| Published on 28-03-2008 In National |
| Viewed 2022 times |
| What is BJP harping about Tibet? |
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Written by
Nilotpal Basu |
Predictably the BJP has jumped into the fray. Top Leaders of the Party, including the Leader of the Opposition – L.K Advani has joined the shrill cacophony of the Western World to condemn the Chinese Authorities over the developments in Tibet. These Leaders have voiced their 'indignation' over what they called "indiscriminate violence" by Chinese forces. They have not only stopped at that, but also criticized the Indian Government for "blatant appeasement towards China with scant regard to the country's national honour and foreign policy independence".
Paradoxically the BJP's position reflects the same foreign policy sub-ordination to western powers, which ironically they claim is 'foreign policy independence'. While the BJP claims that India's opposition to China on the Tibet question should be premised on ancient cultural ties and "unique spiritual linkage" between our country and Tibet – speaking out would not be construed as 'interference'. In their zeal to lambast China and remain intellectually loyal to their western mentors, they quite forgot the official Indian position that Tibet is an integral part of China – and it was even so during the Vajpayee days in South Block.
Obviously, the BJP's stated position is almost a mirror image of the American position – so candidly articulated by Nancy Pelosi - the ebullient Speaker of the US House of Representatives. Pelosi was at her moralizing best when she visited Dharamsala to express solidarity with Dalai Lama. She stated "speaking for myself, I would say if freedom loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China's oppression in Tibet we have lost our moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world." Ms Pelosi was symptomatic of the grand standing that the western world has exhibited with such flair to castigate China's handling of the Tibet 'disturbances'. That Ms. Pelosi and her other western compatriots cannot marshal a semblance of this moral outrage over the daily developments in Iraq – in the Abu Ghraib prison, in the torture chambers of Guantanamo Bay or the extinguishing of medical and energy supplies to the occupied Palestinian population in Gaza strip – is an altogether different proposition!
Those of us who are accustomed to the coloured disinformation of the western media would tend to take the reality of the riots that broke out in Lhasa on March 14 and accounted for 22 lives with a pinch of salt! The events were nowhere near the 'democratic upsurge' of 'colonized' Tibetans 'craving for freedom' against the Han Chinese Communist rule.
Visual coverage now available clearly established the criminal complicity of militant monks against innocent civilians signaling ethnic violence. Violence of a similar nature has also taken place in other Chinese provinces of Gansu and Sichuan with ethnic Tibetan communities.
There is also extensive evidence in the Indian media about the orchestrated nature of protest by Tibetans in India including fasts and storming of Chinese Embassy premises for ensuring an 'appropriate global coverage' by the western media. So much so, that even Dalai Lama's press conference is timed to suit western prime time.
But at the end of the day what is the demand? Now that it has been proved that the violence in Lhasa or elsewhere in China cannot be justified under any circumstances, the western world has started demanding that the Chinese Government must talk to the Dalai Lama. The western powers has no other go but to take this position because no Government till now has been able to derecognise the fact that the Tibet autonomous region is very much part of the People's Republic of China. But it is exactly what the Chinese Government is doing. Accompanied with great strides towards the building of infrastructure and development of Tibet the Chinese Government had six rounds of discussions for ensuring a political solution of the Tibet question. Even the Dalai Lama has stated that the essence of his approach is to "recognise today's reality that Tibet is part of the People's Republic of China…and not raise the issue of separation from China in working on a mutually acceptable solution for Tibet."
In such a background the laments of the western powers and their faithful in the form of BJP Leaders only smacks of sheer hypocrisy. Any Government worth the salt would not flinch from dealing with the violence to trigger off ethnic disharmony as the Chinese have done. The attempts by some of the western Governments to demonize China and undermine the holding of the Olympic Games can only create new flash points of tension in the present international environment. Saner counsel should prevail to avert such an unfortunate course of development.
Finally, the Chinese Government has gone out of the way to put on record its appreciation for the Indian Authorities for maintaining the principle of non-interference. This is a sound asset for us since we have been past victims by the very same western moralizing on the question of Jammu & Kashmir. Are Messers Advani and Rajnath Singh listening?
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