REPORT OF UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD DAY 2008
Common traditions of India and China: In a 45 minute stimulating lecture he gave refreshingly different and frank views about Indo Chinese relations over ages through interesting facts, figures and anecdotes. He underlined the important aspect of India and Chinese as neighbours - that it is a unique example in world history where neighbours sharing such a long common boundary did not fight any war or had no history of hostility over centuries till late 1950’s, when India became free and China overthrew imperialism. The first contacts after Buddha’s nirvana were established by Bouddh bhikus in 483 BC according to western history and 1800 according to Indian accounts. It is amazing but true and the reason was that China had adopted Buddhism in a big way from this period which had come from India. Hence, there was no reason for hostility.
Post 1962 war, the relationships went into deep freeze and hostility and the first initiative to thaw the relationship came from the then Prime Minister Morarji Desi who asked Dr. Swamy to visit China as a representative of the Indian government. It was followed by Dr. Swamy’s visit as an emissary of GOI during Mrs. Gandhi’s premiership. Incidentally, it was during this trip that Dr. Swamy was able to persuade Chinese government to open up Kailash Mansarovar to Indian pilgrims and he was the first Indian to do this yatra of nearly 110 km on feet, to convince the Chinese of his sincerity! Late Rajiv Gandhi’s visit saw a major break through in relations with China and 1998-99 saw the signing of the first trade agreement between the two countries. Since then, there is a good trade relationship but we cannot be said to be friendly.
Hindi Cheeni Bhai Bhai cannot be a reality: According to Dr. Swamy , we can neither be friends nor foes, we can only work out a balanced relationship. We can have a friendly foreign policy but a defence policy of equality vis a vis China for which we need to have a strong defence budget. Today, while China spends 6% of its budget on defence, India spends only around 2%.
Can India overtake China? -Dr. Swamy brought up the oft repeated question – “Can India can equal China in economic growth?” or “can it race ahead?”. According to Dr. Swamy, till 1980’s, growth rates of both China and India were around 3.5% because both followed the 5 year socialist plans, which suppressed the growth potential of both ancient and great civilizations. The fact is that till 17th Century, India and China had a 50% share of global GDP and both produced everything possible at that time. It was only after advent of British and Imperialists in two countries that they went down into the quagmire of poverty. Thus, both have inherent potential to do well due to their civilizational strengths. However, while China embarked on economic reforms in 1980’s, India waited another ten years to embark on reforms. Thus, India lost 10 years in this growth story. It will take some time cover up this gap. While on this subject, he also asked people to be more careful when talking of figures touted by Chinese as their measuring standards are very different from others, thus giving wrong ideas; and he gave some examples to buttress his argument. He asserted that in the long run, India will over take China in economic development. Reason was its healthy democratic system which allowed for a political change when things went wrong and comparatively strong financial institutions.
He pointed out that whenever financial crises engulfed a nation and took it down, there were major political changes which brought in new leadership and new ideas which turned around these countries. He gave examples of Brazil/Chile/Argentina economic recession of 1960’s and Japanese financial melt-down of 1970s and India’s own examples of 1990’s to strengthen his argument. According to him, Chinese financial system is highly primitive and on the verge of breakdown due to profligacy of Communist party which is asking banks to fund public sector to keep supporting workers who are mostly their party members and that is eating away the assets of all financial institutions which may collapse any time. While in a democracy it is possible that people would take corrective action and throw up a new leadership and new ideas, in China, Communist party would not allow the power to go out of their hand and therein lies its serious problem. He believed that it could happen in a not very distant future. In case of India, though there is a serious indiscipline in fiscal management with government following populist agenda at the cost of financial health, the democratic system will help it come out of it soon. Another factor in favour of India is its young population. While India’s average population is 27 years, China’s average age stands at 37 years. With tight population control this average is going to go further up with higher life expectancy and lower birth rates, putting lot of pressure on economy to support old population. All these factors taken together indicate that 2050’s India would be in a position to overtake China, was his contention.
Issue of Tibet – Tibet also came up during a sparkling Q&A session. Dr. Swamy lamented that there was clarity in Indian establishment about its stand on Tibet. While on one side, India has reiterated time and again that Tibet is a part of China, it has let an émigré government be established in India under his holiness Dalai Lama. As a country that has given asylum and right to live decently to many a persecuted communities over ages, and it is right to give asylum to Tibetans; whether it is purely a humanitarian asylum or political support is never clear. India should not open up hostile fronts both against China and Pakistan, it should support Dalai Lama’s request for freedom to practice its culture in line with its assertion that Tibet is a part of China and not talk of independence as it has no relevance in present circumstances.
The programme was chaired by Mr. Shriram Dandekar , Chairman of Camlin International, who in his brief address, talked of Chinese traditions and culture and quoted some very interesting Chinese proverbs which he gathered during his Chinese business trips from local population and gave a glimpse of Chinese thinking about life and business. The programme closed with vote of thanks proposed by Mr. Sanjay Kelapure, convener of the programme. He thanked the sponsors M/s Kisan Moulding, M/s Kisan Irrigation, M/s Sureshot Advertising & M/s Edge Consultancy for sponsoring the programme.
