Charting policy through turbulent waters

Carefully, step by step, the policies of the present government in India are focused on removing blocks to exports from India.

- M.D. NALAPAT

After the newly elected President of Sri Lanka made his first overseas visit to India and thereby stood by traditional Sri Lankan diplomacy, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will repay the gesture by being the first foreign leader to visit Sri Lanka since the new dispensation took over in Colombo. More than successes, it is failures that contain lessons for policymakers; the economic effects of relying on China have become obvious to the common citizens of Sri Lanka, Nepal and most recently Bangladesh. In contrast, close relations with India have resulted in economically beneficial outcomes.

The collapse of SAARC as a functioning organisation as a consequence of the machinations of the Pakistan army contains lessons for the leaders who gathered in Bangkok for the 6th BIMSTEC Summit. The dismal trajectory of Pakistan has become a regional cautionary tale, as the growing mayhem in what was once a prospering country is making the life of citizens more and more difficult. The very mention of the joint operation of the Mukti Bahini and the Armed Forces of the Republic of India in 1971 may have been expunged for the moment from college textbooks. The reality of that military operation, which resulted in the rout of the Pakistan army that had soaked its hands in the blood of many millions of innocent Bengalis, cannot be covered up by doctored history. There was an ethnic, indeed a racial, arrogance in the way in which Chief Martial Law Administrator General Tikka Khan in Rawalpindi ordered his forces to run amok in what was then East Pakistan.