2 - The foreign policy of Janata government: a critique
We live in a dynamic world where rapid changes are taking place. The rapidity and importance of these changes make it necessary for us to have debates in this House more often than once a year on the international situation. The debates need not always be on the initiative of the Government but could also be held on the request of private members.
This is the first occassion when I am speaking in this Lolk Sabha on foreign affairs. Before I proceed further I would like to express my appreciation of Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee in his role as a minister of external affairs. I had earlier observed him expressing his views as a leader of the Jana Sangh. After watching him perform in the Lok Sabha during the last two years, I must say I have found he has a flexible attitude and an elastic mind that would justify him to have the legacy of Nehru's policy. While what I have said goes to the credit of Vajpayee it also is a credit to Nehru's policy.
We are today discussing the foreign policy of India in the year 1979. I hope the minister of external affairs would look at the problem not only as the policy for the year under review but also as a projection of the policy for the 1980s. I would like the foreign minister to consider what the policies in the next decade would be, what the world would be like what the shape of the world movements would be like, what India's policy would be in the context of its geographical location, size and importance and finally what would be New Delhi's perspective and assessment of the decade to come.
Foreign policy is a subject that can be dealt with more easily with a long-term perspective. I hope after listening to the debate Mr. Vajpayee will not merely answer the points made here and get away with his usual eloquence but will take us into confidence and give us his assessment of the problems with a perspective for the future, with the capacity to view things in their true relations and relative importance. That is what I mean by a perspective view.
There are several important criteria by which the foreign Policy of a country like India can be examined. The first is its relations with the immediate neighbours and the second its relations with the countries of the region. If one takes the first factor into consideration, there is a certain sense of complacency in the mind of the leaders of the Government. The leaders would like us to believe that the relations with the neighbouring countries are very good and that the improvement in the relations has happened only after the Janata Government came into power. Both these impressions are misleading. If India has today good relations with the neighbouring countries diplomatically and in other spheres, this was so even before the Janata Government came into power. To give the impression that the relationship with the neighbouring countries are all right is also wrong. The neighbouring countries do not only include Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh. The term should include China also. I shall deal with China later.