Lake Placid

Key changes in the South Block shaped the Wuhan summit’s vision of cooperation

- Pranay Sharma

A correlation between the departure of one of India’s longest serving foreign secretaries, S. Jaishankar, and a visible improvement in Sino-Indian relations is likely to be seen as a tenuous argument meriting an out-right dismissal from seasoned Indian diplomats.Yet, sections within and beyond the Indian foreign policy establishment are joining the dots and linking recent developments in South Block with those in the outside world, seeking to explain the informal April-end summit between Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping in Wuhan.

The unique dialogue between the leaders has raised hope that this could remove bilateral strains and bring the two nations closer for a more cooperative and realistic partnership. As both were looking for steps towards a rapprochement in a post-Doklam scenario, some global developments, perceived to be significant for both countries, might have played a role in hastening a thaw. A change of guards at South Block, with Vijay Gokhale, an old China hand, taking over as foreign secretary, along with two other seasoned China experts—Gautam Bambawale as Indian ambassador in Beijing and Pranay Verma, as joint secretary East Asia in the MEA—certainly made a different approach to China more visible.

Good relations or frosty, India expects the ‘red lines’ over its key security concerns to be respected by Beijing. But a fundamental principle now adopted by New Delhi is to avoid unnecessary confrontations with China, especially those where costs outstrip returns. The so-called ‘Tibet card’ is a prime example. Despite the hype that usually goes with the idea, its potential leverage value has been uncertain. This was perhaps the reason why Gokhale had advised scaling down all programmes to celebrate the completion of the Dalai Lama’s 60 years of exile in India, since Beijing always saw these as part of New Delhi’s plan to destabilise it by using the Tibetan leader.