Nepal has included three thousand thirty-five square kilometers area in their political map and they claimed it as their own land not India’s. The areas, Nepal has shown in their map are Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhuray.
Their judgement is, according to the contract of the British Administration in 1816, these are their lands and India is using them. On the other hand, India dismissed Nepal’s claim. Their concern is that, it is totally Indian Territory and what Nepal is telling now is totally baseless.
India and Nepal are close neighbouring countries. All over the world, it is a common feature that two neighboring countries always suffer from some border landmark problems. And it is always settled down with the help of negotiation not the vaguely or by the cannons. In this South Asia, we are seeing that India and Pakistan have a territorial problem in Jammu and Kashmir.
For this problem, these two countries betrothed in at least five wars. But no solution came out yet. On the contrary, after the creation of Bangladesh, India and Bangladesh found out there were many landmark disputes existing between them.
And it was not settled in the era of Pakistan. In 1974, two countries came to an agreement at the stage of Prime Minister Level. In that agreement, they sorted out all the disputed areas would be marked and each country would hand over the other’s territory.
To establish this agreement, it was needed for both countries to pass the agreement and hand over the territory rights in the parliament. The Bangladesh government passed it in 1974 but it was not implemented then.
Because, Indian government could not pass it and long delay was happened regarding this issue because of the absence of political government in Bangladesh and also the lack of good relations between these two countries.
After a huge political turmoil, India and Bangladesh became good friendly neighbors in 2009. But then Indian government parties were not in enough majority by which they would pass the agreement in the parliament.
In 2014, Indian power party had that much majority. Besides, the opposition also supported the government party and they ratified the agreement in the parliament. In that way, these two countries settled their border landmark disputed lands peacefully.
We all know that anyone can disagree with his relatives but not disagree with his neighbors. So, when a bad relation arises between two neighbors then some things obviously happen. First, two neighbors always engage in many conflicts; those basically hamper two countries’ economic, social, cultural even human development.
Because, two neighbouring countries share some common economic, social, cultural and human development aspects. Secondly, some other countries get entrance issuing that conflict. This is always happening in the case of India and Pakistan.
If India and Pakistan maintained a good relation from 1947 to present, it is obvious these two countries could have been achieved at least 30 percent more economic and social development what they are enjoying now.
Besides, many bad elements basically the terrorist groups get shelter in Pakistan in the name of blowing India. Simultaneously, one kind of Hindu jingoism has risen in India capitalised hate Pakistan campaign. Besides, India’s economic rival, China got upper hand in Pakistan.
They have not only occupied the Pakistani economy market but also established their control over Pakistan Army and one of the naval port in Pakistan and Shaksgam of Kashmir.
So, there are two examples in front of Nepal now; one Pakistan another Bangladesh which will they choose? If they choose the way of Bangladesh, they have to go for negotiation with India for solving the border dispute.
Then, it may take time but nothing will be hampered between these two countries. As a neighbour, they can enjoy all the facilities from each other and continue the negotiation. If they walk on this path, they can maintain their all types of relation with other countries and that will not hamper the negotiation between India and them.
Contrary, if they walk in the way of Pakistan, then obviously their another neighbour, the Indian economic rival China will get upper hand. All the concerned people of this area know that an anti-Indian sentiment has risen in Nepal. It was four years ago when I visited a South-East Asian country for joining a conference.
In that occasion, many diplomats and strategists from different countries joined. At a stage, I got chance to talk some young Nepali diplomats. In that conversation, they expressed their higher praise to China and anger against India. As a journalist of Indian close neighbor and a small country, this sentiment is very common to me.
It is one of the common failure of India that they could not incredulous the anti-Indian sentiment from their small close neighbouring countries.
The same anti Indian sentiment I have seen in Maldives and Sri Lanka. It is a big question that why India failed to overcome this wound of the heart from its small neighbouring country people.
Such as, China is demolishing the Muslims of Uighurs but none of the Maulanas (Islamic Clerics) from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Maldives uttered any single word.
But they all are concerned about Indian Muslims. So, India should understand that their neighbours are more concerned about them. They should think and behave in that way of which none of its neighbouring people hurt by their country and theirpeoples behave.
However, now the question is that will the Nepali Prime Minister, K.P. Oli, go for negotiation with India or use the anti-Indian sentiment of his country that will create a fight against India? The people who are anti-Indian in Nepal have a soft sentiment to China; what was told earlier about Nepali young diplomats.
So, when Mr. K.P. Oli will go to use the anti-Indian sentiment, then a pro Chinese sentiment will get upper hand in his country. Following this way of pro Chinese sentiment, China can get entrance in Nepal. Besides, some political analysts are telling, Nepal is doing this with the help of China.
It is not clear yet if China is helping Nepal or not. And it is far way what will happen between Nepal and India, Nepal and China, in future. But now is the time for Nepal to analyse the character of its two neighbor China and India.
They can analyse only two or three incidents from the past history. First, they can go for analysing Indian history. In 1971, India helped Bangladeshi freedom fighters supporting with their conventional army. Bangladeshi freedom fighters along with Indian conventional army defeated Pakistani Army and Bangladesh got free.
After defeating Pakistani Army, Indian Army stayed in Bangladesh only six to seven weeks. After the Second World War to still there is the example, India the only country withdrawn their army from other’s lands as soon as possible. Not only that the Indian army occupied huge area in the western side of Pakistan but also they retreated on their own will.
They didn’t occupy an inch of Pakistani land in the western front. Besides, India sent their army in Sri Lanka for peace keeping in Tamil crisis in 1987 but they had withdrawn soldiers in 1990. Even then, they sent one thousand sixteen hundred troops in Maldives for saving their President from a military coup d’état. But their soldiers did not stay there.
On the other hand, Nepal can remember the history of Tibet. In 1950, People Liberation Army of China entered the Tibet. After this, 1.2 million Tibetans sacrificed their lives and still they are fighting by staying various countries of the world. And Tibet is the territory of China now.
Some analysts are saying that Nepal is fuming now with the help of China. But they have to think about what will be the prejudice in the name of help if Chinese troops enter in Nepal!
Swadesh Roy, Senior Journalist, Dhaka, Bangladesh. He is a highest state award winning journalist and can be reached at [email protected]