According to media reports, the first destination of the new Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang in the itinerary of foreign visits now being worked out will be India, and that too as early as in May. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is slated to visit Japan during the same month, and Li apparently would like to meet Singh before the Japanese visit.

Can it be that Li wants to send through Singh feelers to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on lessening the tension and friction that have characterised relations between China and Japan over the islands in the East China Sea?

China watchers will, however, dismiss this as speculation since it is not known in the past to have invoked the help of a third country in the resolution of its disputes. On the other hand, one cannot entirely rule out the new leadership in China wanting to try new approaches towards a mutually cooperative and harmonious bonding in this part of Asia.

BASTION AND BULWARK

There can be no doubt that the Chinese ruling establishment had always been under a compulsive urge to somehow neutralise the designs of the US and its allies among industrial nations which continue to pursue their fixations with containment, balance of power, divide-and-rule and the like. It has also nurtured a fear that the US is out to undermine its efforts to establish for itself a position of dominance, if not of leadership, in the region.

What stronger bastion and bulwark against such designs can there be than that of a dynamic strategy of forging closer ties with India, whereby the two of them become a new centre of gravity of the world political and economic order and the flywheel of progress and prosperity?

Hints to this effect from the Chinese side have been there for some time. The most explicit expression was given to them by an editorial in the China Daily in December, prefacing it with the astonishing remark that the boundary question is ‘just a tiny part’ of China-India relations.

It emphatically asserted that the two countries are not competitive rivals, but cooperative partners, and that their differences count for nothing before the convergence of their interests. Calling them “emerging powers in Asia”, it pointed out how they were vitally important players in respect of global issues such as world economic recovery and climate change, and how they could have a lasting impact on peace, security and cooperation in the region and beyond.

The new Chinese President too reiterated the same sentiments when Manmohan Singh conveyed his congratulations and best wishes to him.

GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY

But India had always been guarded in acting on these hints. It has been leery of adopting a forward policy in conjunction with China or even in asserting the role of a regional power devolving on it by virtue of geopolitical factors.

In fact, it has not implemented even such a simple decision as the establishment of a hot line between the leaders of the two countries, taken as far back as February 2010 at the level of Prime Ministers.

There are many hang-ups dampening India’s enthusiasm for China’s call to join it to form the political and economic pivot of Asia.

First, of course, is the memory that still rankles of the humiliation it suffered in 1962 at the hands of China. Second is China’s belligerent and intolerant attitude when it comes to what it unilaterally proclaims as its ‘core interests’. Next is the uneven record of organisations such as ASEAN, SAARC, SCO and APEC. Fourth is India’s unwillingness to incur the displeasure of the US and other industrial countries by being overly receptive to Chinese overtures. And finally, the lingering influence of shades of non-alignment on India’s behaviour and conduct.

It is time to put them behind. It will most certainly be to the mutual benefit of both countries to make the impending visit of Li the occasion to effect a turnaround by discarding the old inhibitions and complexes bedevilling their relations.

Here is a golden opportunity for the two Prime Ministers to show determination and courage in arriving at a breakthrough in the festering border dispute, instead of subjecting it to the charade of countless rounds of talks at the level of timid and puny officials.

They should likewise decide on brave, new moves to promote mutual trust, economic cooperation, people-to-people cultural and social exchanges and cooperation in all spheres.

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