Free Coaching cum Residential.

The Government of India started a residential coaching scheme for minority students towards effecting a radical improvement in their employment and representation in government and industry — one of the objectives laid down in the Sachar Committee report on improving the state of minorities.
The Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry will soon roll out an ambitious scheme that envisages coaching for all government examinations — from Civil Services to state-level examinations — for minority students selected after an all-India merit test.

The aim is to prepare the students of under-privileged category for entry into civil services. The centre would have facility of computer, LCD projectors and library among others. About 100 students have been selected for specialised training 

@ CC&CP , Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi
@ JH-RCA , Jamia(University) Hamdard, New Delhi
@ Hamdard Study Circle (HSC), New Delhi

@ RCA , Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh

@ Ambedkar University, Lucknow
@ Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad
@ Haj Committee of India, Mumbai

@ Zakat Foundation of India (ZFI) Fellowship, New Delhi

@ Career Plus, New Delhi

Not just pension (PFRDA)

Not just pension

Lok Sabha passing the PFRDA bill is good news. But if government means business, there's more to be done.

After a delay of nearly a decade, the Lok Sabha passed the pension bill on Wednesday. That the bill could finally go through is a heartening signal from Parliament.

In terms of implementation, through a network of sophisticated legal contracts, P. Chidambaram had already implemented the decision of the Vajpayee-led NDA government to build the New Pension System (NPS) — it applies for all new recruits to government January 2004 onwards.

The delay in the PFRDA Bill, therefore, did not hinder the building of the NPS. With the act in hand, it will be possible to merge the two strands of the NPS (civil servants and the unorganised sector) into a single system with portability.

Modern investment regulation will become possible. The PFRDA will have explicit regulatory and supervisory authority on the NPS.

The ministry of finance must now recruit a high quality team for the PFRDA and work towards the full-blown NPS, as originally envisaged by the Project OASIS report in 2000.

The NPS is now shaping up as a large pension system by world standards.

It features some of the lowest costs in the world for fund management and record keeping, thanks to the sound foundations right from the outset — with centralised record keeping at the National Securities Depository Limited and procurement of fund managers through auction.

While mutual funds and insurance companies have been beset by scandals in consumer protection, the design of the NPS, from the start, incorporated a sophisticated treatment of such imperatives.

Every employee of a private firm must be given the choice of walking out of the clutches of the EPFO, and shifting to the NPS.

The PFRDA Bill had become a symbol of the inability of the UPA 1 and UPA 2 administrations to carry through the simplest of policy projects — even one that had been initiated by the NDA administration.

Now, the UPA government must vigorously push on with the legislative agenda.

To make up for 10 years of stalling and decay, there is no time to lose.

Of prime importance are four big projects:

1)      the goods and services tax,

2)     the direct tax code,

3)     the Unique Identification Authority of India and

4)     the Indian financial code.

All are at a mature stage, draft bills already in hand. It should be possible to enact some of these laws in these last few months of the UPA's term.

Losing ground to Big Pharma, bit by BIT

India needs to revisit its bilateral investment treaties programme to ensure that multilateral gains on patents are not lost

Desperate to finance the high Current Account Deficit (CAD), India has approved seven proposals for brownfield FDI (foreign investment in existing companies) in the pharmaceutical sector.

Under the extant regulatory framework, 100 per cent FDI in the pharma sector is allowed through the automatic route in new projects (greenfield investments) but brownfield investments require the approval of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB).

Given the critical linkages of the pharmaceutical sector with public health, this piece seeks to highlight the need for caution in approving FDI in the pharma sector in the light of India’s international commitments under Bilateral Investment Treaties (BIT).

Gains

International commitments on intellectual property rights especially patents have always been a sensitive issue especially in the context of the pharmaceutical sector.

While one side of the debate argues that stronger patent protection incentivises innovation, the other side has argued that a strong patent regime results in a monopolisation of production of essential medicines, accompanying high prices, and consequent exclusion of large sections of the population from essential medicines.

This tension was best depicted in the troubled negotiations that led to the adoption of the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The agreement brings the protection of intellectual property within the multilateral framework of trade rules established by the WTO.

In these negotiations, while the developed nations wished to keep to a minimum government interference with intellectual property, including the interference through compulsory licensing (authorising a third party to produce the patented drug), developing nations tried to preserve their regulatory freedom.

A compromise is embodied in Article 31 of TRIPS, which allows countries to issue compulsory licences on patented drugs.

