Singapore Trip

Drawing on extensive interviews with Lee and many others,Datta-Ray takes us chronologically over a large historical terrain. Given Singapore’s political and economic trajectory,it is interesting that at the outset,Lee looked upon India as a model for managing the transition from colonialism: in governance,economic development and foreign relations. These were,of course,Lee’s “socialist” years. But there was a more personal element to it: his admiration for Jawaharlal Nehru.

Over time,Lee’s views on India became more qualified. Two major factors contributed to this change. First,India’s laggard economic growth made any serious,meaningful economic cooperation rather difficult. Until the late 1960s,Lee had hoped India would push ahead of China on the economic front. He had always admired India’s private corporations. The Tatas,for instance,were invited to set up a pioneering industry in Singapore. Looking back,he feels (characteristically) that it was India’s political culture that prevented it from being a “dynamic meritocracy”,and thus realising its potential.

Second,India consistently turned down Lee’s overtures on defence cooperation. One of Lee’s first diplomatic actions after proclaiming independence on August 9,1965,was to write to Lal Bahadur Shastri,seeking assistance for military training. The letter drew a blank. For one thing,New Delhi was preoccupied with the war with Pakistan. For another,Singapore continued to remain a part of the Anglo-Malayan Defence Treaty — an arrangement that made it impossible for non-aligned India to accede to Lee’s request. For a third,India was concerned about the impact on its relationship with Malaysia.

Subsequently,following British military withdrawal from the Far East,Lee wanted India to proclaim a “Monroe Doctrine” for Asia and to act as a balancing force against communist China. Indira Gandhi,however,brushed aside his concern that British withdrawal would leave behind a vacuum and endanger Singapore’s position.

India-Singapore relations touched their nadir following India’s recognition of Kampuchea; though Lee shrewdly recognised the realpolitik calculations that underlay New Delhi’s decision. Datta-Ray deftly takes us through India’s role in the politics of Southeast Asia during the turbulent 1960s and 70s. But he could have expended a few pages setting out the regional context more clearly. Things began to change yet again during the Rajiv years. Among other things,these sections remind us that the ground for the post-1991 transformation was actually laid in the early 1980s. The material on the subsequent period is more familiar,but no less interesting.

Datta-Ray’s central argument calls for some reflection though. Throughout,he endorses Lee’s views that it is imperative to restore India’s ancient civilisational relationship with Singapore (or Suvarnabhumi,as he repeatedly calls it). This view was the core belief of the “Greater India” theorists of the inter-war period. But Nehru’s India deliberately (and wisely) eschewed such claims to cultural leadership. India’s failure lay in not attempting to revive the “great crescent”,the vibrant trading network that had stretched from Calcutta to Singapore. World War II,Partition,and the civil wars in Burma and Malaya had seemingly destroyed it for good. Owing to Lee’s untiring efforts,we can now look forward to the recreation of the great crescent and the restoration of the real historical link between Singapore and India.