http://newindianexpress.com/opinion/China%E2%80%99s-do-and-dare-gamble-versus-India%E2%80%99s-sit-and-stare-shuffle/2013/04/28/article1564584.ece
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Even as Indians are wrestling with localised politics of economics, India is confronted with the geopolitics of economics. From Maldives to Sri Lanka to Nepal to Pakistan, India finds itself losing its voice. It is inadequately equipped to enforce its rights in a world where surplus is the defined and accepted measure of power. Of course morality matters, but the might of right must necessarily contend with the right of might. You cannot campaign in the constituency of morality without scoring consistently in the dollar-denominated contest. The axiom—that geography is the determinant of history—has returned to haunt India. The incursion into Indian territory by the Chinese Army is a dare, to the sit and stare version of governance patented by the present regime.
Size does matter—in economics and in geopolitics. It mattered in 1962 and matters much more in 2013. In 1962, per capita income of China was $69 compared to India’s $58. Today, at over $6,000, Chinese per capita income is four times that of India. The primary reason: attention to agriculture where poverty was located. In 1962, average yield per hectare for cereals in China was 1,500 kg compared to 965 kg/ha in India. Today China boasts of per hectare yield of 5,705 kg/ha compared to 2,800 kg/ha for India. Thereafter China didn’t dither and lather in debate, it invested in infrastructure to shift workers from farms to factories, riding the demand curve of global growth.
The perception is that China had a head-start on India. Fact is, it was only in 1992—around the time India liberalised—that China took off when Deng Xiao Ping made his famous “southern visit”. Deng had declared: “Reform must not be like a woman with bound feet but must stride boldly forward for 30-40 years.” He defined the path for the Chinese economy by stating “market economics need not be surnamed capitalism. Socialism has markets too”.
As China wooed foreign investment and technology bringing scale and competitiveness, Deng warned the cadre “Watch out for the Right but mainly defend against the Left”. China invested in pride and prosperity. Its geopolitical postures are backed by the scale of its GDP. India, in contrast, has been paralysed by pelf and paranoia. In 1992, Chinese GDP was $423 billion compared to $293 billion for India. In 2013, India is struggling to post a GDP of $2 trillion while China’s GDP is at the $8-trillion mark.
This growth has been facilitated by autocracy. But it is also true that on every human development indicator, China is ahead of India. In 1950, India and China had literacy levels of around 20 per cent. India in 2012 boasts of 75 per cent literacy. China achieved 78 per cent literacy in 1990. Thanks to the focus on education, in 2011, over 4 lakh patent applications were filed in China compared to less than 10,000 in India. Take life expectancy at birth—in 1960, it was 42 in India and 43 in China. India now boasts of a life expectancy of 65, a milestone China achieved in 1974. Every hour nearly 200 children under-5 die of malnutrition in India compared to 35 in China. Even in provision of basic services, China is far ahead. Nearly a third of Indians—33 per cent or over 400 million—lack access to electricity compared to barely 1 per cent in China. What does one make of the fact that the Chinese autocracy has been more concerned about human development than governments elected by a democracy!
Nothing that happens in China is an accident. In the Sixties, China used Pakistan to befriend the US to counter the Soviet Union. Through the past decade and more, China has assembled an alliance of quasi-client states. Its forays in Africa and the moves in Asia—in Sri Lanka, Nepal, Myanmar, Bangladesh and Pakistan—are deliberate. In 2011, it became the world’s second largest economy. It has stitched a new pact with Russia —the new leader Xi Jinping chose to visit Moscow first and then flew with Vladimir Putin to the BRICS summit at Durban. It is not an accident that it is now teasing the US, taunting Japan and testing India simultaneously. The US needs China for subsidising its consumption and funding its deficit; Japan is invested in China for returns. The third-party interests inure China from intimidation and insure it from geopolitical risks. The dragon now seeks a stature commensurate with its size.
The moot question is how India deals with the challenge. Jingoism is good for TRPs but is a poor tactic and no strategy. Strategic thinking demands imagination and gumption. A chessboard has 64 squares and Indians play it well. But the Chinese play Weichi on a board with 361 squares. The objective of Weichi is not to check-mate but to encircle. China has completed the geopolitical encirclement. There has been much murmur about the Tibet card. The efficacy of this card is debatable, especially since it’s a long-played card. And a trump card works best with a winning hand. In the short term, India must play patience. In the long term, India must shuffle its strategy to focus on growth to acquire influential scale. It is only in the books that the meek inherit the earth.
shankkar.aiyar@gmail.com
Shankkar Aiyar is the author of Accidental India: A History of the Nation’s Passage through Crisis and Change
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