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BIMSTEC and its Geo-strategic Importance G V C Naidu Initiated in 1997 at the instance of Thailand, BIMSTEC Bay of Bengal Community Initiative for Multisectoral, Technical and Economic Cooperation has since come a long way to promote the idea of sub-regional cooperation comprising a region that has enormous untapped potential. This is a unique initiative in the sense its membership consists of nations from both South and Southeast Asian regions. When Thailand mooted the idea, it on the one hand was looking at tapping vast economic potential of India, and on the other, it was beginning to understand the growing Chinese economic clout in Southeast Asia and excessive dependence on its markets. Bangkok was keen to exploit its geostrategic location to make forays into Myanmar and other South Asian countries to its west as well. Hence, it had become necessary to evolve an institutional mechanism to channellise cooperation in the region. The BIMSTEC unfortunately could not take off and many of the earlier plans had to be kept on hold because of the debilitating effect of the 1997-98 financial crisis that hit Thailand and other countries of the Asia Pacific. It was only after Thailand recovered from that crisis that renewed efforts were made to rejuvenate this organisation. Judging from the fervour, it appears BIMSTEC is likely to become a major foreign policy preoccupation of India and other member states.
BIMSTEC: Origin, Growth and Progress Tridib Chakraborti
Having discussed the origin, growth and progress of BIMSTEC, as a sub-regional organisation in the context of the new global order, certain questions still remain pertaining to its utility. Is BIMSTEC an alternative model of SAARC? What is the utility of BIMSTEC in the context of India’s ‘Look East Policy’? The answers to these questions could well be positive. It is true that regional integration is a building block, not a substitute, to greater integration with the global community. Regional integration agreements are required to be inclusive, for an exclusive one could be a bane, rather than a boon to global integration. During the decade of its existence, BIMSTEC did not offer an alternative model of SAARC. Since SAARC has always been bogged down by intra-regional differences, particularly relating to Indo-Pakistan rivalries, its progress has been too slow to be tangible. It is in the economic field, first through preferential (SAPTA), followed by Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA), that SAARC has demonstrated some degree of corporeal collective purpose. Barring India and Pakistan, the other five member states had been consistent disciples of regional integration, as their destiny and identity remain deeply tied to the success of this regional organization. Among the momentous decisions adopted by the SAARC members so far, a large number of initiatives have come largely from the smaller states of South Asia. The need to make the regional association a better platform has become far more essential with the advent of globalisation. Given this situation, it is imperative for the SAARC members to think regionally rather than locally, in the context of a market-driven global economy. Thus, in the milieu of regional economic integration in the new global order, the emergence of BIMSTEC does not stand in opposition to SAARC. In fact, the Bay of Bengal Community could act as a complement rather than a substitute to SAARC’s prosperity and its efforts to promote a free trade area in South Asia by offering a larger space for the SAARC states to engage in trade, commerce and marketing with Southeast and East Asia. The BIMSTEC could also act as a spur to SAARC on economic cooperation. Furthermore, with the end of the Cold War, the strategic alliances withered away and were replaced by regional trading blocs. The process of globalization is not likely to end in a scurry, and the current dictum of ‘trade or perish’ seems to be gaining enhanced strength and urgency. BIMSTEC‘s growth, through its experience of a decade, has not only been slow in taking off, but it still faces serious uncertainties, such as coping with incompatibilities and the onerous demands of regionalism over nationalism, and hastening the process of meaningful integration; deepening and expanding cooperation areas and arrangements; and initiating quick and result-oriented short gestation cooperation projects, based on effective and proactive measures for better understanding among the member countries are deemed essential. The sooner the BIMSTEC countries realise this and learn how to work successfully and actively in consort, the better it will be for their peoples. Moreover, since India and Thailand are economically more developed in comparison to the other members, it is their conscientiousness to play a more pragmatic, imperative and responsible role for a prosperous future in order to develop BIMSTEC as a successful sub-regional organisation in the context of the new global order.
