India-China relations have attracted international attention ever since the bloody clashes took place in Galwan Valley of Ladakh eight months ago. The clashes resulted in the tragic deaths of twenty Indian soldiers and the capture of another ten. Reportedly, China captured over one thousand square kilometers of land on the Indian side of the border. The Chinese refused to backtrack. This refusal lead to the first bloody conflict between the two nations in decades.

The Indian army subsequently moved to capture key heights, overlooking Chinese positions forcing a stalemate. There have been several rounds of talks between the two sides since then; all promising but nothing substantive till now. Meanwhile, China extended its field of play along 2,200 miles of the Indo-China border. As recently as last week, it was reported that the Chinese had built an entire village in Arunachal Pradesh. There was another non-fatal clash between the two armies along the Sikkim border, this too on the north-eastern side of the Indian border.

While all of this hasn’t occurred suddenly – in 2017 the two armies came face to face for weeks in Doklam at the Bhutan border – what has certainly changed is the two supposed strongmen, at the helm of national affairs. This rapid change has occurred in both the countries at a time when geo-political realities are in a tailspin.

Facing a humiliating defeat at the hands of China in 1962, along with a near closure of the walls between the two countries, things began to improve only in the post-Cold War context. With both countries increasingly making overtures to each other, a new leaf was turned with then Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi’s visit to Beijing. From a gradual establishment of border dialogues, leading to established protocols of disengagement around border disputes, a turn towards deeper economic co-operation was amicable. This change occurred despite China’s backing of Pakistan on the latter’s ongoing strategic conflict with India that apparently grew with the coming of the Modi era. While at home Modi continued to base his popularity on publicly bashing Pakistan, during the same period he created bilateral and interpersonal ties with Xi Jinping. The two leaders have met eighteen times, stopping only after an escalation of the border conflict. However, despite the escalation the Indian prime minister has continued to remain silent and largely allowed his ministers and defence staff to do the briefings.

The prime minister’s silence is caused not only by the fact that China is militarily fourfold stronger than India, it is also due to the strength of the Chinese economy which India cannot hope to match in the near future, especially after the pandemic. Economically, China is five times larger than India. A reason for the prime minister’s silence also lies in the fact that even during this period, China has emerged as India’s largest trading partner, pushing the United States (US) to the second spot notwithstanding India’s symbolic banning of a few dozen Chinese applications.

A major change in India’s international policy was that unlike the Nehruvian legacy of non-alignment, the Modi government openly canvassed for the recently ousted Trump government. His slogan of Abki Baar, Trump Sarkar (This time, a Trump government), showed a distinct change from the Indian geo-political positioning of retaining a strong and independent voice. Instead, the new government was swayed by the superpowers. This happened at a time when Trump had chosen to publicly nominate China as a major enemy. The US was seen raging against China’s economic dominance, geo-political positioning and setting the country as the new US rival in the post-Cold War era. Trump fanned the US-China clash by backing the idea of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, an “Asian arch of democracy” constituting Japan, Australia, United States and India.

According to recent prematurely declassified foreign policy documents, Trump administration saw India as a counterbalance to China in the Asia-Pacific region, pledging strategic military and diplomatic support to India. This was certainly a key policy shift from earlier years although Modi continued to assure China through his publicly trumpeted bilateral meetings with the Chinese premier. What seems to have upped the proverbial ante is India’s revocation of the Article 370 with respect to Jammu and Kashmir. This led to harsh public criticism from China, very soon to be followed by the Ladakh intrusions.

With the coming of the Biden government, things have become more uncertain for India. Many of the US president’s team members including Vice President Kamala Harris are no fans of the Indian prime minister. The new US officials especially look down on the Modi government’s record of crushing minorities and its disregard of human rights. The big question for Prime Minister Modi right now is: how to retain its balancing act against China at a time when its one key possible backer may not be very forthcoming in its support.

The writer has been in the development sector for more than a decade and currently works with an international non-governmental organisation based in Delhi. He may be reached at:    avinashcold@gmail.com