Author: Claude Arpi
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: March 27, 2004
Before India shone, it used to radiate.
But it was another sort of light that it shared with others. The great
rishi, Sri Aurobindo, wrote at the start of the 20th century: "This was
an invasion of peace and not of war, for to spread a spiritual civilisation
by force and physical conquest, the vaunt or the excuse of modern imperialism
would have been uncongenial to the ancient cast of her mind and temperament
and the idea underlying her Dharma." Recently, these words came to mind
when I attended an international seminar on "India and Central Asia, Classical
to Contemporary Period" organised in Delhi by the ICCR and Astha Bharati.
Opening the seminar, Dr Najma Heptullah,
the president of the ICCR, said: "India has had age-old linkages and interactions
with the Central Asian countries. Over the centuries close interaction
of ideas, cultural diffusion and continuous exchange of literature, and
technology, frequent and human migrations (took place)."
Several experts from the newly independent
Central Asian republics were present. Dr BB Kumar, one of main organisers,
emphasised: "India and Central Asia, with common and contiguous borders,
climatic continuity, similar geographical features and geo-cultural affinity,
have long traditions of socio-cultural, political and economic contacts
since remote past... There has been uninterrupted flow of men, material
and ideas between the two." However, it is striking that the geographical
"continuity" between Central Asia and India does not exist anymore. Why
is something that was done 2000 years ago no longer impossible?
First, some of the "natural" roads
leading to Central Asia (through Afghanistan) were severed by the creation
of Pakistan in 1947. Then, two months later, the grabbing by Pakistan of
the eastern parts the State of Jammu and Kashmir followed. Gilgit and Baltistan
were offered to Jinnah's Dominion by a Major Brown, Commandant of the Gilgit
Scouts, who hoisted the Pakistani flag on November 1, 1947, in this strategic
tehsil of Maharaja Hari Singh's state. Brown had certainly the blessings
of his bosses in Karachi as a senior British officer commanding a battalion
specially trained to guard these strategic outposts could not act on its
own, without reference to his hierarchy.
A few years later, one of the greatest
(and mostly unknown) foreign policy blunders was committed by Nehru. During
the first years of the Hindi-Chini Bhai-Bhai policy, he accepted without
protest the shutting down of the Indian consulate in Kashgar. It was a
very ominous decision. The consulate, the gate to Sinkiang, was closed
for the simple reason that Zhou Enlai, the Chinese Premier, did not want
India's ageless link with Central Asia to flourish. At the same time, he
was keen to open Chinese consulates or trade agencies in Calcutta and Bombay.
India could have negotiated the issue and kept the Central Asian road open
in exchange of opening the new trade agencies, but the demands of the machiavellian
Chinese premier were granted without discussion. India lost on all the
fronts.
Nehru had to explain to the Lok
Sabha: "Revolutionary changes took place there (in Sinkiang)... the Chinese
Government, when they came to Tibet, told us that they intended that they
wanted to treat Sinkiang as a closed area..." Acknowledging the "revolutionary
changes", India complied and lost its trading road with Central Asia which
for millennia transited through Kashgar and Yarkand. The severance of India's
ageless relations was accepted as a fait accompli. Nehru also cited "the
developments in Kashmir". It was totally irrelevant since, after summer
of 1948, India controlled the Zoji-la pass and the Ladakh region. The Karakoram
Pass leading to Sinkiang was still open to caravans.
Traditionally, trade and culture
has always followed the same trails. Today, though there is still a great
affinity between the people of India and Central Asia, the physical "continuity"
is absent. As a result, trade has reduced to a minimum and cultural exchanges
are practically non-existent. Is there a remedy?
In 2003, Defence Minister George
Fernandes and External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha visited Uzbekistan.
A year before, Prime Minster Vajpayee went to Almaty in Kazakhstan, but
despite these efforts, problems of access have not been sorted out. The
situation is such that experts thought to get Turkmenistan gas through
a pipeline passing Afghanistan and Pakistan. One can understand that Delhi
is not too warm about this joint project.
China, very dependent on Central
Asian oil and gas, is now planning a railway line from Beijing to Europe
passing through Central Asia. It is doubtful that the Chinese leadership
would allow India's concurrence in the area accept to reopen the traditional
route in the near future.
In case Delhi has a roadmap to solve
the Kashmir issue, the reopening of the route through Gilgit through the
Wakhan corridor is certainly worth considering. When the "core issue" so
dear to General Musharraf comes on the negotiating table, let us hope that
the South Block officials will remember the ancient links between Central
Asia and its strategic importance and will bargain hard. And, after all,
the people of Gilgit and Baltistan are deeply discontented with Islamabad!
