A friend in need

India-Sri Lanka relations are now at an all-time high, with India lending a helping hand to its war-weary neighbour on various fronts.

in New Delhi

RELATIONS between India and Sri Lanka have never been better than now. India is no longer viewed as a domineering neighbour, and the bitter memories of the 1980s are fading from the collective memory of Sri Lankans. The prompt response of the Indian authorities in dispatching aid to the flood-ravaged areas of southern Sri Lanka in mid-May in a way reflected the new bonding between the two countries. The Indian Navy ship, INS Sharda, which returned on May 26, reached Galle port in less than 24 hours after India's help was requested. Some of the Navy's personnel, including medical staff, have remained in Sri Lanka to continue with the relief work. In one of the worst cases of flooding the island has experienced in recent times, Indian Navy personnel worked shoulder to shoulder with Sri Lankans in rescuing marooned people and in providing succour to the homeless.

Interestingly, parties and groups that were until recently overtly hostile to New Delhi, such as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), were involved in the flood relief efforts. "India is the only country that can extend support so fast. The emergency aid India rushed in had a massive impact on the whole island," said Sri Lankan High Commissioner to India Mangala Moonasinghe. A senior official in the Indian External Affairs Ministry said that India's ties with Sri Lanka now are the closest after the ties with Bhutan.

India's Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Ram Naik was in Trincomalee in the last week of May to lay the foundation stone for an "oil tank farm" in the port town. India has been allowed to refurbish the oil storage facilities in this strategically located port. There have been no protests from any of the political parties and organisations, including the JVP and the LTTE, against the Sri Lankan government's decision to let Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) modernise the port. Sri Lankan diplomats say that if this was done a few years ago, there would have been a political uproar.

Indian and Sri Lankan officials say that there are no plans to use the port for military purposes. The port, covered on all sides by mountains, was crucial in the Allies' campaign against Japan during the Second World War. There were reports some years ago that the United States was interested in using Trincomalee as a naval base.

IOC has entered the domestic petroleum sector in the island by selling its products through 250 outlets. Sri Lanka has agreed to give its offshore area close to the Godavari Basin to the IOC for exploration. Initial surveys carried out by the Indian Navy's hydrographers have given cause for cautious optimism about the possibility of finding hydrocarbon deposits.

Sri Lanka is happy with India's support for the current efforts to bring stability and peace to the island. "India naturally likes to see peace in its own area of influence," said a senior Sri Lankan diplomat. Indian officials, while emphasising their support for the peace process, are however not too happy with the involvement of many foreign powers. New Delhi is not taking sides in the domestic dispute between President Chandrika Kumaratunga and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe on the conduct of the peace negotiations and the role of "facilitators" such as Norway and Japan, though it is worried about the possibility of the "facilitators" slowly turning into "mediators".

Indian officials point out that it was President Kumaratunga who first invited Norway to lend a helping hand to resolve the long-running ethnic conflict. Japan, the biggest aid donor to Sri Lanka, had also expressed an interest in being involved in the peace process. Japan is also playing an important role in the Aceh peace process in Indonesia. Japan's diplomatic activism in Asia is being viewed with suspicion in some quarters. So too is the U.S. role. Indian officials admit that the Americans had become rather "more active" on the island. New Delhi had "conveyed its concerns" in this regard to Colombo. Indian officials say that American activities have now "been curtailed".

The main Opposition party, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) headed by Kumaratunga, is of the opinion that the presence of too many foreign facilitators in the peace process is bad for the country. Although the negotiations have hit a temporary roadblock, both New Delhi and Colombo are confident that the Tigers will return to the negotiating table sooner than later. Sri Lankan officials say that the LTTE's current attitudes are generally more flexible than before. As an illustration, they point to the accommodating stance the LTTE took on the question of an "interim council" for the North and the East.

The Sri Lankan President and the sizable Muslim population in the East are against the area being formally administered by the LTTE. Indian officials are optimistic about the LTTE taking part in the Tokyo round, scheduled to be held in the second week of June. Sri Lankan officials say that they keep New Delhi informed on a regular basis about the progress made at the talks. Two other countries that get this privileged information from Colombo are the United Kingdom and the U.S. "We keep India, America and Britain informed about every step we take," said a Sri Lankan official.

New Delhi wants a peaceful settlement of the conflict, "provided it satisfies all sections" and guarantees the unity and integrity of the island-nation. Indian officials stress that the concept of "Eelam" favoured by the LTTE will undermine the unity of the country. According to them, India has declined to participate directly in the talks despite the Sri Lankan government's request. They say that until the Congress(I) drops its objections about the LTTE, the separatist group will remain on the "banned" list of terrorist organisations as far as India is concerned.

IT is on the economic front that the ties between India and Sri Lanka are the strongest. Sri Lanka is the only country with which New Delhi has signed a "free trade agreement" (FTA). Bilateral trade between the two countries exceeded $1 billion for the first time in 2002; it was $600 million the year before. Although the balance of trade continues to be in India's favour, Sri Lanka's exports to India increased by over 100 per cent in 2002 as compared to the previous year.

