The Arunachal Factor

China might be deeply engaged in scripting a response to the proposed visit of the Dalai Lama to Tawang in November, because Tawang, in Beijing’s theory of an expanded nation-state comprising annexed territories, belongs only to China for the town being the birthplace of the sixth Dalai Lama in the 17th century. But that should not worry India. The Dalai Lama’s, as his secretary has clarified from Dharamsala, will not be a political visit. He will be landing in Tawang for religious/spiritual purposes; according to the secretary, the Dalai Lama has received an invitation from some local Buddhists. However, for China, given its obsession with Arunachal Pradesh and the influence of Tibetan Buddhism in areas like Tawang, there will hardly be any difference between religious and political visit by the Dalai Lama to Tawang. Yet, because India has allowed the Dalai Lama to live in the country ever since he fled Tibet in 1959 following Chinese aggression, and because his is a non-violent, spiritual attempt to consolidate Tibetan voice and save a culture and tradition from suppression and extinction, the Tibetan spiritual leader has all the right to visit Tawang and see how that great spiritual tradition is flourishing in that part of the world. There cannot be any room for technicalities to deter the Dalai Lama from undertaking a spiritual journey to Tawang; if there are any, they will be just for the sake of the sustained charade of diplomacy that has not, and cannot, serve Indian interests. The Dalai Lama is not visiting Tawang to bombard China with missiles from that part of Arunachal Pradesh. Also, New Delhi need not be apologetic about the symbolism of the Dalai Lama’s visit in any way as it has tended to on some past occasions. The logic is simple: since the Dalai Lama has been granted asylum in India, and Tawang, a seat of Tibetan Buddhism, belongs to India, the Tibetan spiritual leader naturally enjoys freedom to visit Tawang for spiritual purposes — despite the fact that China would give such visits a political colour.

Symbolism apart, including the past visits of the President and the Prime Minister to Arunachal Pradesh to assert the Indianness of ‘‘the land of the rising sun’’ as they have described and that will remain an ‘‘integral’’ part of India forever, what New Delhi should seriously ponder is infrastructure build-up in the hinterland, considering especially the marvel of infrastructure that China has developed on its side of the border with Arunachal Pradesh and the Tibet plateau — not just for development in the Tibetan region but also for rapid troop mobilization in case of emergency. It is time New Delhi woke up to the reality and expedited infrastructure development, mainly road connectivity, in Arunachal Pradesh. It will also be the best reward to the deep sense of attachment that the Arunachalis have with the idea of India. Let us celebrate such people and their sentiments in the hinterland. And let us grow as one people that way. THE SENTINEL