Part 1: How Does India Handle A Malignant China?

Back in 2003, this author had a series of interactions with Richard D’ Aveni, then a professor at Dartmouth College in the United States. The term “BRICS” coined by Goldman Sachs had become very fashionable and it seemed “India Shining” was more a reality than a slogan. He was a “hawk” in the “Cold War” mould and even then believed that China one day would challenge the United States.

His take on India was blunt and in your face. In 2003, he said India faced two choices. It could either invest seriously in becoming an economic, military or geopolitical power or become to China what Mexico is to the United States, a poor neighbor down south that revels in victimhood and rues the numerous chances it missed. India hasn’t become an economic and military powerhouse (yet) that the world would respect. Nor has it become a Mexico like southern neighbor of China. It is in what Indian mythology would say being a “Trishanku”, roughly translated as neither here, nor there.

But post the Covid pandemic, India must wake up to the fact that China is a malignant 9super) power at least when it comes to the strategic interests of this country. As India assumes chairmanship of the World Health Organization, which is really not a big deal, China hasn’t hesitated a moment to bare its fangs. There is the usual bout of threats and posturing in Ladakh; the usual “reminder” to India that Taiwan is actually a province of China and a prod to the communists ruling Nepal to recklessly provoke India. Expect a statement soon on Pakistan and India conducting a peaceful dialogue to settle the “disputed” issue of Jammu & Kashmir. Of course, Taiwan and Tibet are not “disputed”: they are eternal parts of China! The pressure, the hectoring and the threats will mount further if global supply chains actually start moving some of their manufacturing facilities out of China; with a part of it coming to India .Incidentally, India is not the only country that China is openly threatening.

People often wonder why .China gets away with all this while India gets pilloried in the Global Media. They cite the example of Xinxiang, a Muslim majority province of China where at least a million “citizens’ are in de facto concentration camps. They wonder why “Muslim” nations don’t vociferously condemn Chinas they do India for its “human rights” abuses” in Jammu & Kashmir. The simple reason is: money talks and the more the money, the louder it talks. China seems to be intent on using its massive economic clout to simply buy its way out of trouble and bully those who become pesky enough to question its actions. Recall how it stopped beef imports from Australia and threatened to stop sending students and tourists if the later persisted in demanding accountability from China for the Covid pandemic.

When it comes to money, India is no match for China. The GDP of China at $ 15 trillion is five times that of India. Its exports are 10 times that of India. Its per capita income is about five times that of India. Manufacturing accounts for less than 20% of GDP in India while it accounts for more than 40% in China. It has already spawned global consumer brands like Haier, Lenovo and Oppo. In the early years of this century, it looked as if India had the edge when it came to the services sector like IT and ITES. But even there, China is a bona fide superpower with companies like Alibaba, Tencent and Huwaei. This automatomatically gets reflected in military and geopolitical power and reach. China had a military budget of $ 261 billion compared to $ 71 billion for India. With the Belt & Road Initiative, it is seeking to dislodge the United States as the pre eminent global power. No matter how hard India tries, the gap between the two is so vast that catching uo will take a long time, if at atl.

Till the early 1970s, India and China had about the same size of GDP and manufacturing capabilities. What happened that China raced so far ahead? Read in the next part of this series.