That’s the view of a Chinese strategic expert. The funniest part is:
China can give political support to Bangladesh enabling the latter to encourage ethnic Bengalis in India to get rid of Indian control and unite with Bangladesh as one Bengali nation; if the same is not possible, creation of at least another free Bengali nation state as a friendly neighbour of Bangladesh, would be desirable, for the purpose of weakening India’s expansion and threat aimed at forming a ‘unified South Asia’. [DS Rajan]
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 
Comic people and thoughts!
It reminds stories of spreading the swine flu scare just to sell pills ; just expressing a loose association that occurs to mind-
Not expecting out through moderation, either.
Cheers!
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It is quite a plausible threat. There is nothing comic about it as we have a history of separatist movements funded by outside forces which started quite similarly. China is no holy angel when it comes to intrusive foreign policy.
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shanta, so if the chinese “expert” had any understanding of india, he would have taken an example of those states and their secessionist movement.
please do enlighten me on which separatist movement has been started by bengalis in india since 1947…
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Scribina – I was referring to the separatist movements like Khalistan and in the North East. They have been actively funded by outside forces not necessarily China. China has much to gain from the destabilization of India. The Naxal movement is not all indegenous and have their tacit support from China. We would be naive if we believe that it is an indegenous movement against exploitation.
The Naxalbari movement have their
It would be too naive to believe that thet
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just questions from a foolish non-indian:
why would the break up of india be bad?
are all separatist movements in india funded by outsiders?
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Hi Pradeep,
Do you really need that ‘foolish non-Indian’ bit to make your point ?
In the reverse order: there are separatist movements in India and then there are movements for subnational autonomy. Quite often the former emerge as strands within the latter and consolidate at some point as independent blocks. The exchanges between these two types of challenges to the Indian national state wax and wane. All this is not very different from the way such movements elsewhere.
Groups that campaign for outright secession from India actively court outside support whether it is from transnational networks of people sharing that ethnic, regional identity or from agencies of governments or from supranational agencies. (Maoists are not secessionists). Afterall, separatism is about creation of a new international boundary and it cannot be done without the support of international actors. This too is not unique to separatist movements in India.
Isnt all this elementary? I am still groping to understand the purpose of your question – are all separatist movements in India funded by outsiders. It doesnt seem to be a question to seek information. What is the point ?
The first part of the question – why would it be bad ? Can we think of any break up that is not preceded and followed by incalcuable violence ? Any new nation state to establish its own identity will have to go through its own ritual cleansing.
Perhaps it is worth it some times. Perhaps it is never worth it. I am no judge. But am I to take it that you are willing to wager that in this instance or that all secessions are automatically justifiable simply because they are secessions?
Frankly, I am a little intrigued by the original article. This particular article originates in Chennai. The background buzz to this is the perception that China is gaining a foothold in Sri Lanka and more broadly in the Indian Ocean. There are Tamil groups who are upset about this. And then there are people who are claiming that in the emergining geopolitical/geoeconomic order, Indian national interests are to reappraised, by seeing China as a threat. There is a complex terrain of Tamil politics from which this voice is speaking.
More immediately, I dont know who will benefit from the escalation of these hostilities. But the underlying theme in the discussions around this seems to be the capacity of nation states in this region to act as sovereign powers. Whether China will support secessionist movements in India or not, whether a break up here or there will be necessarily good or bad — those questions cannot be addressed without some normative understanding/critique of the extant/emergent geopolitial order and against that backdrop – some sense of where we stand vis a vis the ongoing and potential bloodshed.
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breaking up india and anihilation of hindus/hinduism has been the dream of many including tamil nationalists who follow periyar,
m-l movements that insist that india is a prison house of nationalities.periyar himself wrote about dravidaland and according to s.v.rajadurai, he i.e. periyar was firm on establishing a nation for tamils till his death. the success of maoist movement in nepal is due to many factors
including support from abroad.so the ideas expressed in the article may seem to be
lunatic but they cannot be dismissed so.
‘why would the break up of india be bad?’
bad for whom and good for whom is the right
question?.
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The maverick Chinese expert, I am sure, has his counterparts in the Indian community of ‘strategic’ experts who have been arguing for the breaking up of Sri Lanka, Pakistan, large bits of Central Asia and China with their own little bits of self assurance intact.
in my understanding, if keeping the geo-political entity currently designated as the ‘Republic of India’ (or any other state, for that matter) together by force resulted in greater human suffering, then breaking up such an entity into smaller units would not be a bad idea.
Conversely, if breaking up such an entity caused greater suffering than keeping it together entailed, then there would be some sense in making sure it held together.
I think all arguments about the destiny of states need to be made on the basis of the consequences of change or continuity alone, not on the grounds of the immutability of the state in question. I fail to see why the map of a state, of any state, be it China, or India, ought to be considered sacred by anybody.
A nation-state is a piece of real estate with a flag as a signboard. What matters is whether or not its denizens have the best means to attain a good life, not the size or the shape of the plot of land.
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There are many ideas of India, and hence, virtually many Indias.
The constitutional idea of India as a sovereign socialist, democratic and secular republic is in stark contrast with an increasingly militarizing India which fails majority of its people.
The latter perhaps hardly represents not even more than 10 percent of all Indians.
The case seems to be not much different with many other elite sovereign powers ,especially those wielding the huge stock of Weapons of Mass Destruction and claiming absolute police power over other sovereignties questioning the flawed logic of militarization ,expansionism ,aggression and looting of resources.
The latter India, despite its shameful status in Human Resources Development Indices as low as 170th among the list of 175 countries, has but no shame in calling it as an emerging ‘super power’ on the strength of its military might with few nuclear-headed submarines and missiles!
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guys leave the article be… it is just a bogus piece. “YY article” in Chinese, if you get the meaning…
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