📰 With Doklam standoff resolved, PM to visit China
Will attend BRICS summit in Xiamen, then go to Myanmar
•A day after the resolution of the Doklam standoff, India announced that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will pay a three-day visit to China, even as Bhutan welcomed the diplomatic end of the border crisis.
•The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) also announced that Mr. Modi’s visit to China for the BRICS summit will be followed by his visit to Myanmar.
•“At the invitation of the President of People’s Republic of China, Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi will visit Xiamen, in China’s Fujian province during September 3-5, 2017 to attend the 9th BRICS [Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa] Summit,” said the Ministry of External Affairs in an official press release here on Tuesday.
•India on Monday declared de-escalation of the two-month-long standoff on the Doklam plateau that had led to dramatic rise in tensions.
•Citing a senior official, The Hindu had reported that the trip is likely to include a one-on-one meeting between Prime Minister Modi and President Xi Jinping on September 4. The meeting between the two leaders will be the first since they exchanged courtesies during the July 7-8 G20 summit meeting in Hamburg.
📰 ISRO opens up satellite making to industry
Space agency invites applications from single, combined domestic entities
•The Indian Space Research Organisation has opened the door to domestic entities that can give it up to 18 spacecraft a year starting mid to late 2018.
•The Bengaluru-based ISRO Satellite Centre (ISAC), which has so far produced about 90 Indian spacecraft, on Monday invited single or combined industries to apply for this opportunity.
•ISAC Director M. Annadurai told The Hindu that the centre expected to select five or six contenders from this exercise “if they are found technically suitable.”
Three-year contract
•ISAC would sign a three-year contract with the finalists, train, handhold and supervise their teams in making its range of satellites at its facility.
•The Indian Space Research Organisation Scurrently makes four categories of spacecraft — communication, remote sensing, navigation and scientific missions — and in three sizes of 1,000 kg to 4,000 kg.
•The first lot of spacecraft from this exercise was expected in about six months from the signing of the contracts. This is also roughly the normal time taken to assemble a satellite.
•Dr. Annadurai said: “The outsourcing of assembly, integration and testing [AIT] in a way covers operational spacecraft, mostly repeat types that ISRO routinely requires.
•However it will be decided by an in-house committee” which he heads.
•About the cost of industry-made spacecraft versus those made in-house, he said: “We don't envisage any cost increase.” Currently, about eight satellites are being produced in a year for national programmes; a 2,000-kg spacecraft costs ISRO about ₹200 crore.
•The contract mentions milestone payments, assigning of new spacecraft upon delivery; and a possible renewal of contract after three years.
Benefits for ISRO
•How would the exercise benefit ISRO or ISAC which has around 900 engineers versed in different skills related to spacecraft?
•“Right now, the manpower of ISAC/ISRO is not adequate for meeting both the increased load of making more satellites; and also for the R&D that we need for future satellites. The present bid to outsource our AIT will help us re-deploy our human resources effectively and focus on R&D,” he said.
•It would also aid self-reliance by way of an independent Indian satellite industry.
Important missions
•Although the goal is to get vendors to realise satellites “end to end”, ISAC would retain important and scientific missions.
•In the $ 339-billion global space industry, satellite manufacturing accounts for 8% or $13.9 billion ( data as per the Satellite Industry Association's 2017 report).
•This segment is led by established players from the United States and Europe who supply satellites to their government and commercial users.
•ISAC’s EoI is seen as a first step towards the making of an Indian space industry.
📰 N. Korea fires ballistic missile over Japan
The U.S. cannot browbeat us, says Pyongyang; Japanese PM Abe calls it an unprecedented and grave threat
•Nuclear-armed North Korea fired a ballistic missile over Japan on Tuesday in a major escalation that triggered global alarm and a furious response from the government in Tokyo.
•Later, two U.S. officials said it was likely an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) and further analysis was under way to determine whether it was a success or failure. It appeared to be a KN-17, or Hwasong-12, according to initial data, they said.
