Very rarely does Arunachal Pradesh, one of India’s most beautiful and underdeveloped states, get to be in the national news radar. When it does, it’s mostly thanks to the Chinese army, whose border skirmishes with Indian soldiers prick our territorial nationalism. But who cares about the hardships on the land that we so loudly claim is ours?

Last month I was in Dambuk — an idyllic hamlet in Arunachal Pradesh’s Dibang Valley — for the Orange Festival of Music and Adventure. But the real adventure was the eight-hour road trip from Assam’s Dibrugarh airport to Dambuk.

It included crossing the Brahmaputra on wooden boats with SUVs on board to enter Arunachal Pradesh, and then driving over dry riverbeds that can only be crossed by elephants during monsoon. A ferry and a bus got stuck in the river at night, leading to a dramatic rescue operation of festival participants that continued into the morning.

That morning, then chief minister Nabam Tuki was supposed to visit Dambuk to inaugurate the Orange Festival. He cancelled at the last moment: there were rumours that a political coup was imminent in Itanagar, though the Delhi media mostly ignored the development. A couple of locals warned that with uncertainty in the capital, the terrible infrastructure on display would not improve before next year’s festival.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the McMahon Line in Tibet, China has connected every county in the restive province to its extensive road network. Last year, China Tibet Online reported on the construction of a road to Metok County, the last village in Tibet before the Tsangpo/Brahmaputra enters the Upper Siang district of Arunachal. China also has several civilian airports and military airfields close to the border, as well as a modern railway network. The strategic asymmetry could not be starker.

“I drove on the Kathmandu-Lhasa road, and the Chinese side was fantastic,” said Hari Singh, former national car rally champion, who was part of the Festival’s organising team. He reckoned Arunachal’s border infrastructure is the worst he has seen in many years spent rallying around the world. “But I also noticed how people in Tibet were scared to speak anything about the army. Here you don’t have that fear among locals,” he said.

For all its better infrastructure, Tibet does not have a democratically elected government. Arunachal had one till January 26, 2016 and people of the state were proud of its democracy, if not of those running the government. Every Tibetan I met in the state felt they were better off in India than China, though they would probably be materially more comfortable in Tibet. Even the Indian Army — often the crowd villain in sensitive states — is quite popular in Arunachal Pradesh, and seen as the line of defence against Chinese aggression. India’s freedom trumped its shoddy infrastructure.

Now with President’s rule imposed in the state, India has jeopardised its trump card with the people. The political turmoil and slugfest between the BJP and Congress would bring smiles only in Beijing. The corruption and the leadership vacuum that have hobbled Arunachal for decades have now blown up in our face.

Admittedly, economic development in a state such as Arunachal remains a complicated task. On January 23, for example, hundreds of Buddhist monks protested against plans for a dam in Tawang, only a few kilometres from the Chinese border. The state needed a transparent local government, which could have worked towards infrastructure and economic environment with central assistance. It needed a bipartisan approach to push aside political differences, to work in the national interest and build on the democratic goodwill of the people.

Imposing President’s rule before a test on the floor of the Assembly is a mockery of the democracy that distinguished India from China, and made us a more desirable home for the Arunachalis, despite the many hardships they face in their daily lives. Instead of asking its MLAs to back Congress rebels and destabilise the Tuki government, the BJP leadership could have taken a less partisan approach in this small but sensitive state.

The Congress did not cover itself in glory either. First, it failed to pacify the rebellion brewing against Tuki. And then, faced with the BJP joining hands with the rebels, it delayed the floor test to prevent losing power. The self-serving, cavalier approach of politicians in both Delhi and Itanagar has pushed the state towards the Himalayan precipice, further away from the Indian mainstream.

As journalist Shekhar Gupta asked on Twitter: “Could you have done this if we were UP, Bihar, even Delhi? Some R-Day gift to a tribal state of just 15 lakh tribals, 2 MPs.”

Sambuddha Mitra Mustafi is the founder of The Political Indian; @some_buddha

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