BIMSTEC or the Big Leap Forward for India’s Northeast? Samir Kumar Das
If India’s Northeast were to benefit from the Look East policy, the region needs to be thoroughly recast in a way that will have its obvious implications for the nature and character of our nation-state. First of all, we need to ‘soften’ and ‘open’ borders in a way that will not unduly harm our interests and assets in the region. This should not be misunderstood as doing away with borders. Secondly and as a corollary to the first, such softening of borders also presupposes recognition of the double if not the multiple nature of people’s identities. Insofar as one’s identity is perched between two or more nation-states (like those of the Nagas and the Kuki-Chins between India and Myanmar etc) probably the instrumentality of double citizenship could be a tribute to one’s ethnic and community identity that spreads across the nation-states. Thirdly, we have also to recognise that in the era of globalisation there will remain with a state’s territory different groups and grades of people other than the commonplace binary categories of citizens and foreigners. The so-called ‘illegal migrants’ largely employed in low-paying, extremely uncertain and absolutely unorganized sectors of the economy constitute such a lot and it will be simply impossible for us to detect, disenfranchise and deport them. Assam since the movement of 1979-1985 serves as an illustration. The ‘work permit’ regime proposed by Sanjoy Hazarika and others (Hazarika 2000) is meant to address and alleviate the problems that spring from the supposedly huge number of immigrants in the region. Many policy analysts would argue that labour mobility particularly in the age of globalisation looks nearly unstoppable, notwithstanding the national borders and restrictions imposed on international migration. Under these conditions, it would be difficult to put in place a legal regime that continues to take impenetrability of borders for granted. Rather a work permit regime advocated by some scholars would go a long way in solving the problem. The work permit regime entitles the immigrant worker to work in another country in a group where cheap labour is in great demand, but not to stay and settle or be regularised as citizens. The group collectively serves as a guarantee against the possibility of their ‘melting’ into the vast sea of citizens. While it is possible to keep a tab on the group of workers it is not so in the case of a single individual. The demand for cheap labour is met by the steady supply of immigrants from across the borders. The economic rationale is bound to work in favour of immigration. It is necessary to see that it does not create any political problem for us and elicit xenophobic reactions from the natives and the locals. The work permit according to Hazarika is going to be issued for a fixed period and unless renewed the group as a whole will have to quit once the period is expired. This is the only alternative that, to their mind, is capable of solving the dilemma of separating the citizens from the workers.
BIMSTEC Perspective in India-Myanmar Relations and Northeast India Factor Langpoklakpam Suraj Singh
The uniqueness of BIMSTEC that it provides a unique link between South Asia and Southeast Asia, bringing together 1.32 billion people, a combined GDP of US $ 800 billion and a considerable amount of complementarities. With 13 priority sectors lead by member countries in a voluntary manner, this grouping is working for regional economic growth and trade liberalisation1 . In the last few years, BIMSTEC economies have been growing at a faster pace than of some other dominant blocs. According to Centre for Study in International Relations and Development (Kolkata), the region witnessed an average 6 percent growth rate in GDP and 5 percent in GDP per capita in 2005. Studies also show the potential of US $ 43 to 59 billion trade creation under BIMSTEC FTA once it is signed and implemented. Having a cross regional dimension this grouping aims for a multi- pronged approach towards the development perspective of the region. BIMSTEC is in between two already existing regional organisations in South and Southeast Asia — South Asian Association for regional Cooperation (SAARC) and Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) respectively — aimed at fostering development of these regions. Besides, it also serves as strategic link of cooperation in the framework of Greater Mekong Sub-Region (GMS), Ganga-Mekong Cooperation (GMC) and Kunming Initiative. The enormous pressures of globalisation are forcing countries in the region to seek greater efficiency through larger markets, increased competition, access to superior technology and greater FDI that can only be achieved through Regional Trading Arrangements (RTAs) and Regional Integration Arrangements (RIAs). Regional economic integration in the region is also desirable as it has the potential to exploit their considerable synergies and complementarities for the mutual advantage2 . This is what BIMSTEC aims at because with such arrangement there are mutually beneficial strategic and security reasons also.