•A visibly unsettled Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said it was an “unprecedented, serious and grave threat”, while the UN Security Council called an emergency meeting at Tokyo and Washington’s request.
2009 satellite launch
•The last time a North Korean rocket overflew Japan was in 2009, when Pyongyang said it was a satellite launch. Washington, Seoul and Tokyo believed it was a clandestine test of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). Pyongyang last month carried out two overt ICBM tests that appeared to bring much of the U.S. mainland within reach for the first time and heightened strains in the region.
•At the time, U.S. President Donald Trump had issued an apocalyptic warning of raining “fire and fury” on the North, while Pyongyang threatened to fire a salvo of missiles towards the U.S. territory of Guam.
•South Korea said the latest missile was launched from Sunan, near Pyongyang and flew around 2,700 km at a maximum altitude of around 550 km.
•Guam is about 3,500 km from North Korea — although the missile was fired in an easterly direction and not towards the U.S. outpost, home to 1,60,000 people and host to major military facilities. Mr. Abe said the overflight was an “outrageous act” that “greatly damages regional peace and security”. In a 40-minute telephone call with Mr. Trump, he said, the two allies had agreed to “further strengthen pressure against North Korea”.
Pyongyang defiant
•However, North Korea was defiant.
•“The U.S. should know that it can neither browbeat the DPRK with any economic sanctions and military threats and blackmail nor make the DPRK flinch from the road chosen by itself,” North Korea’s official Rodong Sinmun said, using the initials of the North’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
•Robert Wood, U.S. Permanent Representative to the Conference on Disarmament at the UN in Geneva labelled it “another provocation” that was “a big concern”.
•Russia, which also has ties to Pyongyang, said it was “extremely worried”, hitting out at a “tendency towards escalation”.
•Any launch towards Guam would have to pass over Japan first and analysts said Tuesday’s overflight presents a major challenge to both Tokyo and Washington.
•Before 2009, the only time it had traversed Japanese airspace was in 1998, in what it also claimed it was a space launch. The U.S. said it was a Taepodong-1 missile.
•Pyongyang says it needs nuclear weapons to protect itself against the U.S., and the firing comes during the annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian South Korean-U.S. joint military exercise, which the North always condemns as rehearsals for invasion.
‘Halfway house option’
•Euan Graham, of the Lowy Institute in Australia, said that a launch towards Guam would have been a “red line” for Washington, and instead Pyongyang selected a “half-way-house option”.
•Japan has in the past vowed to shoot down North Korean missiles or rockets that threaten to hit its territory.
📰 Lessons from Doklam
India must engage China a lot more. The BRICS meet is a good occasion to initiate a dedicated backchannel
•The resolution of the Sino-Indian military stand-off at Doklam, that lasted close to two and a half months, is a much-awaited and welcome development where patient statecraft and deft diplomacy seem to have paid off. Even as several significant questions remain unanswered about the terms and conditions of the resolution, it provides New Delhi and Beijing an opportunity to reflect over what went wrong and rejig this important bilateral relationship. The upcoming visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to China to attend the BRICS summit will provide the two sides such an opportunity.
•“War is the continuation of politics by other means,” observed the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz in his classic work,On War. In other words, military strategy should flow from carefully considered political thinking. Now that we have arrived at a peaceful resolution at Doklam, we need to examine the political strategy guiding India’s military deployment at Doklam. Moreover, are there any lessons we can learn from this military stand-off with China?
‘Self-help’ world
•The most self-evident lesson from the Doklam stand-off is that we inhabit a ‘self-help’ world wherein China is a world power — India is on its own and would have to fend for itself in case of a clash with China, a country with which every major state in the international system has a robust economic relationship. It is important to note that none of the major powers unambiguously and unreservedly supported India’s position on Doklam. In fact, even Bhutan kept a studied silence through the latter part of the stand-off. New Delhi, therefore, must carefully review the scenarios and consider its options before upping the ante. Moreover, regarding Doklam, instead of inviting military attention to itself and trapping itself in a conflict with Beijing, New Delhi could have convinced Thimphu to be more vocal about Bhutan’s territorial rights.
