Trade, travel and border talks see progress ahead of SCO summit
US President Donald Trump might fancy himself for being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for playing a role in pausing or ending six to seven conflicts around the world. A clinching argument in his favour could be that he may even have brought peace in inducing an India-China thaw since it is his use of punitive tariffs that may be driving India to look north.
India-US ties may be compromised by the tariff tantrums, but the contretemps could lead to wider consequences as anti- India and Indians feelings seems to be spreading now with MAGA loyalists taking aim at the H-1B visas that thousands of skilled Indian IT workers use as the route to jobs in America.
So much has global geopolitics changed since the advent of Trump 2.0 that India is disregarding Chinese support to Pakistan in recent military skirmishes to actively pursue a resetting of ties, including in a broader look at trade with China as in agreeing to open three designated trading posts on the frontier even though de-escalation on the border remains only a topic of deep discussion more than action.
The ball has been set rolling in most other spheres with positive decisions to resume direct flights, which China has desired for long, facilitating visas to tourists, businesses and media, sustaining spiritual tourism among Indians to Tibetan places like Mount Kaliash and Lake Manasarovar, which opened to them this summer, and creating three new mechanisms on managing border issues.
It is significant in this regard that China has also moved towards removing irritants in export of rare earth minerals, fertilisers and tunnel boring equipment needed for the Bullet Train project in western India. And India may respond by easing some of the strict scrutiny on FDI proposals that inhibit investments from countries which have land borders with the country.
The warmth with which the Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi was received in New Delhi is a clear pointer to what can be expected in Tianjin even as his New Delhi visit went beyond the optics with positive changes promised from China to ease supply chain pressures amid the current uncertainties in the global trading order.
All the signs are pointing to a positive push to mend relations with China five years after troops were pushing each other in the Galwan Valley. The coming meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with President Xi Jinping of China and President Vladimir Putin of Russia at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Tianjin, China, this month-end should give further impetus to the rungs below to remove many other irritants that have built up over the years.
There is an equally sympathetic response to India’s current trade dilemma after Trump took aim only at India, ostensibly “for profiting from refining and exporting discounted Russian oil”, with Moscow now promising to look at taking more goods even as it expects India to sustain the oil purchases for its own domestic consumption against rising needs in energy.
Finding the balance between India’s longer term strategic ties to the US and its military dependence on Russian weapons while also resetting ties with China is going to be challenging. But so long as the idea has sunk in that Trump’s America is going to be unpredictable in its approach, national compulsions require India to look further afield to secure its own security and employ its freedom to trade with anyone to best serve its own interests.
