The balancing beam in India’s geopolitical gymnasium has got narrower and harder to handle. The resignation of Bangladesh’s leader Sheikh Hasina and her subsequent flight to India from Dhaka, capping a month of unrest and street violence, has injected fresh instability in the South Asian neighbourhood.
Security issues have arisen from the governance vacuum in Bangladesh, including apprehensions of increasing encirclement, adding to India’s existing geopolitical headaches. This is expected to have repercussions on India’s domestic economy as well.
This is the latest addition to a series of tough geopolitical challenges for India which began with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and got muddier with the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Both wars, unnecessary and unending, have adversely affected India’s economy by disrupting established global trade and supply routes, and introducing imported inflation through elevated commodity prices. India has chosen a strategic neutral position, criticizing war but steering clear of condemning Russia.
India’s dependence on Russia for military hardware—and the availability of Russian crude at discount rates—has necessitated this ‘balanced’ response.
New Delhi’s dependence on Tel Aviv for critical aviation technology and crucial intelligence inputs has resulted in the noticeable absence of an official response to Israel’s wanton violence in Gaza.
But this balanced outlook has limited shelf appeal. Threats in the immediate neighbourhood are likely to demand a completely different response from India’s foreign policy desk and security apparatus. Dominos have been falling one after another, with Bangladesh merely the latest casualty.
The chronology of developments in Bangladesh makes for interesting reading. On 13 July, Sheikh Hasina returned from Beijing, cutting short her trip by a day, ostensibly miffed over China’s extension of $100 million in aid against the $5 billion expected. She also reportedly may have felt slighted by the treatment meted out to her.
To make matters worse, she had completed two trips to New Delhi before flying to Beijing. Before travelling to China, Hasina had encouraged a bidding war between India and China for the expansion and modernization of Bangladesh’s Mongla port on Rupsa river and for its operating rights.
Once she got back to Dhaka, media reports claimed India had bagged Mongla port’s operational rights. This followed the 2018 decision to allow India access to both Chittagong and Mongla ports for transporting goods to the Northeast.
An India Today story on her balancing act between India and China had quoted professor Asif Nazrul of Dhaka University as saying, “There will be a point in time when India-Bangladesh and China-Bangladesh relations will come to a head.” The port deal seems to have become that point, with trouble that had been simmering in the background suddenly acquiring critical mass.
On 1 July, students in Bangladesh had gone on protest asking for reforms of the country’s job quota system. So far, so peaceful. On 14 July, a day after Sheikh Hasina returned from Beijing, the protests suddenly changed complexion: they became generalized, acquired a violent streak, and spilled on to the streets.
On 16 July, police firing killed six students, further inflaming protests. India’s Mongla port deal was struck somewhere around 18 July. By 20 July, as protests and violence claimed over 260 lives, military curfew was imposed.
Finally, on 5 August, Sheikh Hasina was forced to resign and flee the country as the military confessed its inability to resist waves of marauding mobs, speculated to be controlled by the Jamaat-e Islami, which is known to be close to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), and, by extension, subject to Beijing’s imprimatur.
Apart from losing an ally in the neighbourhood, India faces other challenges: Bangladesh’s new regime is bound to re-examine all past deals.
So, not only does the Mongla deal now appear in jeopardy, even as India’s access to the Northeast through Mongla and Chittagong stands disrupted, it is also quite likely that the new regime will favour other powers by granting them access to critical Bay of Bengal springboards.
Developments in Bangladesh could be viewed as part of a broader trend in the South Asian jigsaw puzzle. Pakistan, facing near bankruptcy and ear-deep in domestic instability, finally has a government in place.
With elected leader Imran Khan in jail, the Pakistani army—and its cat’s paw, the ISI—has also managed to regain control over the country’s political system.
It is well known that debt-servicing problems have Pakistan over a barrel, forcing Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to hotfoot it to Beijing and make all kinds of security promises to Xi Jinping in return for Chinese largesse, both in terms of restructuring old debt as well as appealing for fresh funds.
Down south, Sri Lanka’s 2022 economic crisis has left it partially vulnerable, though baleful Chinese influence through crippling infrastructure debt seems to have receded momentarily.
Further south in the Indian Ocean, the 2023 elections in the Maldives threw up President Mohammed Muizzu, who has perceptibly increased the distance between Malé and New Delhi. Whether the archipelago will truly get warmer towards China is yet to be seen.
On Indian’s north-eastern borders, the ever-revolving political carousel in Nepal has settled on K.P. Sharma Oli as the prime minister for a fourth time.
Oli is seen as more favourable to Beijing than to New Delhi. Even Bhutan is now seeking to thaw ties with China, ostensibly to reduce security threats and settle pending border disputes.
Clearly, India’s new gymnastics routine will now have to include a new set of somersaults and cartwheels.