While this provision does not lay down the grounds on which compulsory licences may be issued, it provides certain procedural safeguards and requires payment of “adequate remuneration” to the patent holder.

Indian patent law

Even after the agreement entered into force on January 1, 1995, certain concerns remained, which were sought to be addressed by the Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health.

The declaration reiterated the commitment of WTO countries not to sacrifice public health at the altar of patent protection.

It clarified the sovereign right of individual countries to decide for themselves the circumstances warranting issuance of compulsory licenses.

Making use of the flexibilities in TRIPS, the Indian patent law has made an attempt to balance the need for patent protection of pharmaceutical drugs with the public interest of access to medicines.

Thus, while it allows patenting of pharmaceutical inventions, it does not allow ever greening of patented drugs by prohibiting patents on “the mere discovery of a new form of a known substance.”

Further, it also allows for the grant of compulsory licences at any time after three years from the sealing of a patent.

The requirement to wait for three years is waived in cases of national emergency or extreme urgency.

Patents can also be revoked in public interest.

Relying on this balanced statutory framework for patent protection, India issued compulsory licence on German drug major Bayer AG’s cancer drug Nexaver in March 2012.

Also, the Supreme Court in Novartis A.G. v. Union of India upheld the rejection of a patent application by Novartis, a Swiss pharma major, to patent a new version of the anti-leukaemia drug Glivec.

Conceding bilaterally

However, the gains that India got multilaterally on patents and public health may be lost bilaterally through BITs.

BITs are treaties aimed at protecting foreign investment.

These treaties allow foreign investors to bring cases, in front of three privately appointed arbitrators; against host states challenging the latter’s sovereign regulatory measures. This is known as investment treaty arbitration (ITA).

India has entered into BITs with 86 countries out of which 73 have already come into force. This includes almost all the major European countries like the United Kingdom, Germany and Switzerland.

Further, in recent times, many foreign corporations — from global telecom giants to hedge funds — have issued ITA notices to India for alleged BIT breaches.

Most Indian BITs define investment broadly to include intellectual property like patents. This gives an ITA tribunal jurisdiction over regulatory actions of India that impact the intellectual property like a patent held by a foreign pharmaceutical company.

Indian BITs protect “investments” from expropriation. The term “expropriation” is defined in Indian BITs to include direct taking of an asset by the government as well as all other measures having the effect of “direct taking” that deprive the investor of an asset or its use.

Typically, Indian BITs permit expropriation only for a public purpose, in a non-discriminatory manner and against compensation. Often, the expression “compensation” is qualified by adjectives like “prompt,” “effective,” “fair,” and “full,” with a requirement to pay interest on compensation.

This makes the compensation requirement in BITs much more stringent than the “adequate remuneration” requirement mandated by the TRIPS agreement for issuance of compulsory licence.

Since patents fall within the definition of “investment,” its “taking” by way of compulsory licensing or its revocation would trigger the expropriation provisions in Indian BITs.

This would give a privately-appointed arbitral tribunal an opportunity to decide whether sovereign measures like issuance of compulsory licence or revocation of patents is legal or not.

Further, to bring this international claim, the foreign investor is not required to exhaust local remedies or get the approval of her government.

In this regard, it is important to derive warning signals from the service of an ITA notice, under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), by Eli Lilly and Company, a U.S.-based corporation, against Canada for invalidating two of its pharmaceutical patents.

Consequently, nothing stops Bayer and Novartis from initiating international law proceedings against India under India’s BITs with Germany and Switzerland.

To add to the worries, the proposed India-U.S. BIT is back in the news and progress is expected on that front during the meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Obama in late September.

Apart from the protection already enjoyed by pharma firms under the WTO, a BIT with the U.S. will grant additional protection to the patent rights of American pharma companies in India.

Thus, it is imperative that India revisits its BIT programme to ensure that multilateral gains on patents and public health are not lost bilaterally.

The silent emergency (on falling child sex ratios.)

The silent emergency

Government, civil society need to urgently address falling child sex ratios.

Preliminary findings after a whole year of campaigning on the falling child sex ratio (CSR), by 200 NGOs across 23 states, indicate that we have only skimmed the surface of this silent emergency. These NGOs had gathered under the National Foundation for India last year to deal with the problem. Findings show the implementation of the Pre Conception and Pre Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act continues to be poor, and the nexus between clinics, doctors and the political class is proving difficult to break.

