Why does India not have a Geneva game-plan?

by Kumar David

Why is there uncertainty, even at this late stage, about the stand India will take on the Human Rights resolution on Sri Lanka’s long ended civil war and overlapping allegations that the current regime harbours authoritarian ambitions? India’s silence is both curious and significant. There are three substantive players in the game in Geneva. Team 1 is the core group (UK, Canada, Germany and three other ninnies) supported by the new US Administration; they work as a unit. Team 2 is China; the only other important team member is Russia. Team 3 is India and India alone, an important outlier. Everyone else (there are 47 voting members on the Council) is small change led by the nose by one or other of the big teams and this goes for the Muslim states and Pakistan. America-Europe or China, Teams 1 or 2, will tell them what to do, and these nobodies will docilely follow – give or take some mild concern among Muslim states about the plight of fellow Sri Lankan Sons of the Prophet. The caveat is that if Team 3 (India) takes a strong position one way for the other it will swing five-plus votes which will be a deciding factor on whether Sri Lanka is treated harshly.

The motivations of Team 1 and Team 2 are known and consist of an international and a domestic concern. The international or strategic aspect has been much commented on. China’s concern in a safe maritime concourse in the East China Sea, Straits of Malacca and the Indian Ocean. Friendly states and harbours along the way are much prized. Team 1, behind which stands the Quad (US, Australia, Japan and New Zealand) has an interest in blocking China’s upswing. All this you read in the newspapers daily. Then there is the domestic imperative. Team 1 and the West has a popular ethos of democratic and human rights in public spaces – whether deemed bogus or not, it exists as a political force. If a British or an American government seems soft on human rights – Burma, Sri Lanka, Belarus etc. – the domestic opposition (Labour, Republicans, Churches and NGOs) will go to town. The unpopularity and setback will be substantial. China too has its internal dimension. Its chorus is “Non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries” which says: You slaughter your Rohingyas or Tamils, or whatever, and leave us free to do likewise to our Uyghurs. This is crudely stated, but that’s the essence of it. The motivations of Team 1 & 2 are therefore transparent, their behaviour is predictable.

But India is an enigma. Why so undecided even so late with only two weeks to go to the vote? What is the Indian Government weighing up that makes it so flatfooted? Not a single reputed commentator has stuck his neck out and said confidently “This is what India will do”. I too will make no predictions as it is abundantly clear that Narendra Modi and GoI are themselves clueless which way they are pointing. The fears that have got India flatfooted in order of importance are as follows.

a)

India needs to mull the China factor judiciously. If the Lankan regime cosies up to China too much, such as allowing Chinese bases, it will be punished, but how does punishing Lanka benefit India? It’s better to balance the cards and avoid a showdown.

b)

India does not want to beat the Double-Rajapaksa regime over the head with a big stick, nor does it wish to starve Lanka and be seen as a bully. This is not 1983, the military-political crisis is not even remotely as critical. Rightly, the big stick has been put away.

c)

There is concern in the BJP about Tamil Nadu and worry of an anti-BJP electoral backlash among Tamils in India if their brethren in the Island are let down.

The only good Muslim in the Hindutva-Bible is a dead Muslim but Lanka’s less than two million Muslims are too insignificantly small for Modi and the BJP to worry about. What I am saying is that the BJP’s and the Lankan Gotabaya Executive’s shared hatred is unlikely to be a factor in GoI decision making. Some commentators draw have drawn attention to this shared prejudice but I don’t think it will be a factor in Modi’s decision making on the UNHRC issue.

Finally in this Geneva Season: Though the LTTE, and 30 years ago the JVP were terrorist, a clear distinction must be made between the following categories: Deaths in armed encounters, persons belonging to these outfits who are taken prisoner or arrested outside the conflict zone, and thirdly of course civilian. Under no condition can killing, torture or beating of prisoners, arrestees or civilians EVER be justified. The Lankan police and military, the LTTE, and briefly the JVP in 1989, are guilty of these crimes. Now even former minister Patali Champika (PC) seems to concede that there is a blithering, blooming imbroglio that needs fresh thinking – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giurcb7RsXc&t=1s in Sinhala.

I doubt if the Double-Rajapaksa government, as a unit, has the flexibility to think out of the box like PC. Though I don’t agree with some of what he says, he does concede that a fresh approach is timely. Sinhala-Buddhists are numerically a huge majority, but the remaining 30% won’t accept inflexible single-community hegemony. But there is room for a new deal and for accountability. If PC can be flexible, why not the smarter than Gotha fox Mahinda, be more flexible? India, to be helpful, must exploit these opportunities.