The Sri Lankan High Commissioner told Frontline that the primary reason for this increase in bilateral trade was "the efficacious operation of the Indo-Sri Lankan Free Trade Agreement" signed on December 28, 1998. India is the largest importer of Sri Lankan goods and services. The Sri Lankan envoy said that the two governments were holding negotiations to expand the existing FTA into an economic partnership agreement that would include the services sector. Sri Lankan officials want the process to be expedited as they find the Indian bureaucracy a "little tardy" at times. India has extended to Sri Lanka a $100 million in soft loans, a $20 million-programme loan and a $31-million loan to buy wheat. Sri Lanka is planning to set up an Export Development Board (EDB) office in Chennai.

"Both sides are benefiting from the FTA. No other SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) country has the kind of economic relations that we have with India," said Moonasinghe. Colombo feels that close economic links between countries in the region like India, Myanmar and Bangladesh, will help South Asia penetrate ASEAN (Association of South-East Asian Nations) and eventually APEC (Association of Petroleum Exporting Countries).

"There has been immense development in the relations," said the Sri Lankan envoy. Both sides are about to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to start a ferry service between Colombo and Tuticorin. This will be a boon for the economically disadvantaged travellers between India and Sri Lanka. Besides, passengers will be able to carry 100 kg of goods on the ferry.

The Sri Lankan government has lifted the visa requirement in the case of Indian nationals. Indians can get a visa on arrival at Sri Lankan ports. Indian tourists have been pouring into Sri Lanka, outnumbering those from other countries. Sri Lankans constitute the third largest group of tourists visiting India after those from the U.S. and the U.K. Sri Lankan Airways operates 35 flights to India every week. There is a direct flight now from Colombo to Bodh Gaya, Bihar. Many of the Sri Lankans coming to India are ordinary people who want to visit the Buddhist pilgrimage site at least once in their lifetime.

There is a proposal to connect the Indian mainland with Sri Lanka by constructing a bridge from Dhanushkodi in Tamil Nadu to Talaimannar in Sri Lanka. Once completed, it would be one of the longest bridges in the world. The bridge is currently estimated to cost $800 million. As of now, the project seems to be on the backburner as the Tamil Nadu government has not yet given its clearance.

The arrest of Indian and Sri Lankan fishermen for fishing in each other's territorial waters have generated much political heat on both sides. Indian officials admit that fishermen from Tamil Nadu are the culprits most of the time. The fish wealth on the Indian side of the narrow maritime boundary has been depleted owing to over-exploitation. The ban on fishing imposed by the government in Colombo on the Sri Lankan side of the boundary owing to security considerations, which was in force for many years, resulted in an abundance of fish there. The ban was lifted after the peace talks started.

The Sri Lankan Fishermen Association, which is dominated by the LTTE, has been active in intercepting Indian fishermen operating in Sri Lankan waters. Detained Indian fishermen sometimes have to spend more than 24 hours in the custody of Association activists before they are handed over to the Sri Lankan authorities. Indian officials said that the Sri Lankan Navy had been quick in releasing captured Indian fishermen. According to Indian officials, one way to reduce such incidents is to prevent the entry of mechanised trawlers from the Indian side into the narrow straits. New Delhi has requested the Tamil Nadu government to crack down on trawler owners who are responsible for many such incidents.

Sri Lankan officials point out that the Navy-to-Navy cooperation between the two countries has been very good. The military attaches of both countries have traditionally been navy men. Every third month, there is a "flag meeting" between the two navies, and twice a year there are "operational meetings". The major topics discussed at these meetings relate to poaching and gun-running. According to Sri Lankan officials, Colombo prefers India as the training place for Sri Lankan military officers. At any given time, there are more than 300 Sri Lankan Army officers in India, undergoing weapons training or attending courses at the National Defence College (NDC) in New Delhi. Most of the serving Sri Lankan Army officers have attended NDC courses.

The Sri Lankan High Commissioner says that the close cooperation in defence training is because of the "shared military culture" of the two countries. He pointed out that India and Sri Lanka were the only countries in the region that had been holding elections regularly since they became independent. Their Armies have never usurped civil authority.

Sri Lanka is seeking the Indian Army's help to train its soldiers for international peace-keeping activities. Sri Lanka has a 1,00,000-strong Army, which cannot be easily demobilised if and when peace dawns. Sending them on United Nations' peace-keeping missions would keep them gainfully employed.

The India-Sri Lanka Foundation, which was set up in December 1998, is doing good work to foster cultural and educational links between the two countries. Eighty-five projects funded by the Foundation have been completed in the fields of education, culture, archaeology, agriculture, science and technology, health and women's studies. The Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (in Chennai) is helping to set up a technology institute in Sri Lanka modelled after the IITs. More than a thousand Sri Lankan students are now studying in various Indian universities.