PARAGRAPH OF THE DAY –
Anatomy of a reset –
The India-China relationship has always been too complex to classify under a single theme. Competition-cooperation-discord is an often-evoked term typology that reflects the contradictory nature of this relationship. Last year witnessed all these facets play out: India’s trenchant critique of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), India’s entry into the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the dramatic crisis in Doklam on the northern frontiers, the acceleration of multilateral cooperation in the BRICS format, and attempts to foster economic engagement. Yet, nothing exemplified the state of ties more than the Himalayan standoff, which was the closest both countries came to drawing blood in over three decades.
Build-up of negativity –
What led to this tailspin in India-China relations? We will not find the clues in some valley or a narrow stretch of road in the upper Himalayas. Rather, the main reason has been a systematic buildup of negative images of how each side viewed the other’s foreign policies along with a collapse in geopolitical trust. For India, China’s attempt to raise its economic and political profile in the subcontinent was seen as an encroachment on, and an affront to, Indian authority in the neighbourhood. For China, India’s pursuit of deeper military engagement with the former’s main strategic rivals — the U.S. and Japan — was viewed as a serious challenge to its future security. Convinced that only an assertive policy would work, both Delhi and Beijing over the past two years began exploiting leveragesand pressure points to keep the other side off balance. India tilted closer to the U.S., China towards Pakistan, and on a scale not witnessed even during the Cold War years.
Yet, neither side has been able to extract any concessions or improve the terms of their bilateral interactions. On a range of issues – the Nuclear Suppliers Group membership, Pakistan-sponsored terror and hydrological cooperation being the most prominent — India failed to receive any give from China. With India’s boycott of the BRI, China too found itself confronting not only the only major holdout against its flagship international initiative but also its most suspicious and non-cooperative neighbour in Asia. Beijing also noticed that New Delhi was beginning to openly involve external powers to collaborate with it in an anti-China strategy in South Asia and the Indian Ocean. Worse still must have been the spectacle of India brandishing its Tibet card. Such unbridled competition and rising costs to Indian and Chinese interests — and Doklam was the tipping point — appears to have persuaded both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping that their policies were producing zero-sum outcomes and required some kind of a course correction.
Sensibly, both leaderships have drawn the correct lessons and are reciprocating each other’s moves towards a reset. The traditional template, where India-China differences were handled in an overall framework of a politically stable and mature relationship, is being restored. The rhetoric from the recent meeting between Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj and Chinese State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi was instructive. The emphasis has shifted from a glass half-empty narrative to a glass half-full: “our commonalities outweigh our differences” (Indian Foreign Minister) or “our common interests far outweigh our differences” (Chinese Foreign Minister). To be sure, we have heard similar rhetoric before. But the context is new as both leaderships hope to infuse stability back into this complex relationship.
WORDS AND MEANINGS –
1) Evoked
Meaning: Invoke (a spirit or deity).
Example: “Akasha is evoked in India when a house is being built to ensure its completion”
Synonyms: Summon, Invoke
2) Facets
Meaning: A particular aspect or feature of something.
Example: “A philosophy that extends to all facets of the business”
Synonyms: Aspect, Feature
3) Trenchant
Meaning: Vigorous or incisive in expression or style.
Example: “The White Paper makes trenchant criticisms of health authorities”
Synonyms: Incisive, Cutting
Antonyms: Woolly, Vague
4) Exemplified
Meaning: Be a typical example of.
Example: “The best dry sherry is exemplified by the fino of Jerez”
Synonyms: Typify, Epitomize
5) Tailspin
Meaning: Become increasingly chaotic and out of control.
Example: “An economy tailspinning into chaos”
6) Encroachment
Meaning: Intrusion on a person’s territory, rights, etc.
Example: “Minor encroachments on our individual liberties”
Synonyms: Intrusion into, Invasion of
7) Affront
Meaning: An action or remark that causes outrage or offence.
Example: “He took his son’s desertion as a personal affront”
Synonyms: Insult, Offence
Antonyms: Compliment
8) Pursuit
Meaning: An activity of a specified kind, especially a recreational or sporting one.
Example: “A whole range of leisure pursuits”
Synonyms: Activity, Relaxation
9) Assertive
Meaning: Having or showing a confident and forceful personality.
Example: “The job may call for assertive behaviour”
Synonyms: Confident, Forceful
Antonyms: Retiring
10) Exploiting
Meaning: Make full use of and derive benefit from (a resource).
Example: “500 companies sprang up to exploit this new technology”
Synonyms: Utilize, Use
11) Leverages
Meaning: Use borrowed capital for (an investment), expecting the profits made to be greater than the interest payable.
Example: “A leveraged takeover bid”
12) Prominent
Meaning: Important; famous.
Example: “She was a prominent member of the city council”
Synonyms: Important, Leading
Antonyms: Unimportant, Obscure
13) Boycott
Meaning: A punitive ban on relations with other bodies, cooperation with a policy, or the handling of goods.
Example: “A boycott of the negotiations”
Synonyms: Ban, Veto
Antonyms: Approval
14) Confronting
Meaning: Face up to and deal with (a problem or difficulty).
Example: “We knew we couldn’t ignore the race issue and decided we’d confront it head on”
Synonyms: Tackle, Address
Antonyms: Avoid
15) Suspicious
Meaning: Having or showing a cautious distrust of someone or something.
Example: “He was suspicious of her motives”
Synonyms: Doubtful, Unsure
Antonyms: Trustful, Trusting
16) Spectacle
Meaning: An event or scene regarded in terms of its visual impact.
Example: “The spectacle of a city’s mass grief”
Synonyms: Sight, Vision
17) Brandishing
Meaning: Wave or flourish (something, especially a weapon) as a threat or in anger or excitement.
Example: “A man leaped out brandishing a knife”
Synonyms: Flourish, Wave
18) Unbridled
Meaning: Uncontrolled; unconstrained.
Example: “A moment of unbridled ambition”
Synonyms: Unrestrained, Uncontrolled
Antonyms: Restrain
19) Rhetoric
Meaning: The art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the exploitation of figures of speech and other compositional techniques.
Example: “He is using a common figure of rhetoric, hyperbole”
Synonyms: Oratory, Eloquence
20) Emphasis
Meaning: Special importance, value, or prominence given to something.
Example: “They placed great emphasis on the individual’s freedom”
Synonyms: Prominence, Importance
