Economic rivalry makes China scale up border strife with India
Photo credit Twitter ITBP
By Manish Anand
New Delhi, April 4: China has once more shown its growing appetite for mischief with neighbouring countries to keep the border hot. By renaming 11 places in Arunachal Pradesh, China stays on the path to pin down India with border tension, which has been Beijing’s strategic shift for at least four decades.
Till the 1970s, China was ready for trade off with India to sanctify the status quo on the principle of ‘we hold the western sector, you stay with the eastern parts”. But the 1980s brought the change in the shift in the Chinese strategy, as Beijing began showing stubborn stance on resolving the border issue with India.
“From the stance of making the status quo official, which meant India giving up claims on the western sector and China relinquishing claims in the eastern sector, Beijing began hardening stance in the 1980s after India started showing signs of growing on the economic front,” said former foreign secretary Shyam Sharan during an interaction at the Indian International Centre (IIC) recently.
For China, India remains an economic rival on the world stage. Currently, the Chinese economy is six times the size of India. But Chinese economic growth after slumping to two per cent in the last financial year is only projected to grow by five per cent in the current fiscal. India in contrast would remain the fastest economy with 6.5 per cent GDP growth, and picking up thereafter.
“China gradually hardened stance and began asserting claims on whole of Arunachal Pradesh, while showing lack of interest in talks with India to resolve the border issue,” added Sharan. The former diplomat argued that the shift in the Chinese stance on resolving the border issue with India to the economic reasons.
It may be recalled that India and China held border talks in Beijing after a gap of three years. This was principally explained to the growing Chinese isolation on the world stage following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
India and China are seen as competitive economy in the fast changing geostrategic affairs. India having become integral to Quad is seen by China aligned to the US in the global affairs. Also, India is aiming to become the fourth largest economy by 2035 and close the gap with China by the time the country celebrates 100 years of Independence.
India on Tuesday trashed China renaming the regions in Arunachal Pradesh, saying that this is not the first such attempt. “We reject this outright. Arunachal Pradesh is, has been, and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India. Attempts to assign invented names will not alter this reality,” said Arindam Bagchi, the spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs on Tuesday.
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