Bangladesh’s Perception of BIMSTEC: An Analysis Mohor Chakraborty According to the policy-makers of Bangladesh, the institutionalisation of BIMSTEC acted as an engine of regional coordination and integration, not only with the SAARC member-countries like India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan, but with the greater part of East Asia, particularly through the connectivity with Myanmar and Thailand, which are members of the ASEAN as well. Besides bolstering economic equations among the fellow-members of the organisation, their political relations could be cemented through deliberations and commonalities arrived at the BIMSTEC forum. Bangladesh’s dwindling experience with the SAARC process, particularly in the perspective of Indo-Pakistan politics, generated greater impetus in its diplomatic psyche for enhancing meaningful regionalism, and its association with the BIMSTEC was a well-structured means for that end. The Founding Father of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had an inherent belief in the closest possible cooperation among the neighbours in a region and between various regions. He had also acknowledged the fact, that interaction between sub-regions of countries could bring immense benefit to their populations. Since its independence in 1971, successive governments in the country had welcomed sub-regional cooperation - manifested in the incarnation of the SAARC in 1985, followed by the BIMSTEC experiment in 1997 - in pursuit of optimum management and utilisation of resources, and as media for the acceleration of the phenomena of economic transformation and integration of component regions. The currents of liberalisation and globalizstion of international economy, with the advent of the chronicle of the post cold war era and termination of bloc rivalry, not only created opportunities but also posed serious challenges for countries of the Third World, by making interdependence the key factor to survive in the face of stiff competitiveness. It is in the countenance of such.... competition and complementarity that regional cooperation proved successful in enhancing the economic ties. Bangladesh charted the BIMSTEC as a cementing platform between booming and potential markets in the Southeast and South Asian regions, by throwing open new vistas that had remained untapped in the cold war era, just preceding the process of economic liberalisation in a majority of the countries of the Third World, with its repercussions on the forays of regional, sub-regional, intra-regional groupings and growth triangles. Particular accent in encouraging the concept of regionalism was laid by the former Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, who attached great importance to the issue of regional association. In Bangladesh’s estimation, BIMSTEC is a unique tether between South Asia and Southeast Asia bringing together 1.3 billion people - 21 percent of the world population, a combined Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of US$750 billion, and a considerable amount of complementarity given geographical contiguity, differing levels of development and resource endowments. The BIMSTEC is also an engine for creating an enabling environment for rapid economic development through identification and implementation of specific cooperation projects in the sectors of trade, investment and industry, technology, human resource development, tourism, agriculture, energy, and infrastructure and transportation; the acceleration of economic growth and social progress in the sub-region through joint endeavours in a spirit of equality and partnership; and the promotion of active collaboration and mutual assistance on matters of common interest in the economic, social, technical and scientific fields.
BIMSTEC and SAARC: Understanding the Linkages Padmaja Murthy Though, SAARC and BIMSTEC arose in response to a different domestic and international environment, presently both are faced with the same socio-economic challenges which transcend national boundaries and wherein globalisation dictates the economic agenda. Both SAARC and BIMSTEC are linked by countries having membership of both the groupings; similar issues in their respective agenda; the important program of sub-regional cooperation; the primacy attached to the economic agenda and consequently to connectivity and energy security; also both are grappling with non performance and thus devising strategies to be more relevant and effective as instruments of regional cooperation. They are both different organisation but the performance of either will only benefit each other. There is a point of view that India should focus on BIMSTEC, given that SAARC has failed to deliver the goods. However, it needs to be stressed that while BIMSTEC opens gateways to South East Asia, SAARC just cannot be overlooked. For India, making it work is not a question of choice but of necessity. Former Prime Minister I K Gujral had said that India’s stature and strength cannot be divorced from the quality of its relations with the immediate neighbours. SAARC is an important mechanism to have cordial relations with India’s immediate neighbourhood. Both SAARC and BIMSTEC have effective instruments of peace and stability and should draw maximum benefits from both.
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