While patriarchy continues to be the underlying cause for the problem, advances in technology have made sex selection easier for those wanting sons.

Mobile ultrasound machines have made their way into remote districts and it is now possible to determine the sex of the foetus through blood and urine tests. A year of campaigning revealed not just a "son preference" but also a "daughter aversion".

In 2011, alarm bells went off when the census revealed that the CSR for children from the age group of 0-6 years had plummeted to 919 girls to 1,000 boys, from 927 girls to 1,000 boys in 2001.

Except for Chhattisgarh and a few states of the Northeast, the entire country was in trouble.

The trend of eliminating girls spanned across class, caste, ethnic and religious lines. The situation was more disturbing in urban areas but even in rural areas, prosperity was leading to a fall in the CSR.

Both in 2001 and in 2011, the states that fared the worst in the north were Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan, Punjab and Chandigarh.

According to civil society representatives, there was little seriousness in implementing the PCPNDT Act. While Rajasthan has filed the maximum number of cases under the PCPNDT Act — more than 500 cases since 2009 — Delhi has reported only 62 cases, J&K one case and Himachal Pradesh, none. In Punjab and Haryana, more than 100 cases were filed under the act. In UP and Bihar, 108 and 126 cases, respectively, have been filed. The number of convictions, if any, is very low.

As Satish Agnihotri, an IAS officer who has worked extensively on the issue, pointed out, different regions had different weak links. In some areas, the appropriate authority for implementing the PCPNDT Act has not been formed, in other areas, it has been formed but is not working properly.

Identifying the weak links of each region is as vital as a sustained campaign to bring back the balance in the CSR.

There has also been some excellent work in different areas and these best practices need to be replicated and shared with the bigger movement.

In the Ganganagar district of Rajasthan, the Chamber of Commerce joined forces with the Gurudwara Committee to facilitate education for girls. This is in partnership with the Let Girls Be Born Campaign, run by NGOs Plan India and Urmul Setu. Local panchayats are celebrating the birth of girls and several families have come forward to adopt girls from families that feel they cannot afford to support more than one daughter.

In many states, a larger female workforce has shown an improved sex ratio. So there is a need to focus on education and employment for women.

However, in Kerala, which has the highest literacy rate in the country, the CSR is declining.

In India, the medical termination of pregnancy was legalised in 1971.

Women, quite rightly, don't want to lose out on this right, which gives them control over their bodies.

But people seem unable to distinguish between safe abortion, which is legal, and sex selective elimination, which is illegal. In the north, a pro-life group is adding to the misunderstanding and confusion on the two issues.

Another problem that calls for attention is violence against women, which is aggravated when the woman is unable to produce a male child.

The existing laws need to be strengthened through implementation. It is equally important to educate medical professionals on the ethics of medical practice.

Working with faith-based organisations may help because they lay the cultural foundations of society.

But campaigners feel that collaboration with religious groups "is a double-edged weapon".

Meanwhile, the ministry of women and child development has identified 100 districts with a poor CSR and drawn up an action plan.

As a first step, the collectors of these districts and some civil society organisations have been called upon to launch a mission to save the girl child.

At the national level, the ministry will work closely with the information and broadcasting ministry and others to create a fund for a media campaign on the declining CSR.

Only the joint efforts of government and civil society organisations can reverse this bleak trend.

Justice and the juvenile

Justice and the juvenile

Calls to dilute the Juvenile Justice Act in light of what is perceived as lenient punishment to the juvenile offender in the Delhi gang rape case are understandable but misplaced.

The crime shook the country’s conscience, brought forth an unprecedented outpouring of anger and triggered collective introspection on the safety of women and girls. But even though there is a view that the young perpetrator has been able to get away lightly, this is not reason enough to question or do away with the principles underlying juvenile justice.

Separate legislation has existed in many countries around the world since the early 20th century for the care and protection of children, including child offenders.

The present system in India was introduced by a 1986 Act and improved upon in 2000.

The JJ Act, 2000, a progressive legislation, replaced the regular judicial process with a reformatory regime, favouring supervised probation or stay in an observation home over imprisonment. The law tries to reform a young offender’s conduct rather than confine him for decades in a prison with adult criminals, which only works to fan recidivist tendencies.

While refusing to allow the Delhi gang rape juvenile offender to be tried as an adult, the Supreme Court pointed out in its order that underage crime still forms only a tiny percentage of the large body of crime in the country.

