CONDOLEEZZA Rice, during an official visit to India in 2005, had described Bangladesh as the “next Afghanistan”. It was, thus, for very good reasons that the Indians were greatly excited when the Awami League won the 2008 elections by a massive margin. The assurance given by Sheikh Hasina within days of becoming Prime Minister that Bangladesh would not allow its territory to be used for carrying out insurgency against India was welcomed in India with great enthusiasm, both by the ruling Congress and the opposition BJP. By her just-concluded state visit to India, Sheikh Hasina signed and sealed that assurance by signing three security related agreements that would give the Indians the handle over its insurgents who either hide in Bangladesh or are inclined to cross over to Bangladesh in search of sanctuary. The agreements ensure that all that India had wanted and expected on the important issue of security from Bangladesh has been delivered. It was Mamata Banarjee who perhaps spilled India glee over these three agreements when, after a meeting with Sheikh Hasina, she told waiting reporters that India must give Bangladesh whatever it wanted.
Another good friend of Bangladesh, the Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, was also equally magnanimous in his wish to help Bangladesh. He spoke about India's keenness to increase duty free imports from Bangladesh. After a half-hour meeting with the Bangladesh Prime Minister, he made a very thought provoking statement to the press. The Indian Finance Minister said: “For the first time Bangladesh understands our concerns and we understand theirs.”
The generosity and magnanimity expressed by the two ministers, however, did not translate into concrete results except where India signed two MoUs, one to provide a US$ 1 billion credit line and, the other, to sell to Bangladesh 250 MW electricity. Except for these concrete assurances, the Joint Communiqué that was issued after the summit level talks was full of good intentions by India on all the major issues without really providing what Bangladesh expected from India on the major issues. On water sharing of the common rivers, the Joint Communiqué stated that on Teesta, there would be further studies. There were also references of cooperation on other common rivers and also a direction that the Joint Rivers Commission would meet in the first quarter of 2010. On sharing of the maritime boundary, the JC stated that the two sides would proceed in the matter through negotiations. On trade, it was stated that the Indian side would reduce the negative list. On Tipaimukh, India assured Bangladesh that nothing will be done to harm Bangladesh's interests.
The Indians received almost total commitment of Bangladesh on the security issues. In fact, India could not have wanted more. The three security related agreements signed during the visit will give India the hand it needs for its security concerns from Bangladesh to ensure that Bangladesh did not become a “next Afghanistan” and cooperated with India fully to apprehend its own terrorists/insurgents. In addition, Bangladesh has given India, for the first time, access to use the Chittagong and Mangla ports, for carrying goods to and from India. India will also invest in Bangladesh roads and railway to facilitate the use of these two ports. The JC is also full of agreed steps on a wide range of issues outside the major and contentious ones that will promote cooperation between the two neighbours.
One can see from the outcome of the visit why both Mamata Banarjee and Pranab Mukherjee were excited. Bangladesh has really “understood” the Indians as the Indian Finance Minister has said by joining hands with India to quash and quell insurgency in India's fragile northeastern states. In fact, the Indian President Pratibha Devingh Patil has rightly articulated this gain by India by stating in her speech on the occasion of granting Sheikh Hasina the Indira Gandhi prize that Delhi and Dhaka have joined in a “crusade” against terrorism. Whether India “understands” Bangladesh is a different matter and does not seem to have been reflected in the Joint Communiqué clearly. In fact, on trade, India was given negative list by 252 but agreed to only 47. As for Mamata Banarjee's offer that Bangladesh should be given whatever it wanted, the Joint Communiqué has fallen far short of expectations.
In fact, two statements of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina would lead one to conclude that she herself may not have been entirely satisfied with the outcome. Before going on the visit, she “vowed” to get for Bangladesh just share of the waters of the common rivers. None of that happened. The Indians could have relented at least on the Teesta where a lot of progress has been made to suggest to Bangladesh that it is ready to be fair on the sharing of the waters of the other rivers. In fact, if one follows the history of negotiations on water sharing, one should be surprised that the Indians have not brought in the issue of augmentation. In the past, they have always pushed back Bangladesh's demand on water sharing on the issue of lack of water to share and the necessity of augmentation for which they had expressed their intention of linking major rivers, like the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, on their side. This time they sidelined augmentation. Where then would the water come from? The fact that augmentation was not looked at would suggest that the Indian side just went over the water issue knowing that there would be little they would do to meet Bangladesh's needs and interests. What Bangladesh has missed, in the ambiance of the good intent of the Indians, is a historic opportunity of using this visit to bring in a regional approach to the water issue. This visit could have been a historic opportunity of demonstrating political will to seek a sub-regional approach to the water sharing problems of the rivers common to India and Bangladesh. Bangladesh missed it, perhaps unintentionally; India missed it, perhaps, deliberately.
Sheikh Hasina's other statement that could indicate her own assessment on the trip was made at a forum of businessmen. While speaking there, Sheikh Hasina said that India should be generous. One is not sure whether there was a hidden meaning in the statement. But then the Indians have not been generous in relenting on the major demands of Bangladesh related to water sharing, trade and maritime boundary, looking to future negotiations to resolve these issues. In fact, on the maritime boundary, the Indians have put in words in the JC that does not go with the strategy they have shown at the bilateral negotiations that has pushed Bangladesh to go to the United Nations with its case.
From Bangladesh's point of view, Sheikh Hasina has not given to India anything that the opposition could pin on her as selling out Bangladesh's interest. Although in the context of Bangladesh history and national ethos, it is not the correct thing to hand over those who are fighting for their right of self determination as Bangladesh would be doing with Indian insurgents hitherto found inside Bangladesh; it is also something over which the opposition cannot oppose the government publicly given the changed international environment, particularly after 9/11. Sheikh Hasina has also not brought from the trip anything from India on the major contentious issues such as sharing of the waters of the common river; on the maritime boundary; or on trade where the Joint Communiqué is high on hopes but low on delivery. In fact, apart from the US$ 1 billion credit line, India has given Bangladesh promissory notes while Bangladesh has signed on the dotted lines to give India all it wanted on the security issues with the use of the ports as bonus.
The concrete results notwithstanding, Sheikh Hasina has established her qualities of leadership in New Delhi. The award of the Indira Gandhi Prize reflects that. She also has strengthened her close relationship with the Indian leaders, particularly with the Indian Prime Minister and Sonia Gandhi that augurs well for the future. If she had gone to India better prepared and with the opposition on board, her visit could really have been historic but sadly that has not been the case. The visit will open small windows but no major doors.
Published in The Daily Star, January 16, 2010
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