The Indian government wants to take up the 2000-km road project along the McMahon line from Mago-Thingbu in Tawang district to Vijaynagar in the Changlang district of Arunachal Pradesh to match China’s infrastructure development along the border at an estimated cost of Rs 40,000 crore.

Sources in the union Home and Foreign ministries believe construction of the road is vital for India as China has already spread their network of roads and rail network near the border. Thus the latest refrain from New Delhi: “whatever we make on our territory should not be a concern of China”.

The foreign ministry sources say New Delhi cherishes a happy-go relationship with Beijing and other countries too in the neighbourhood like Singapore, Myanmar and Thailand.

From New Delhi’s point of view, they argue eloquently, that India’s economic and strategic cooperation with these countries in general and China in particular are guided by the conviction that the welfare of the people of India and these countries is interlinked. It is this organic nature of relationship between the people in both the countries that reinforces the economic and diplomatic cooperation for shared benefits.

Thus, they find the Chinese objection untenable. On its part China fielded its Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei in Beijing to raise its objection with the oft-repeated argument that the Indian side will not take any action that could further complicate the relevant issue, so as to preserve the current situation of peace and stability in the border areas.

Only in September 2014, India and China agreed to pull back troops ranged against each other in Ladakh, ending their biggest eyeball to eyeball face-off at the border in a year. Prior to that the two armies had mobilised about 1,000 soldiers each.

ASSERTIVE INDIA:

Alarmed by Chinese objections, India has decided to take a firm stance. Reportedly with the direction of the Prime Minister Office if not the Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh sent a strong message to China and asserted that no one can warn India.

“Today, no one can give warning to India. We are a very powerful country,” Rajnath Singh told reporters at Manesar in Haryana.

India did not leave the matter at that. Rajnath’s junior in the Home ministry, Kiren Rijiju, himself an elected MP from Arunachal Pradesh, made it clear the very next day that it is within India’s sovereign right to “develop our own region”.

Swati Deb

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