India’s Disinterest on China

Why in news?

India isolated itself from participating china’s event “Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI) on 14^th May in Beijing.

What is BRI?

The Belt and Road Initiative is a development strategy and framework, proposed by Chinese paramount leader Xi Jinping.
It focuses on connectivity and cooperation among countries primarily between the People's Republic of China and the rest of Eurasia.
It consists of two main components,

The strategy underlines China's push to take a bigger role in global affairs, and its need for priority capacity cooperation in areas such as steel manufacturing.
It involves the export of Chinese capital, labour, technology, industrial standards, commercial benchmarks, the use of the Yuan, the development of new ports, industrial hubs, special economic zones and military facilities, under Beijing’s auspices.
It is funded by Asian infrastructural investment bank(AIIB) and Silk road fund.

Why India resist this initiative?

India’s expects BRI will massively strengthen China’s commercial, economic, political and security influence on India’s neighbourhood and marginalise its regional primacy.
The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), an important part of the BRI, runs through a part of Jammu and Kashmir that is occupied by Pakistan.
China is set to become the first non-Western power in the modern era to shape the geopolitics of Eurasia and the Indo-Pacific.
While most nations are ready to accept this, unwillingly or otherwise, two of China’s neighbours Japan and India are reluctant.

Why are the countermeasures by India and japan?

Japan hasbeen the number one power in Asia, It has already outlined a Belt and Road initiative of its own, called the Partnership for Quality Infrastructure to support infrastructure projects all across the Indo-Pacific and Eurasia.
India has just woken up to the long-term consequences of the BRI, marked by ever-deepening interdependence between China and India’s neighbours.
Neither India’s strong objections, nor its weak political endorsement of the BRI will have any impact on its evolution; there is an air of inevitability to the BRI.

Way forward:

India’s long-term response to the BRI must instead focus on three areas:
India need to ramp up its own internal connectivity.
India should modernise connectivity across its land and maritime frontiers with its neighbouring countries.
ndia can work with nations like Japan and multilateral institutions in developing regional connectivity in the Subcontinent and beyond.
There is a gap in strengthening the relations with neighbouring Countries As India begins to narrow the gap through purposeful action, its ability to engage China on the BRI will improve.
This is not a diplomatic problem for the foreign office to resolve, India must use its resources and effective mechanisms to address the long-term opportunities and challenges.

Source: Indian Express