NEW DELHI:A former career intelligence officer, a seasoned diplomat and a pracharak-turned-politician form the key group which shaped Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s China policy – talk business, but also talk tough.
While Modi wowed the Chinese leadership with oratorical skills and digital diplomacy, three of his trusted men played a crucial role in making the visit a ‘success.’ Their mandate was to ensure that their boss’ first-ever visit to the Communist nation as PM was fruitful. When Modi sat down with the top brass of the Chinese government, his men Friday were on his right side, to be precise.
By dint of seniority, National Security Adviser, Ajit Doval, sat right to the PM and Foreign Secretary, S Jaishankar, next to him. Both played seemingly equal and complementary roles in moulding not just the PM’s vision on China, but also in setting the agenda to further Sino-Indian relations.
The groundwork for the visit, including reaching out to about 48,000 Indians in China, had already been done by BJP’s Ram Madhav, who is seen as Modi’s ambassador-at-large to NRIs. Ram is also the incharge of the PM’s public events abroad.
Doval’s brief was mainly to deal with border issues and security challenges with his vast experience as India’s ‘superspy.’ Interestingly, he had even written a paper on Chinese Intelligence.
Jaishankar, India’s former Ambassador to China, has played sounding board for a variety of issues -- from border challenges to investments. It may be noted that Modi had met top Chinese CEOs and pacts worth $22 billion were signed. Modi first encountered the suave Jaishankar in China, when he went there as Gujarat Chief Minister. A few years later, the PM ensured that Jaishankar is his Foreign Secretary and curtailed the then Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh’s tenure.
While Jaishankar came into the picture officially only in January, Doval, who is dubbed as the James Bond among Indian spies, did take a perceived lead in formulating the China policy, with inputs from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
During the last 12 months, Indian and Chinese officials have held at least 14 meetings. Of these, Doval himself had held two standalone meetings -- as PM’s Special Envoy to China in September and the with State Councillor Yang Jiechi in Munich in February. “I don’t think he has given a great deal of thought to China before being appointed the NSA, except for its Intelligence capabilities, on which, he had published a detailed paper in June 2013. There is little evidence in his writing about the broad, strategic aspects of Sino-Indian relationship, or granular details on something like the border dispute,” Shashank Joshi of Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), London, who had worked with Doval, said.
Incidentally, Modi had consultations on China with several experts, including Doval’s predecessor in the National Security Council Secretariat Shiv Shankar Menon and former Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran -- two career diplomats who had lived in and studied the country. Doval, in a 2012 article, had spelt out three areas where a rising China would needle India -- militarisation and increased aggressiveness on border areas, nexus with Pakistan and spreading footprint in the Indian Ocean Region.
It is in India’s maritime neighbourhood that Doval has a clear imprint. In December, he had conveyed India’s objection to the Chinese Naval submarines berthing at Colombo port to the then Lankan President.