However, merely going through a differential process for juvenile offenders is not enough. It is obvious that the social contract underlying a lenient regime requires equal attention to be paid to the design and implementation of a proper rehabilitation process.

Society will only countenance shielding young offenders guilty of great brutality from the rigours of adult justice if it is confident that they will indeed benefit from the rehabilitative approach to juvenile justice.

In India, we need to guard against the complacent belief that a stint in a remand home is enough for their rehabilitation.

The atmosphere in many such facilities is not conducive for reformation, and in fact may toughen or entrench criminal propensities.

The system should not end up creating a new underclass that combines a sense of triumph over avoiding a prison term after committing heinous crimes, with the psychological effects of staying under bleak, hope-denying conditions.

Making juvenile correctional facilities more humane is one part of the answer.

But to address the need for proportionality — not so much in punishment as in the necessity of socio-psychological repair — when a young offender commits truly heinous crimes, a longer period of sustained counselling and rehabilitation ought to be an essential part of the juvenile justice process even after the maximum period of remand is over.

Intelligent security

Intelligent security

Aaron Mannes, R.K. Raghavan, Animesh Roul and V.S. Subrahmanian

High-profile arrests of Tunda and Bhatkal tell the story of how India's security apparatus is getting better at border control and intelligence operations. There is a lot more to be done.

On August 29, Indian security teams scored a major victory in their fight against terrorism when they captured Yasin Bhatkal, one of the leaders of the Indian Mujahideen, a formidable terrorist group that derives its inspiration from across the border, specifically the Lashkar-e-Toiba and Pakistan's ever-mischievous Inter-Services Intelligence. Although we don't have all the facts, it is logical to speculate that Bhatkal's nabbing was a triumph of coordination between Indian and Nepalese agencies, and between R&AW, the IB and the NIA. It augurs well for the future fight against terrorists, both foreign and homegrown. The relationship is bound to have its ups and downs, but that should in no way be allowed to obscure the objective of strengthening national security. Nothing should be done either by the media or those in authority to dilute this harmony.

Responsible for complicity in numerous terrorist attacks, including the triple courthouse bombings in Uttar Pradesh in 2007, the 2008 simultaneous bombings in Jaipur as well as another series of simultaneous bombings the same year in Bengaluru and the German Bakery bombing in Pune in 2010, the IM has struck terror across many of India's major cities, killing hundreds of innocent civilians. A coordinated effort by India's security authorities led to engineer-turned-terrorist Bhatkal's arrest at the border between India and Nepal. Despite coming in for much criticism over the years, the country's security apparatus richly deserves the accolades it is now receiving for its role in the latest arrest.

But amidst the congratulations and backslapping, there is cause for concern and enhanced vigilance. According to a forthcoming book titled Indian Mujahideen: Analysis and Policies (Springer 2014) by the authors of this article, arrests of IM operatives are almost always followed a few months later by additional terror attacks. IM's forays are almost always targeted at "soft" targets, such as market places, and often involve multiple devices and locations, usually — but not always — in the same city. With the demoralising effect of Bhatkal's arrest on its cadre, IM leaders such as Amir Reza Khan and Abdul Subhan Qureshi, who are said to be still at large in Pakistan, may decide to revitalise their operatives with fresh attacks on "soft" targets during the next three to four months. Based on their historical modus operandi, the cities most at risk are those in UP (such as Varanasi and Lucknow), as well as Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Jaipur. Chennai, incident-free for several years, is increasingly becoming a theatre for the demonstration of militant feelings, as evidenced by a procession some Muslim organisations took out last September close to the US consulate on the arterial Anna Salai. This was to protest against an American movie that had allegedly denigrated Islam. Chennai Police will remain anxious on this score. Undaunted by Bhatkal's arrest, elements of the IM may be expected to bounce back.

The official counter-offensive requires a strong and widespread intelligence presence and police station-level alertness that would sharpen the protection of crowded places in these cities. This would pose a formidable challenge, even with professionally trained intelligence staff, something India does not uniformly possess. Moreover, the book points out that it is vital to keep track of public communications issued by the IM (including claims of responsibility for past attacks and attempts to embarrass India by threatening attacks before the 2010 Commonwealth Games).

It will, therefore, be critical to monitor any public statements put out by the IM in the next few weeks. Their tenor may be one of bravado. But it is backed by some solid yet destructive achievements on the field that can hardly be ignored.