•The second lesson from the Doklam stand-off is that China is unlikely to respect India’s ‘special relationships’ with its neighbours. India has long enjoyed a special status in the South Asian region and often treated it as its exclusive backyard. With China expanding its influence in the region and competing for status and influence, the ‘middle kingdom’ considers South Asia, with India in it, as its periphery. China uses economic incentives and military pressure to do so. Nepal is an example of the former, and Bhutan of the latter. Recall Bhutan, besides India, is the only country from the region that did not attend China’s recent Belt and Road Forum in Beijing. India’s traditional policy towards South Asia, of limited economic assistance topped with a big brother attitude, will need to undergo fundamental transformation to retain its influence.
•Midway through the stand-off there had been concerns in New Delhi about how the Doklam stand-off would eventually pan out. It is pertinent to ask whether Doklam is so fundamental to Indian interests that we were willing to risk a possible military skirmish with China based on the sketchy clauses of the India-Bhutan friendship treaty. The lesson for us is clear: we should consider all odds and evaluate the merit of the cause before making military commitments.
•Four, hyper-nationalism does not pay when it comes to dealing with China. China, simply put, is not Pakistan, and Indian political parties cannot make any domestic gains by whipping up nationalist passions against China. India needs to engage China diplomatically to resolve outstanding conflicts rather than engage in a war of words, or worse, threaten to use force. For sure, it is not 1962, and that’s true for both parties.
•Five, the Doklam stand-off is a direct fallout of the Indian and Bhutanese refusal to be part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). While this round may have concluded without any of the three sides getting hurt, this is unlikely to be the last of Chinese designs against India or Bhutan. Surely India cannot, and should not, acquiesce to the BRI just because of Chinese pressure. And yet, at the end of the day, Indian abstention would only frustrate BRI, it will not derail it. Moreover, down the road, Indian unwillingness to be part of this mega-project will hurt its own long-term economic interests. Therefore, it needs to realise the importance of cooperating with China on the BRI while getting China to do so on various India-led regional projects. It cannot be a zero-sum game.
Next steps
•What is also becoming abundantly clear is that the snail-paced ‘Special Representatives’ talks on the India-China boundary question have not yielded much so far, and it is perhaps the appropriate occasion to revamp the dialogue process. The 19 rounds of talks held till last year have hardly anything substantive to show for them in terms of the resolution of the boundary dispute. Indeed, the focus is increasingly shifting from conflict resolution to conflict management. It is high time, therefore, that the two countries appointed dedicated high-ranking officials to discuss the boundary issues in a more sustained and result-oriented manner.
•Let’s briefly revisit the Doklam facts for the sake of clarity and future policy direction. The Indian Army was deployed on the soil of another country against a third country without proper treaty mandate or unambiguous official invitation to intervene on behalf of the Bhutanese government. The 2007 India-Bhutan Friendship Treaty states that the two countries “shall cooperate closely with each other on issues relating to their national interests.” And that: “Neither Government shall allow the use of its territory for activities harmful to the national security and interest of the other.” Notwithstanding the special security relationship that India and Bhutan have shared over the past several decades, nothing in the 2007 treaty binds India to send troops to help Bhutan. Nor did Bhutan explicitly request military assistance from India during the stand-off even though the MEA statement of June 30, 2017 refers to ‘coordination between the two countries’ during the stand-off.
•The argument here is not that India does not have legitimate security and strategic interests in Bhutan which would be undermined by the Chinese territorial aggression, but that there is a need to engage in careful scenario-building before India decides to take China on militarily.
