No More Games: What PM Modi’s Stern Warnings To Oli And Yunus At BIMSTEC Will Sound Like

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who landed at Thailand’s capital, Bangkok, on Thursday (April 3) morning to attend the two-day 6th BIMSTEC summit there, is likely to deliver tough messages to both Nepal and Bangladesh. 

Modi is likely to meet Nepal’s Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli at the sidelines of the summit Friday. But there is no official word on a bilateral with Mohammad Yunus, the head of Bangladesh’s interim government. 

Bangladesh had, over the last few weeks, made at least two requests to India for a Modi-Yunus meeting on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC summit. 

New Delhi acknowledged the receipt of the requests but said it hadn’t taken a decision. There is still no official word on the acceptance or rejection of Dhaka’s request. 

However, sources in India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) told Swarajya that a short meeting between Modi and Yunus may happen if External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar gives the green signal. 

"The EAM will make an on-the-spot assessment about Dhaka’s intentions and attitude when he interacts with Bangladesh's foreign affairs advisor Mohammad Touhid Hossain at the BIMSTEC ministerial meeting ahead of the summit," said the MEA official. 

Jaishankar, who was a career diplomat with decades of experience in international diplomacy, is also known to be an excellent judge of people and situations. 

“He (Jaishankar) will know best if a Modi-Yunus meeting is advisable and beneficial (for India) or not,” the MEA official added.  

“However, BIMSTEC is a small bloc of just seven countries and, hence, the two leaders (Modi and Yunus) will definitely come face to face with each other. Also, Bangladesh will take the baton from Thailand as the next chair of BIMSTEC, and that means a close coordination between India and Bangladesh on BIMSTEC matters is inevitable. So a meeting between Prime Minister Modi and Yunus may happen,” said the senior MEA official. 

MEA officials who are part of the Indian delegation are, nonetheless, prepared for the possibility of a Modi-Yunus meeting not happening. 

In case Jaishankar doesn’t give the green signal, then a severe paucity of time is likely to be cited as the reason for the meeting not taking place. 

Apart from holding a one-on-one meeting with Thailand Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, Prime Minister Modi is also likely to meet Bhutan’s PM Tshering Tobgay. 

A bilateral with Sri Lankan PM Harini Amarasuriya is unlikely because Prime Minister Modi will be flying to Colombo from Bangkok on Friday (April 4) evening and is slated to meet Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, apart from Prime Minister Amarasuriya, there.

That will leave only Myanmar and Bangladesh out of PM Modi’s list of bilateral engagements in Bangkok. 

A one-on-one between PM Modi and General Min Aung Hliang, the head of Myanmar's junta, is out of the question for obvious reasons. 

Apart from attending the summit and holding bilaterals with the PMs of Thailand, Bhutan, and Nepal, PM Modi will also call on the host country’s King Maha Vajiralongkorn and Queen Suthida Bajrasudhabimalalakshana.

If a meeting between Modi and Yunus that Dhaka has been pleading for does not happen, it will send out a strong message to Bangladesh — that India is displeased by Yunus’ conduct and statements and views many of his moves as aimed against India’s interests. 

But, say MEA officials, what will be far more significant is a meeting between Modi and Yunus actually taking place and the message Modi will deliver to Yunus there. 

Modi, it is learnt, will deliver a strong message to Yunus, whose actions and statements since he assumed office in August last year have been perceived to be anti-Indian. 

Prime Minister Modi will tell Yunus in unequivocal and very strong terms that while India desires excellent ties with Bangladesh, it will not tolerate any anti-Indian activities from Bangladesh. 

The elephant in the room if PM Modi meets Yunus will be attacks on and persecution of religious minorities in Bangladesh. 

Modi is expected to demand that such attacks and persecution should stop and that Yunus should take tangible and concrete steps to curb the activities of Bangladesh’s Islamists, who have been given a free rein. 

The continuing incarceration of Hindu monk Chinmay Krishna Das, who was arrested on trumped-up charges, will also come up. 

Prime Minister Modi will also seek clarification from Yunus on the deals he has signed and is likely to sign with China and how those can affect India’s interests. 

Modi will, said the MEA official, seek a concrete assurance from Yunus that the transit agreements signed between India and Bangladesh in the past will be fully honoured. 

The issue of holding free, fair and inclusive elections in Bangladesh will also come up for discussion. Prime Minister Modi will underline the fact that a substantive engagement between India and Bangladesh will happen only after an elected government is in place in Dhaka. 

New Delhi, said a former Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, is in no mood to humour Yunus and will deliver that message very bluntly. 

“Yunus’ actions since August last year provide no reason for New Delhi to humour him. He has encouraged radical Islamists and freed convicted terrorists, given a free hand to anti-Indian forces, disregarded India’s sensitivities with regard to Pakistan and is engaged in a dangerous game of trying to play off China against India. Therefore, he cannot expect normalisation of ties with India,” the former envoy to Dhaka told Swarajya. 

As for the meeting with Oli, Prime Minister Modi is set to ask for an end to the false rhetoric of border disputes between Nepal and India when no such disputes actually exist.

Modi is expected to tell Oli that while ties between the two countries are on an even keel and India is closely engaged with Nepal in multiple areas, an elevation of ties as desired by Oli will depend on his conduct.

"Oli has practised a policy (like Yunus) of playing its two big neighbours against each other. India can no longer tolerate this tendency of its smaller neighbours acting oversmart and playing off China against India. The present Modi government is firm on discouraging such misadventures. Oli will be given this message," a senior officer in the MEA’s Northern Division, which deals with Nepal and Bhutan, told Swarajya. 

Prime Minister Modi will, it is learnt, tell Oli that Nepal must abandon its irrational claim over a 335-square-kilometre area in Uttarakhand encompassing Limpiyadhura, Kalapani, and Lipulekh. Oli was the first to assert a few years ago that the area belonged to Nepal, and he even made changes in Nepal’s map to reflect this claim. 

“We well understand that this baseless claim is being made just to incite passions in Nepal by its politicians for their political gains. But Nepal needs to realise that it cannot have excellent ties with India if it makes such claims that embitter ties, especially people-to-people ties, between the two countries,” said the MEA official.

Prime Minister Modi, it is learnt, will deliver precisely this message to Oli.

“Oli will be told that it is solely up to him to decide what trajectory Indo-Nepal ties will take. The benefits (for Nepal) of close ties with India are many, but negative actions and anti-India moves will harm Nepal much more than India,” said the MEA’s Northern Division official.

Oli and Yunus—in case he gets an exclusive audience with PM Modi—are thus set to get sharp raps on their knuckles. 

And if the meeting with Modi does not materialise, Yunus will return to Dhaka with egg on his face. Either way, it will be a hard lesson delivered to him.

Also read: 

What’s Keeping India From Inviting Nepal’s PM Oli, Despite His Repeated Requests?