A Bridge Too Far

New Delhi is trying to build a bridge, literally, to link India and Sri Lanka. But will the proposed 30-km long concrete-and-steel structure across the Palk Strait (from Dhanuskhodi in Tamil Nadu to Talaimannar in northern Sri Lanka) successfully bridge the gulf of differences between the South Asian neighbors? 

Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who visited New Delhi in mid-September, had first mooted the Hanuman Bridge during his earlier tenure as prime minister from 2001 to 2004 when, interestingly, there was a Bharatiya Janata Party government in India. But the BJP had then rebuffed him mainly because of opposition by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalitha. But now Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Jayalalitha are on good terms and New Delhi wouldn’t have revived Wickremesinghe’s pet project without the lady’s tacit consent.

The Indian news agency, Press Trust of India, reported that Nitin Gadkari, federal Minister for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping, called on Wickremesinghe to discuss the $5.1 billion Hanuman Bridge which apparently the Asian Development Bank has agreed to finance. The bridge would integrate the neighbors’ rail and road networks taking New Delhi’s sub-regionalism agenda to a new level. 
In January, India and three SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) members — Bangladesh, Bhutan and Bangladesh — signed a road connectivity agreement after Islamabad pointblank refused to grant India road-rail access to Afghanistan through Pakistan. New Delhi hailed the vehicular traffic pact linking the four nations as a triumph of sub-regionalism as opposed to regionalism which SAARC stands for but which remains a distant dream because of the deep distrust between India and Pakistan.

After the high-profile Gadkari-Wickremesinghe talks, a follow-up meeting of Sri Lankan and Indian bureaucrats in Colombo is on the cards. But the Hanuman Bridge is being vociferously opposed by those Sri Lankans who call themselves nationalists. They have warned that the bridge will reduce Sri Lanka to an Indian province — and their warning about the looming ‘annexation’ is being highlighted by influential sections of the Sri Lankan media. 

The complexities of Indian-Sri Lankan ties are evident from the utterances of none other than Wickremensinghe who is now so keen on the Hanuman Bridge. Ahead of Modi’s Colombo visit in March, Wickremesinghe had suddenly but ominously announced that Indian fishermen sneaking into Sri Lankan waters would be shot dead.

Wickremesinghe’s ultimatum during a television interview on the eve of Modi’s visit acutely embarrassed India. Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj was at a loss for words. I have raked it up just to demonstrate what a minefield India-Sri Lanka relations are even in the best of times. Which begs the question: Can the Hanuman Bridge paper over the deep-rooted suspicions bedeviling bilateral ties?
New Delhi doesn’t want Colombo to cosy up to Beijing which is passionately wooing Sri Lanka. Colombo, in turn, doesn’t want New Delhi to support the island’s Tamil parties. And what’s more, Colombo wants New Delhi on its side in the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva where charges of war crimes against the Sri Lankan military (during the fighting with Tamil Tiger rebels which ended in 2009 with the defeat of Tamil challengers after 30 years of civil war) are under investigation. 

Backing Sri Lanka in the UN is extremely difficult for New Delhi in view of Tamil sentiments in south India. But that’s the price Colombo wants New Delhi to pay for keeping China at an arm’s length. Sri Lanka’s expectations are indeed a nightmare for India’s Foreign Office.

Another spoiler is the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), which is deeply resented by Sri Lankan business classes; they believe it is tailored to further India’s business interests alone “as the non-tariff barriers in Indian are an obstacle for Sri Lankan exporters.”

Sri Lanka is also troubled by the chronic delay plaguing the Sampur coal-fired power plant, which is a joint venture of the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) and India’s National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC). 

Similarly, India’s failure to operationalize oil storage facilities on the east coast despite giving periodic assurances underlines ‘Big Brother’ India’s incapability to meet delivery deadlines. 
In the ultimate analysis, can the Hanuman Bridge become a bond when the waters between Sri Lanka and India are a battleground for fishermen of the two nations who clash off and on resulting even in deaths? 

True, fishermen on both sides are Tamils but the tragic violence on the high seas has shades of a state of war.

(Arab News)