The Xiamen opportunity
•But finally, it all comes down to devising a strategy to engage a resurgent China, also a significant neighbour, in the days ahead. While Doklam may now be a thing of the past, Sino-Indian ties are never likely to be the same again – there will be skirmishes, war of words and attempts to outmanoeuvre each other in the neighbourhood and beyond. While New Delhi needs to constantly look over its shoulders for potential Chinese surprises, there is also an urgent need to adopt a multi-pronged strategy to deal with Beijing, for, after all, statecraft is not as black and white as some would like it to be. India, for one, needs to engage China a lot more at several levels: diplomatically, politically, multilaterally and economically. The upcoming BRICS summit in the Chinese city of Xiamen is a good occasion to initiate a dedicated backchannel with Beijing given the high potential for future disagreements. The two sides also need to conduct bilateral consultations on various issues – ranging from Afghan reconciliation to regional economic development. The more diplomacy the better.
📰 Dera through the Punjab lens
There is a need to urgently address disquiet over multiple crises
•It was a decade ago that the shroud of banality ‘Saint Dr. Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Insaan’ spun fell on Punjab, in particular the Sikh community. I saw it first-hand in the summer of 2007 when my mother lay dying from stage IV cancer in Mandi Dabwali, south Punjab, 40 km from Sirsa where he is the head of a Dera. Soon after Baisakhi that year, Gurmeet Singh — whose rise remains shrouded in mystery and who was already charged with rape and accused in the murder of journalist Ramchandra Chhatrapati — had imitated the tenth Sikh Guru Gobind Singh’s clothing and ritual Khande di Pahul while conducting the initiation for the followers of his cult, the Dera Sacha Sauda.
•The Sikh faith disallows the use of the term Sacha Sauda and anyone dressing up as a guru, the term because it is associated with the first guru, Guru Nanak. When he was younger, Guru Nanak’s father gave him some money for trade, which he used instead to feed the poor and hungry. When his father asked if the deal was good, he answered it was a true deal — a sacha sauda. Though no one knows how Guru Gobind had dressed in the year 1699 at the inauguration of the Khalsa, the 20th century painter Sobha Singh had formalised the look of some of the gurus and the Sikh community had accepted the pictorial representation as an article of faith. When the self-styled godman parodied this, the Sikhs reacted. The Dera followers, called Premis (lovers), were at war against the Sikhs. The police stepped in. Curfew was imposed. Desperately and helplessly trapped, I could not leave my mother’s side. Punjab remained frozen for weeks. The community took this matter to its own court, the Akal Takht.
The rise of Gurmeet
•In the last decade, the rise of the banality of Gurmeet Singh has known no bounds. He has taken on every available moniker — saint, doctor, Ram, Rahim, Insaan — and parrots messages of peace and harmony while leading a degenerate life. He has amassed Guinness world records for the largest vegetable mosaic, highest number of birthday greetings, eye scan and blood donation camps. His biography lists over 50 talents in the arts and sports. His atrocious self-promotional movies succeeded at the box office and further established the strength of numbers of his followers. Owing to his reach in the political constituencies of south Punjab and Haryana, political parties of all hues — the Akalis, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress — have patronised him. Groups of Sikhs and Premis clashed, there were attempts on his life, but he seemed above the law — a power not only unto himself but a power broker in Haryana and Punjab.
•In autumn 2015, the State froze over incidents of sacrilege of the Sikh Holy Book. Again Gurmeet Singh was involved, for two reasons: one was his Dera’s alleged involvement in the stealing of a Granth Sahib from Burj Jawahar Singh Wala village, random posters appearing in villages saying the Dera would target the Sikhs; the second was the Akal Takht, under the influence of then Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal-controlled Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, finally pardoning Gurmeet Singh for the incidents of 2007, even though he never presented himself to the Takht. When Sikhs protested, the Akal Takht revoked the pardon but the anger of community against their institutions falling prey to the shenanigans of politicians led to the Sarbat Khalsa (plenary meeting) which remained inconclusive. Even the probes into the 150-odd incidents of sacrilege remained inconclusive.
