Multiple conversations in Delhi

JYOTI MALHOTRA
Gulf News, Dubai, March 2007

India’s been at the heart of multiple conversations over the weekend, reclaiming the space that it had seemingly relinquished over the last decade, of being a melting pot of ideas, a crossroads between civilizations.

Just as the plane carrying the former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami took off from Delhi, another carrying Pakistan’s former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was touching down. Somewhere in between, a team of US negotiators was settling down in the capital, preparing to start discussions on the bilateral nuclear energy agreement with India.

Perhaps New Delhi, too, having upset the foreign policy applecart with a vengeance since it went overtly nuclear in May 1998, also thought it was time to reach out and shake hands with those it had offended in the recent past, such as Iran. What better way to do so than to give Khatami a visa to attend a media conference in the Indian capital, especially since the Iranian leader had an innate gift for nuances?

Not for one moment did Khatami disappoint his Indian audience. At a public meeting at the Indian Council for World Affairs, a Foreign Office think-tank, Khatami smiled sweetly and spoke firmly. He told us that the Gulf and Middle East was in such a state of perpetual ferment because of the artificial crises imposed from the outside from the western superpower, but he also admitted to ``the enemy within’’ the region.

The people of Iran, Khatami said, must shed its nostalgia for their ancient civilisation, and meet half-way the enlightened western world, which also had to be complimented for the vast strides it had made in so many areas.

Then came the sting in the tail : India, he said, hardly had any right to be critical of Iran’s nuclear programme, along with the US, because India was not even a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

When it was pointed out to him that India, indeed, had never been a signatory to the NPT, while Iran, as a member, was violating NPT tenets, Khatami laughed his disarming laugh. ``It was the Shah,’’ he said, ``who had signed the NPT,’’ then added quickly, ``but I am not saying that Iran is withdrawing from it.’’

Only a few years ago, a prickly India would have reacted negatively and shrilly to outside criticism. This time, though, New Delhi let it ride.

Truth is, New Delhi’s newfound confidence stems from the fact that India knows the world knows that America – the great superpower, or the great Satan, call it what you will – is doing a special deal with India that allows New Delhi to join that exclusive, rarefied high table of big powers.

To be sure, India needs to get its act together in many more ways than one if it is to truly behave like a regional power. Better relations with Pakistan to be sure, but also with Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka.

This ability to play multiple relations at the same time, that once came so naturally to India – constantly at the crossroads of empires, waxing and waning with new ideas, new religions, new power equations – is still a bit rusty, although Benazir Bhutto’s presence in the Indian capital showed, that India, was still susceptible to what the Americans have to say about Pakistan.

So why had Benazir been invited to India anyway? Especially at this exact time, when Pakistan’s lawyers were continuing their agitation to embarrass Musharraf. Perhaps, New Delhi was beginning to feel that it wasn’t politically right to put all its eggs in the Musharraf basket. Or, was Benazir, allegedly and recently split from her husband, and thereby ready to reclaim the Bhutto legacy, merely a decoy for India to secretly pursue conversations with Pakistan’s national security adviser Tariq Aziz?

Whatever the truth on that front, fact is that India and the US are certainly holding on to their tight, bilateral embrace. Despite many a perceived hiccup, for eg on the Iran front, negotiators from both nations are poring over documents that will allow New Delhi to become a favoured nuclear partner with America.

The challenges are so many, that it would be easy to lose count. India would like the US to make a signal exception to the fact that it be allowed to reprocess all the spent fuel that is produced by a nuclear reactor. Evidently, the US has only does so with 2-3 other nations, such as Japan and Switzerland, but on the condition that those nuclear programmes will have very intrusive inspections.

At the moment, New Delhi would like to have its nuclear cake and eat it too. Will the US, greatly weakened in Iraq, agree? Believe it or not, but the answer to this also lies in other relations India can leverage on the Indo-US table, for eg with Iran.

If India can show to the US, that a nuclear deal benefits Washington as much as it does New Delhi, much would fall into place. If the US allows itself to look at the world through multiple prisms, and not the straight and narrow the neocons are accustomed to, India would be an equal, not a junior partner.

Hopefully, all these multiple conversations over the weekend have sown the seeds for a multicolour garden, that allows a hundred flowers to bloom.

ENDS