Time to widen the arc of relations

The Abu Dhabi leader as the R-Day guest suggests India’s renewed West Asia focus

The Persian Gulf, and West Asia as a whole, has been seen as holding a fatal attraction for Indian foreign policy. New Delhi has enormous stakes in the region. That Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan is the chief guest for the 68th Republic Day is proof of India’s growing ties with the United Arab Emirates, and, by extension, the Gulf region as a whole. The region is the country’s largest trade and investment partner and the primary source of oil and gas imports. New Delhi encourages the export of labour and import of fossil fuels, but works hard to ensure that West Asia’s poisonous ideologies are not stowaways with the more benign cargo. This is only further complicated by Pakistan, which actively imports the worst that West Asian minds produce — and adds some homegrown hatreds to the brew. Islamabad initially did so as a means to access the wealth of countries like Saudi Arabia. India had, therefore, assumed there was little in the way of strategic convergence between itself and the Gulf states, especially the Sunni monarchies, and shunned such arrangements.

There is now evidence, signalled by the crown prince’s presence and an earlier visit by the then Saudi Arabian monarch 10 years ago that a revisiting of both Gulf and Indian assumptions about each other are afoot. The most important, and least mentioned, development is a growing recognition among some Sunni Arab leaders that their past patronage of radical Islamicist movements has proven a double-edged sword, the worst manifestation being the Islamic State. The United Arab Emirates is at the forefront of this reconsideration with the present ruling faction of the Saudi royal family also struggling to find a reformist path. In addition, uncertainty over the Gulf’s strategic utility to the United States and the rise of India’s economy and energy imports has made the Gulf region come to see New Delhi in a new light. Automatically Pakistan has become devalued in this new regional equation and it is the possibility of engendering a giant regional pivot away from Islamabad to New Delhi that has led India to become so much more proactive in the Gulf.

The actual construction of a new path requires an economic equation that goes beyond workers and crude, a military relationship that at present is largely on paper and, finally, a careful examination of how far each side is prepared to go on promoting the sorts of Islam, such as Sufiism, that have India at their core.

There is a big difference in the way 15th August and 26th January are celebrated. The former is led by the prime minister’s speech from the ramparts of Delhi’s Red Fort while the latter by a grand military parade on Raj Path overseen by the President. Most people accept this difference as merely the artifact of tradition but the ceremonies carry important symbolism. In this column I suggest an innovation that would make the symbolism more appropriate and meaningful.

As all Indians are aware, Republic Day commemorates the date on which the Constitution came into effect. In other words, it is a celebration of the Indian State and the power that resides in it by virtue of the Constitution. The growling Mauryan lions, our State emblem, reflect this power. It is appropriate, therefore, that Republic Day celebrations are led by military parades on Raj Path and that the President, as head of the republic, presides over the event. It is a “topdown” show of strength and the national capital is the obvious place from which the celebrations are led.

Independence Day, in contrast, is a commemoration of the day we became free of British rule. By its very nature, it is a “bottom-up” celebration of freedom and belongs to the people rather than the Indian State. Therefore, the prime minister, as representative of the people, leads the celebrations with a speech. However, note that neither the national capital nor Delhi’s Red Fort have any special place in it beyond tradition. Freedom belongs equally to residents of the smallest village in Meghalaya or Kerala. This is why the symbolic importance of Independence Day would be greatly enhanced if the Prime Minister would deliver his annual speech from a different location every year.

There are many locations across India that have strong historical associations with the idea of freedom. Here are a