By – Amar Yumnam
To begin with I would point out that I completely dislike the term usually used for the South East Asian part of India. With the usual term the “Thinkers”, “Policy Makers”, and “Decision Takers” of India find it very convenient to just take it as a region without any deeper application of mind. Thanks to the blessings of God, I have had the opportunity of listening to quite a few Policy Thinkers, Policy Advisors and Policy Makers of India and more frequently now with the arrival of digital technology. The latest I listened to was a Great “Economist” as he claims himself while talking about a little less than one hour – he was with the Planning Commission, and now at the Niti Ayog. He says he has served many PMs, and now Modi. He was talking on International Trade Policy where the model he and his team are now focusing on to evolve a model concentrating on relationships with the High-Income Countries.
During discussion, I wanted to know from him: A. Learning from the impacts of the America-Iraq war and the consequential externalities the world is facing now, how the Dichotomous (two different – two different countries in the present context) models of relationships can still be the only workable models. He did not fully digest the question, and thus one-to one relationships I explained. B. He mentioned a little derogatorily about the developments in the South East Asian countries. He did not mention anything about Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand. When I enquired, he spoke about the investment in infrastructure in the Indian part. This immediately revealed his pity attitude about the region and do away completely without application of mind; I was asking about policy and so I asked policy. When I started controlling my feeling of laughter, he started mentioning about Japan with which new relationships are being envisaged. Given the experiences of the ongoing war, only God knows how such a policy can be successful by completely ignoring South East Asia. C. He put a very high emphasis on the tertiary education success of India, I just enquired how is the situation of this now in Thailand with Universities in global rankings, and no rankings of any university in India. Till about three decades back, India was the destination of Thailand students for higher education while reverse is the case now. He somehow diverted from answering this question. D. I asked him how China has performed in balanced regional development. In this I gave the example of how is Yunnan today compared to what it was a decade back. I told him, I have seen both Beijing and Sanghai more than once and Yunnan at least four times. With that kind of example in our neighbour, why is it that India cannot go for something like Yunnan being allowed an independent group for development relationships with Myanmar and Thailand.
He kept on repeating his Japanese related answers. I could not help feeling that he is a great Economist with no modernisation of thinking but master of the art of working for the Powers That Be. In the International Trade model India is now evolving, the neighbouring countries, the South East Asia and the South East Asian part of India occupy no space of imagination. This must be because if the South East Asia is included, the South East Asian part of India would necessarily become a part of the thinkers to whom India ends in West Bengal.
The biggest tragedy of the South East Asian part of India is that the so-called leaders of the region find it convenient to align their thoughts to the thinkings of the Mainland Leaders for reasons of holding power. They are happy of the division in thinking of a single country into Mainland and Marginal (Border)land. Thus, the Government of India can easily get away without application of mind to the differential characteristics of the region. It is global experience that “local governments face significant external constraints when it comes to acquiring the resources to address challenges and meet the demands of their residents. For example, localities have historically faced limitations from state constitutions and long-standing statutes on their authority to use taxation to raise revenue. These limitations are intensifying as part of a growing trend of abusive state pre-emption…”Same is the case on the capital budget side as well. So policy takes leave of absence such that Economic Democracy never arrives.
