Defining moments

N. RAM

THE targeting of China as a potential security 'threat' prior to the Pokhran nuclear explosions by Defence Minister George Fernandes, and in officially provocative and unfriendly terms after the tests by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in his letter to President Bill Clinton, has dealt a serious blow to the post-1988 process of normalising, improving and developing Sino-Indian relations.

Years of plodding effort to bring a semblance of normalcy to a relationship which had turned first sour, then bitter and finally been ruptured in 1962 culminated in Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's path-breaking visit to China in December 1988. Mao Zedong's famous smile and handshake, his 1970 instruction that China should work for the improvement of relations with India, Ambassador K.R. Narayanan's restorative and forward-looking work in China during 1976-78, and some other developments in intenational affairs prepared the ground for normalisation. External Affairs Minister Vajpayee's visit to China in February 1979 represented a significant political effort to move in the direction of normalisation, although its results were largely neutralised by China's short-lived military move into Vietnam. I was part of the accompanying media team in 1979 as well as in 1988.

In reality, India and China have met somewhere halfway between their positions on how to normalise. China's approach to border issues between, say, China and India is that these are (in the words of Premier Zhou Enlai) problems "left over by history," which can be resolved on the basis of "equal consultation, mutual understanding and mutual accommodation." Under the influence of Deng Xiaoping, China's official policy is to solve territorial and marine rights disputes with neighbouring countries "through consultation by putting the interests of the whole above everything else, so that the disputes will not hamper the normal development of state relations or the stability of the region" (to quote from the recently released "White Paper on China's National Defence"). The Indian Government, which had earlier insisted, as a precondition for normalisation, on China vacating territory it claimed as non-negotiably Indian, has actually moved closer to the Chinese position. A via media was struck during the Rajiv Gandhi visit by the two sides agreeing simultaneously to normalise and develop bilateral relations all round and try to resolve the boundary dispute, while ruling out the use of force to change the status quo along the Line of Actual Control (LAC).

Some political high moments in this process which I witnessed as a journalist:
On February 14, 1979, the new Chinese helmsman, Deng Xiaoping (yet to shake free of Hua Guofeng, the formal leader at that point of the Communist Party of China), proposed to Vajpayee in the Great Hall of the People: "We do have some issues on which we are far apart. We should put those on the side for the moment and do some actual work to improve the climate to go about the problem. Our two countries are the two most populous countries in the world, and we are both Asian countries. How can we not be friends?"

Recalling the Zhou Enlai-Jawaharlal Nehru visits of 1954, Deng regretted the "unfortunate period" which set back relations: "In 1970 our Chairman Mao said we should work for improvement of relations with India. The process was delayed because of certain factors on your side and internal factors on our side also. The 'Gang of Four' was running wild then and there was not enough stability in China. Now we can brook no further delay. We should speed up our relations."

I also witnessed on December 21, 1988, in the Great Hall of the People, the public moments of the Deng-Rajiv meeting:

Deng: "Welcome, so welcome my young friend. Starting with your visit, we will restore our relations as friends. We will be friends between the leaders of the two countries. The countries will become friends. The people will become friends. Do you agree with me?"

Deng: "So in 1954, when your grandfather, the late Prime Minister Nehru visited China, I was also one of the leaders in China. I was Vice-Premier at that time. At that time, the relations between our two countries were very good."

N. RAM
Helmsman Deng Xiaoping greets Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, December 21, 1988.

Rajiv: "Yes. We have been through a few difficulties in between. I hope we can bring things back and get over these difficulties."

Deng: "So this is our common wish. In the considerable period of time in between, there was unpleasantness at each other. Let's forget it. We should look forward."

Rajiv: "There's so much work to do in both countries."

Deng: "...The genuine start of the improvement of our relations is your visit."

The decision in December 1988 to set up a Joint Working Group (JWG), with the twin function of ensuring peace and tranquillity in the border areas and making concrete recommendations for an overall solution of the boundary question within a definite time frame, was the creative, breakthrough event. In December 1991, Premier Li Peng paid a return visit to India; the communique concluding the visit reiterated the mutual commitment to maintain peace and tranquillity along the LAC.

Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao's visit to China in September 1993 saw the conclusion of the agreement on Maintenance of Peace and Tranquillity along the Line of Actual Control. President Jiang Zemin's visit to India in November-December 1996 saw a major consolidation of this progress.

The highlight of the visit was the signing of the Agreement on Confidence Building Measures in the Military Field along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas. There were other agreements relating to maritime transport, cooperation in combating narcotic drug trafficking, and maintaining the Consulate-General of India in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China.

The high-level political exchanges were supplemented by the exchange of friendly military visits at the top level. In 1994, General B.C. Joshi became the first Indian Chief of Army Staff to visit China. Following an invitation from General V.P. Malik, extended during his October 1997 visit to China as Vice-Chief of the Army Staff, General Fu Quanyou, Chief of General Staff of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) led a five-member military delegation to India in April 1998.

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