let down countries that prize their independence. On the other hand, there are also African voices clearly calling for international intervention — in Liberia, where thousands of Nigerians and 200 Americans are now involved in enforcing a ceasefire in a country where blood has flowed more freely than water, in the Great Lakes area, where three million are said to have died in the last five years, and elsewhere.

How should India respond when the choice is (or is portrayed as being) between an intervention that may resemble imperialism and an indifference to huge human suffering? If humankind is a family, and India a good deal better off than before (continuing to grow at 6 per cent a year, and reaching the ranks of the world's five biggest national economies), does India have a responsibility? And do the circumstances add up to an opportunity for an Indian role on the world stage?

With such questions on my mind, it was natural for me to be reminded of Jawaharlal Nehru when, on TV, I heard Mr. Vajpayee's Red Fort speech, especially as the Prime Minister's speaking style — his intonations and rhythms — sounded so Nehru-like. Though Mr. Vajpayee stressed India's (and his Government's) achievements rather than the nation's purposes, the Red Fort scene on August 15 brought to my mind, umbrellas notwithstanding, the hope and pride entertained in the early years of independence, when we were young and certain of India as a pace-setter in the world.

Before long, however, Nehru's interest in world peace came to be viewed as a flaw that allegedly distanced him from India's internal needs. These seemed to require all the attention that India's rulers and thinkers were capable of. Later, the petering out of the Cold War and a growing focus worldwide on economics appeared to remove all value from a nation that was both non-aligned and poor.

Now, despite hardships facing many of its millions, India is a major economic and military power and described as such. Thus a recent article in Foreign Affairs, the influential American journal, calls the current United Nations Security Council practically valueless for not including India even as a non-permanent member.

Month by month, the profile of Indian professionals and businesspersons seems to grow larger in the U.S., Europe, the U.K., Canada, Australia, South East Asia, in the Far East, the Gulf, and Africa. Indian-Americans find an increasing clout in U.S. politics. Quite apart from any statistics available to the knowledgeable, the successful Indian professional, man or woman , is now a familiar figure at airports and wherever else the world passes through. So is the keen Indian student. No doubt a whole universe separates such Indians from their poverty-trapped compatriots, but at least some of the former seek to bridge the divide.

India's new status has been powerfully highlighted by the renewed request, apparently, for a large Indian contingent for peace-keeping in Iraq. Since so much depends on how, on behalf of India, Mr. Vajpayee and his colleagues will respond, it is worth looking at some of the considerations that may, or should, inform their thinking.

Here is India's great chance, it is argued. Keen, almost desperately keen, for Indian soldiers, Washington will pay the price that India asks, including a final American commitment in favour of India's position on Kashmir. Though we can be sure that in Islamabad, President Pervez Musharraf is being urged to do all he can, and offer whatever he can, to obtain a precisely contrary American commitment, let us look at the rest of this argument. Not only will America remember, to India's great advantage, a positive response by New Delhi, such a response, the reasoning continues, will place India on the right side of history. To offend the world's most powerful country when that country is likely to dominate the world's economic and military future for decades, a country, moreover, where now three million Indians (or more) live, would be foolish to a degree, while to make a timely, bold and positive response would constitute the sort of statecraft on which history turns.

Do not underestimate (the argument proceeds) the technological and military superiority of the U.S. Resolved to ensure, with all the immense resources it can command, the success of the Project of the New American Century, the new Washington, where realists have firmly displaced do-gooders, will reward allies and abandon, if not directly punish, the unwilling. A steadily growing share in the power and prosperity of a U.S.-led century versus a life of neglect in the shadows of the future — that is India's choice, quite apart from the training and war-preparedness, and perhaps incomes that thousands of our soldiers could get.

But my sympathies, if they are of any relevance, lie with another argument, which goes something like this. This is indeed a moment of opportunity for India. India should respond to the renewed request not with a yes or a no, but with a proposal for transferring Iraq from American and British hands to those of the international community — the U.N., or, if it is preferred, a rationalised version of the Quartet (the U.S., the U.N., Europe, and Russia). The moment that has to be seized is not one where India scores over Pakistan, but one where, spurred by India, the world may save itself and America from an unwise continuation of a unilateral bid by the U.S. to reorder the world, and where the world saves itself and Iraq from the bloodshed and lasting hates of a confrontation between Arabs/Muslims and the West. Iraq cannot go back in time. The Saddam Hussein regime is gone, and the Americans and the British (and the Danes, the Poles, the Ukrainians, and some others) are in Iraq. These forces can, and in course of time should, make way first for a force under an international command, and soon thereafter for a force of Iraqis under the command of an elected Iraqi government.

The people of Iraq, and of the world, must be informed that the U.S.-British occupation is to be replaced by a temporary international force commanding legitimacy under international law. Indians can be part of such a force, with their expenses paid for by the Indian Government.

A proposal from New Delhi for such a force in Iraq would not only bring India to centre-stage; it will help the world, and Indians, see what India stands for. India entertains great warmth for America and for the ideas of freedom and democracy that America has proclaimed and often demonstrated. And India is ready to acknowledge that situations can arise that call for international intervention: action to contain a vast human tragedy may, on rare occasions, have to override national sovereignty.

Yet India cannot accept the idea of one nation as the master of the planet. Nor can India accept a permanent war between the West and Islam, or the compulsion to side with one (either one) against the other.

A nation's place in the world is linked to its economic numbers, and also to its ability to respond to quickly changing world conditions, but even more to what it stands for. Surely Mr. Vajpayee realises, when he reflects on his role, that he is the elected Prime Minister of a people, Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Parsis and others, who, while concerned over human suffering anywhere, are proud of a hard-won independence, and, apart from a small two-sided minority, opposed to the idea of eternal enmity between Muslims and non-Muslims. These are the sentiments, or guidelines, that he must represent to the world, and they may even hint at the kind of global role that may be played by an advancing India.

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