An even greater intelligence coup could include more details of how the ISI facilitates the travel of IM operatives, enabling them to receive training in Pakistani camps, including those run by the LeT. The precise nature of the relationship between the IM, LeT, ISI, and Dawood Ibrahim's D-Company is murky, though the evidence of complicity of these entities in terrorist attacks within India is overwhelming. Bhatkal, as a leader of the IM, is undoubtedly well informed. Previous arrests have yielded valid Pakistani passports issued to IM operatives. The fact that Bhatkal was able to travel extensively not only to the Persian Gulf and Pakistan, but also the US, implies that he received abundant support during the last 10 years. Finding out who facilitated such travel, and how, will be critical in reducing IM operations in the future. This is why Bhatkal's interrogation by the NIA in the next few days assumes great importance.

One recommendation in the book is that India build a comprehensive travel information system that tracks any movement both within and outside India that uses public transportation (planes, trains, buses, ships), and that such travel intelligence must not be limited to India alone but span, at the very least, all of the Middle East and Asia. Moreover, added intelligence on how the IM is financed could be another potential intelligence bonanza. It is critical to have detailed information on who finances IM operations and who helps it move money from one source to another. The hawala route is highly probable, but that does not mean there are no others. One may not be able to prove a direct ISI hand in all this, which is why it is essential to locate individuals who provide the conduit.

In past weeks, two high-profile arrests on the porous India-Nepal border — this one, and of LeT bombmaker Tunda — tell the story of how Indian security is getting better at both border control and intelligence operations. At the same time, we should be conscious that the IM is likely to adapt itself adroitly to the increased smartness of Indian agencies. And with support from its sponsors, there is little doubt that new weak points along the border will be identified so as to facilitate the travel of IM operatives.

India needs to extend the definition of its border, perhaps by assisting Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka to implement better border controls so that Pakistani passports issued to terror operatives are quickly identified there, providing a second line of defence. Such support will also assist these nations in better counter-terror operations within their own national boundaries.

This summer's intelligence successes deserve our warmest congratulations, but there is a lot more to do. While R&AW and the IB have their jobs cut out for them, the NIA interrogations will have to be more aggressive and focused if they are to be productive. The NIA is slowly acquiring an élan that is heartwarming, dispelling earlier misgivings about its capacity. This setting implies also a greater willingness to be transparent in dealing with foreign intelligence apparatuses, especially the US's Federal Bureau of Investigation. The reported differences of opinion over the David Headley issue may have to be papered over, and a fresh start at collaboration with the FBI given a chance to succeed.

Mannes is a counter-terrorism and policy researcher at the University of Maryland, where Subrahmanian is professor of computer science. Raghavan is a former director of the CBI. Roul is director of the Society for Study of Peace and Conflict. They are co-authors of the forthcoming book, 'Indian Mujahideen: Analysis and Policies'

Indo-Bangla relations.

Let’s not miss the big picture

KAMAL DAVAR

India should do all it can to resolve contentious issues with Bangladesh in order to strengthen the hands of the secular Sheikh Hasina government

Among all our neighbours, the nation whose birth is indelibly linked to India is Bangladesh. That this nation, uniquely in the Islamic world, is struggling to be a modern secular state, has always acknowledged India’s support for its independence from Pakistan and now looks forward to developing an all encompassing positive relationship with us is inexplicably underplayed in this country.

Economic & political linkages

For long, India has looked at the West as the centre of gravity of its strategic interests, but to little avail.

Our much heralded ‘Look East Policy,’ though initiated in 1993 by the late Narasimha Rao when he was Prime Minister, has only received some impetus. Bangladesh is a natural pillar of this policy, be as it can a ‘bridge’ to economic and political linkages with South East Asia and beyond.

A friendly Bangladesh that ensures no anti-India terror or insurgent activities can be carried out from its soil unlike in the past will substantially assist India in handling security problems in some of its restive north-east States.

Importantly, a ‘neutral’ Bangladesh also ensures containment of an assertive China in this region, including along the strategic sea-lanes of the Bay of Bengal.

Since Sheikh Hasina and her Awami League came to power five years ago, there has been tremendous goodwill for India in Bangladesh. In December, she faces a bitter general election in which her adversaries are the congenitally anti-India Islamic fundamentalists. That India has a stake in the victory of secular forces in Bangladesh is a factor it can disregard only at its peril.

