Syed Akbar

THE Indian strategists not only understand this very well, but they have been translating this perception into increasingly effective actions. While India’s military and naval might give it the profile of strength, its trade relations puts other countries under obligation. The use of its cultural resource for developing better understanding gives it human face. India’s personality emerges as that of an old civilization, spectacularly rich in resource, religions and statecraft, and this goes a long way in covering up the nakedness of its geopolitical ambitions.

INDIAN EXPERIENCE

Indians have learnt well from the British, who enslaved us first with arms, and having pacified us returned our pride by discovering for us the richness of our own languages and cultures. What is called orientalism, the restructuring of the native civilization and its components, was one of the most effective tools of the nineteenth century imperial powers. India is as much interested in reviving memories of the past through commercial and cultural exchanges, while making sure that its armed strength on land and water is not lost sight of by its strategies and neighbours in the region.

According to India Today, “the Indian government credit to Vietnam in the past decade has crossed Rs. 100 corer, making it one of the largest aid beneficiaries Vietnam has been given credit which requires to pay it back in 15 years at an interest rate of 5% annually. The rationale for the aid, in the words of the Indian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is that the two countries are tied to friendship by history and old associations.

India supplies railway locomotives, textile machinery and technology as well as scientific methods and practices of how to grow rice in swampy marshes and cross breed Indian buffaloes with the Vietnamese stock to design a new harder variety. While Indian made tractors plough fields, trains are pulled by Indian locomotives, the Indian rice variety grows on what was until recently uncultivable land, the bust of Indira Gandhi adorns the foreground of a jute mill on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City named after her. The machines supplied by India may not be of very high standards and breakdowns frequently, but the goodwill bought through this commercial enterprise called aid has been acknowledged generously by the Vietnam government, Says 4 senior official of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce: “Our policy is to encourage businessmen from India, We would do anything to help”.

On the cultural side India’s invasion of the world has been spectacular, and as a result no other developing country, not ~ even China, and has enjoyed the goodwill of international opinion as India since its independence. Its export of religion and mysticism is well known and the penetration this has achieved in the ranks of media, film stars, businessmen and the academic world in the U.S.A. and the West is a remarkable example of how territories of mind and heart can be successfully conquered. Currently, a nine hour theatre of the ancient Hindu epic Mahabharata is being performed in Glasgow after a successful run in New York. The famous English producer, Peter Brook, is responsible for this show in which the story of an epic battle between two, ruling cousins is being enacted against the background of much evil as well as the participation of gods and goddesses in support of the adversaries.

MORAL LESSON

Peter Brook’s rendition, besides being excellent theatre, has been called a profound ethical statement which highlights many contemporary issues of statecraft, including the threat of the ultimate weapon of destruction which features in the Hindu epic. The English producer has produced Mahabharata for his own love without being prompted by the Indian Foreign Affairs Minister, but it is earning as much fame and goodwill for the land and people of India, reinforcing its image of a civilized nation of ancient pedigree,

India does not only enjoy gratuitous advantages through the labour of love put in by others, In advancing its forward interest in international relations, it undertakes tasks, directly, such as the saving and preservation of ancient monuments of antiquity in Cambodia. Let us note that its excellent relations with Vietnam has not Come in the way of developing and building equally good relations with Cambodia. Once Hindu religion and culture extended as far as Indonesia, passing through Cambodia and other countries in the same link. Temples were built by kings to preserve their religion for all times to come.

While Cambodia is Buddhist today, the temple complexes still stand and one of them is known as Angkor Watt Time and the local climate has been very unkind to it. Years of civil war in the country have also contributed to its near ruination. Cambodia is not in position to undertake any effort for saying its priceless architectural treasures. India steps in with money, technology and’ trained experts to work on one of the temple complexes so that it can be restored for posterity. It is thus that anew link of friendship is forged at the same time that the ancient religious and cultural connections between the people of the two countries are revived’ and’ strengthened. The Angkor Watt temples were the symbol of Hindu imperial raj of India in ascendance, and by restoring it to its past grandeur India would achieve more than diplomatic bilateral exchanges could have done.

There is a moral lesson to be learnt here for those who would conduct foreign affairs on narrow professional lines. The best results in the international arena are achieved when more than the governments, people are also attracted and engaged and this is done through exchanges of commercial and cultural resources. Longstanding understanding is not built when neighbours and others of interest to us are seen through a pair of binoculars from a fortune bunker, a state or government which carves for itself the position of friendship and trust which human relations and appreciation built by trade and culture offer. India understands these things! Better this is why it conducts its foreign relations far more viably for the fulfillment of its interests than most of the countries in that hemisphere. The profile of our foreign affairs is bureaucratic, and lacks the thrust and grace which are contributed by the cultivation and profession of values of civilization; it is not that we are destitute of such resources. We excel by not giving them a thought.

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Article extracted from this publication >> July 1, 1988