For India, Myanmar represents an inconvenient truth. India is today grappling with the contradictions of an ‘internal matter’ having obvious ripple effects for the region. It is being called upon by the international community to play a more meaningful role, as crisis-prone Myanmar remains tense after violent protests last month. Before the crisis of credibility it is facing becomes more acute, India needs to urgently signal course correction. Unbundling the Myanmar question will critically hinge on whether India is willing to recognise that interests, influence and intent constitute three overlapping strands. Does India see these as syncretically linked?

Since the early nineties, India has consciously sought to engage the junta as against a policy of isolation. India argued that it would be counterproductive to base its policy towards a neighbour on a regime-specific criterion. There’s a strategic sub-text to this, as India looks askance at China’s own rapid accretion of influence here. India sees Myanmar as a critical gateway that links the Northeast to its dynamic, extended neighbourhood. India has also been seeking greater transborder cooperation with Myanmar in dealing with insurgency in the Northeast.

It has been backing its interests with influence by manoeuvring itself into a position of relative strength in Myanmar. Sub-regional initiatives like the Bay of Bengal Multi-Sectoral Initiative for Technical and Economic Cooperation and the Mekong-Ganga Cooperation, moves towards better border management and investments in building ports, roads and railways, have proceeded apace with oil/gas exploration contracts. At the peak of the protests last month in Myanmar, India signed production sharing contracts for three deep water exploration blocks. Earlier, it announced a near doubling of development assistance to Myanmar from Rs 44 crore to Rs 80 crore. India has also signalled a willingness to expand the scope of military cooperation with Myanmar. During Pranab Mukherjee’s visit to that country this January, India conveyed a “favourable response” to the junta’s request for military equipment from India.

There is also the engagement in several cross-border infrastructure projects aimed at improving the connectivity between the Northeast and western Myanmar. One of the earliest projects India undertook was to build and finance the 165 km long India-Myanmar friendship highway that links the border town of Moreh in Manipur to Kalemyo in central Myanmar. India has also announced that a formal agreement on the Kaladan sea port project will be signed by both countries shortly and has decided to fund the $100 million Kaladan Multi-Modal Transport Project, which will connect ports on India’s east with the Sittwe port in Myanmar, thus providing an alternate route for the Northeast. India, Myanmar and Thailand have commenced work on the Trilateral Highway Project, which will link Moreh through Pagan in Myanmar to Maesot in Thailand. The highway is expected to be extended to Singapore, Malaysia, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, holding out the promise of seamless continental connectivity within Asia.

So far so good. But, while it may be getting the sub-plots right, India may be losing the big picture. A recent official statement noted that India is “keeping its eyes focused on self-interests while dealing with Myanmar”. But if interests form the peg of our policy towards Myanmar, then securing these interests is also surely in our interest. And a Myanmar in turmoil is not in our interest. Similarly, ensuring Myanmar’s role as a stable gateway to the east will be critical to the success of India’s eastward orientation. Having decided to engage, India surely cannot stand logic on its head by hiding behind the fig leaf of Myanmar’s crisis being an ‘internal matter’. The ‘strategic interests’ argument has been reduced to a tired phrase invoked at every instance. How sustainable is the promotion of interests without stability, is an argument curiously missing in policy discourse on Myanmar.

Finally, if it wants to get the big picture right, India must get the politics right. India has rightly called for the process of political reform in Myanmar to be more “inclusive”. If it can get political conversations going on the ground, India can constructively help to end Myanmar’s isolation. This would go a long way in alleviating the country’s humanitarian tragedy and address the taproots of social unrest that have sparked off the present crisis. If India’s official position does not reflect these realities, it will run the risk of being caught unresponsive when political transition takes place. In 1989, Burma rechristened itself Myanmar but it remains to be seen if it can now rechristen a far-reaching and durable identity transformation for itself. It will be a mark of India’s statesmanship if it can nudge Myanmar towards that real makeover.

The writer is associate professor, Centre for Policy Research