It is accepted by all that Sheikh Hasina has largely delivered on Indian security concerns by cracking down on terrorism directed against India from Bangladeshi soil. Additionally, the current government is doing its utmost to keep Islamic fundamentalism in Bangladesh, represented by the likes of Harkat-al-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the recently banned political outfit Jamaat-e-Islami, others like Hefajat-e-Islam, Jagrata Muslim Janata, and HUJI-B whose links to al Qaeda are well known, at bay at some cost to the Awami League rank and file.

It must also be noted that when India’s President Pranab Mukherjee recently visited Bangladesh, the other prime ministerial aspirant in Dhaka, Begum Khaleda Zia, whose Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) is known to encourage anti-India sentiments and has traditionally colluded with fundamentalists in the past, did not bother to meet him. Electoral battle-lines between the two parties in Bangladesh are also drawn over their regional priorities.

Unfortunately, there exist many contentious issues between the two countries, primarily in the division of common river waters.

Not surprising considering we share 54 trans-boundary rivers, big and small!

In 1996, the sharing of the Ganga waters was successfully agreed upon between the two nations. However, the major area of dispute has been India’s construction and operation of the Farakka Barrage to increase water supply to the river Hooghly.

Bangladesh complains that it does not get a fair share of the water in the dry season and some of its areas get flooded when India releases excess waters during the monsoons.

In addition, the sharing of the waters of the Teesta river is being vehemently opposed by India’s West Bengal government though many Indian security and water experts in that State empathise with Bangladesh’s stand. T

he sluggish execution of the Tipaimukh hydroelectric project on the Barak River in Bangladesh is another problem area. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has, however, graciously offered a reasonable partnership stake in this project to Bangladesh.

Then, there is the land corridor that India wants through Bangladesh, to connect West Bengal to the north-eastern States. Right now, the only land connection between these two parts of India is the 20 to 25 km wide Siliguri corridor (also known as India’s Chicken Neck). It appears that Bangladesh will grant this only after it gets its demand of water requirements. Importantly, its internal political situation has to ease enough for Dhaka to make such a concession to India.

India’s other concern is the issue of the continuing huge influx of undocumented Bangladesh migrants through a 4000 km-long porous international border, and despite a crackdown by the Sheikh Hasina government, the continuing presence of anti-India forces across the border.

Problems like trade imbalances and tariff barriers between the two nations are easily surmountable and India providing some business incentives recently to Bangladesh have been appreciated.

One other issue that could have been solved, but has been allowed to fester, is India’s inability to ratify the protocol to the Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) of 1974 with Bangladesh. Under this, 161 adversely held small enclaves are to be exchanged by the two countries; 7,100 acres of land will be transferred to India and nearly 17,000 acres go to Bangladesh. The Union Cabinet had in February 2013 approved the draft LBA Bill for introduction in the monsoon session of Parliament for ratification of the swap deal. However, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the BJP have strongly opposed this deal much to the discomfiture of the Centre and annoyance of the Bangladesh government.

Legitimate demand

Overall, India has to consider if West Bengal, under Ms Banerjee, is unnecessarily spoiling the relationship between the two nations by putting spokes in New Delhi’s efforts to address Bangladesh’s legitimate demands. If this continues, India risks missing the larger picture.

Even West Bengal economists lament that their government’s failure to view the big picture and ‘putting politics before development’ has prevented the State from becoming India’s gateway to South East Asia and the Far East as a whole. That the Centre could have taken more efforts to bring the West Bengal Chief Minister on board prior to the Prime Minister’s Bangladesh visit is another story.

Addressing a dialogue organised recently by two think tanks of the two nations in New Delhi, Bangladesh High Commissioner to India Tariq Karim succinctly pointed out that “India’s growth is Bangladesh’s growth because Bangladesh can grow only when India grows.” He reminded his Indian audience of President Pranab Mukherjee’s observation that the “agenda for the future for both the countries has to be sub-regional.”

India-Bangladesh relations have more than an academic strategic content. In the long run, India’s national interests primarily lie towards and beyond its eastern flanks to South East Asia and the new geographical and strategic construct namely Indo-Pacific Asia. India thus needs to strengthen the various regional groupings in this region like the ASEAN and the BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation). Importantly, by pragmatically reaching out to Bangladesh now, it will be able to strengthen the secular democratic forces in Islamic Bangladesh to our east — an imperative which must always be borne in our strategic formulations, for let us never forget that towards our western flank violent Islamic fundamentalism is on an alarming ascendant.

(Lt Gen Davar was India’s first Chief of the Defence Intelligence Agency and Deputy Chief of the Integrated Defence Staff)