Change in the air
•Yet, something remarkable was unfolding. Whether it is river waters or lack of disclosure of the reasons to conduct Operation Blue Star or justice for victims of the anti-Sikh carnage of 1984 or probe into extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances during the militancy period of 1978-93, the Indian state has spectacularly failed in any attempt towards truth and reconciliation in a post-conflict Punjab society. But defying the dominant perception of the nation, even as the State was inflicted with desecrations, the people of Punjab — including Hindus and Muslims — curled up in anger. There were some provocations, but they were minor. Social media rage turned to black flags, large gatherings took place, local gurdwaras supported the protesters, but Punjab displayed extraordinary restraint. It did not spiral into violence. Once could be an exception but Punjab repeated it last week. The Dera Premi incidents in Panchkula left 38 dead and damage to properties in Haryana but not in Punjab.
•Punjab is sending out a signal: it is shunning violence. Do not mistake this shunning of violence as an absence of disquiet. I see my mother in Punjab — multiple maladies, desperately waiting for medication and healing, which remains unavailable. The disquiet looms large in its agrarian and industrial crises, the utter lack of social and economic healing despite the change of governments. Now that the courts have acted, locked away one Baba, the next step should be to strengthen the people’s belief in systems of justice and address other long-standing grievances. It is only by establishing systems of individual and social justice that we can address post-conflict societies.
📰 Centre to unveil ‘future-ready’ industrial policy in October
Blueprint will aim to spur use of IoT, AI, robotics for advanced manufacturing
•The government on Tuesday said it would announce the new ‘future-ready’ Industrial Policy in October, by suitably incorporating measures to facilitate the use of smart technologies such as the internet of things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics for advanced manufacturing.
•The new policy would aim at making India a manufacturing hub by promoting ‘Make in India’, an official statement said, adding that it would subsume the National Manufacturing Policy.
Wide consultations
•Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman would hold consultations on the framework in Chennai, Guwahati and Mumbai with stakeholders, including industry captains, think tanks and State governments.
•The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP – the nodal body for the new Policy and part of the Commerce and Industry Ministry) has sought comments, feedback and suggestions from the public, by September 25, on a discussion paper on the policy.
•The ‘illustrative outcomes’ of the policy outlined in the paper include increasing the number of global-Indian firms in the Fortune-500 category in the long-term, and in the medium-term helping attract $100 billion inward FDI annually and supporting outward FDI to assert Indian presence in world markets, and addressing the problem of low job creation in the formal sector. The other ‘illustrative outcomes’ include developing alternatives to banks and improving access to capital for MSMEs through ‘peer to peer lending’ and ‘crowd funding’, providing a credit rating mechanism for MSMEs, addressing the problem of inverted-duty structure and also balancing it against obligations under multilateral or bilateral trade agreements, studying the impact of automation on jobs and employment, ensuring minimal/zero waste from industrial activities and targeting certain sectors to radically cut emissions.
•Six thematic focus groups: manufacturing and MSME; technology and innovation; ease of doing business; infrastructure, investment, trade and fiscal policy; and skills and employability for the future, would facilitate inputs.
•Focus groups, with members from government departments, industry associations, academia, and think tanks have been set up to delve deep into challenges faced by the industry in specific areas. Besides, a Task Force on Artificial Intelligence for India’s Economic Transformation has also been constituted which will provide inputs for the policy, the statement said. Since the last Industrial Policy announced in 1991, India has transformed into one of the fastest growing economies in the world and is now equipped to deploy a different set of ideas and strategies to build a globally competitive Indian industry, it added.
•The discussion paper said the constraints to industrial growth include inadequate infrastructure, restrictive labour laws, complicated business environment, slow technology adoption, low productivity, challenges for trade including the Indian MSME sector facing tough competition from cheap imports from China and FTA countries, inadequate expenditure on R&D and Innovation. These constraints work in tandem to increase cost of goods and services, it said. “As they are strongly entwined, they exacerbate the disadvantages. The nexus needs to be broken at more than one link to ensure that the spin-off is in the positive direction,” the paper added.
