Avtar Singh Bhasin’s Nehru, Tibet and China: A Timely Contribution to the History of Sino-Indian Border Dispute in Light of Tibet
Book Details: Avtar Singh Bhasin (2021). Nehru, Tibet and China. New Delhi: Penguin (India) Viking.
Given India’s rise and growing international interest in its foreign policy, there has recently been an increase in scholarly output addressing nuances of New Delhi’s way of conducting its international relations and particularly its ties with other states in the international system. Scholarly efforts to situate the dynamics of Sino-Indian relations have also recently been made by several experts of international relations, contributing to the overall body of literature that seeks to add to the understanding of this historical and consequential bilateral relationship.
One such notable scholarly effort meant to address the formative years of Sino-Indian ties in light of Tibet and their lasting imprint on the current bilateral relationship has been made by Avtar Singh Bhasin through his book Nehru, Tibet and China — published by Penguin (India) Viking in June 2021. The author is ideally suited for the task given his long record of service in the Indian establishment — which includes a position in the Joint Intelligence Organisation of India’s Ministry of Defence during the Sino-Indian Border War of 1962 and a subsequent career in the country’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spanning three decades, where he retired as director of the Historical Division in 1993.
In his book, the author divides the study in a dozen chapters with his final assessment of India’s first Prime Minister (PM) Jawaharlal Nehru’s addressal of Sino-Indian relations in light of Tibet being articulated in an epilogue chapter after a detailed examination of evidence. Given fifty pages of references, this book also serves as an example of an evidence-based study that makes for a scholarly achievement in its own right.
The author situates early Tibet as an ill-fated political entity constantly vying for maximum autonomy in face of interference originating from external powers such as China, the British Empire and Russia — each vying for influence in the region — to shape not only its political choices but also its cherished religious customs. Chinese authority in Tibet — manifesting through its powerful representative in the region, the Amban — was initially tolerated by the Tibetans but only from a position of weakness and was ultimately resented.
The author firmly situates China as the constant political entity keen on maintaining control over Tibet through various periods of its history, and one which ultimately resisted signing the tripartite Simla Convention by 1914 involving itself, the British Empire and Tibet in which Henry McMahon led the British delegation. The book details how the McMahon Line — inherited by independent India since 1947, along with other privileges in Tibet — itself came under varying levels of acceptance and denial by Beijing following the establishment of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. That India’s western border remained undefined in its own Survey of India and subsequent maps until 1953–54 further created a legitimate boundary issue that merited serious bilateral negotiations.
The author situates India’s first PM Jawaharlal Nehru as an otherwise cerebral statesman who was firmly given to his own idealist notions of international relations. Despite a brutal incorporation of Tibet into the PRC, gradual erosion of Indian presence in the region under Beijing’s influence, and a flight of the Dalai Lama fearing for his safety to India — Nehru remained convinced that his vision of Sino-Indian borders would endure even as the two new modern states came into geographical contact under unprecedented circumstances. This was in disregard of not only the advice of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev to earnestly take to negotiations to secure India’s borders with China but also Nehru’s own advice to the first Burmese Prime Minister U Nu to settle Myanmar’s borders with the PRC on the practical principle of give and take.
The book details how various exchanges between Nehru and Zhou Enlai failed to give rise to solutions required to jointly work towards a settled Sino-Indian border, leaving space open for military hostilities which ultimately culminated in the Sino-Indian Border War of 1962 and tense ensuing circumstances. Evidence presented in the study also details how India’s first PM ultimately failed to secure either lasting peace with China on the practical principle of give and take or to decisively confront it with the full use of the Indian establishment, the Tibetan rebels and a US willing to cooperate with India to check Beijing’s rise.
The author notes that both countries continue to have a border that is yet to be mutually defined, and that there has been a hardening of stance on both sides complicating an amicable settlement to competing claims since the 1960s. In the present environment, the author contends that India and China will need to be honest with history to arrive at a secure, mutually-agreed border guided by the principle of give and take against maximalist notions arising due to nationalism.
Since his retirement from India’s MEA nearly three decades ago, the author has resolutely made many notable scholarly contributions to the country’s foreign policy and remains highly respected for his pivotal role in the MEA’s successful release of authentic primary sources in the public domain under projects such as India’s Foreign Relations — Documents and India-China Relations: 1947–2000 — A Documentary Study, among several others. This scholarly work cements the author’s standing as a leading contributor to India studies.
However, given its specialist tone, the book might be more suited to an audience at least notionally familiar with international relations rather than one with a more casual interest in the field. Given its extensive documentation of China’s excesses in the Tibetan region and Nehru’s obduracy on the border issue, the book might also not make for a pleasant reading for either Chinese or Indian chauvinists. But will instead be valuable for scholars seeking evidence-based answers on consequential contact between India, Tibet and China during the last century and its lasting implications in contemporary times.
Manoj Saxena is a candidate for PhD (Contemporary India Research) at the King’s India Institute of King’s College London. His research area is Indian foreign policy.
