by A. G. NOORANI
At every stage in the border talks with China since 1959, there was a moment for reflection, and a warning to heed, but Nehru ignored them all.
R.K. Nehru, who expressed his views on the boundary problem with China with forthrightness in various official notes, was even more candid in the interview of July 1, 1971, that was part of the Oral History Programme of the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML). He was 13 years younger than Jawaharlal and was deeply impressed by him. At the same time, what “struck me about Jawaharlal was his impetuosity, a rather charming trait”. He recalled Ambassador K.M. Panikkar’s report from China, in which he predicted that “the Communist government would collapse after some time, and the reason he gave was based on all kinds of historical analogies”. The Prime Minister despised Panikkar, yet he acted on his advice rather than that of Sir Girja Shankar Bajpai, whom he respected.
R.K. Nehru had a long talk with Zhou En-lai when he visited India in April 1960. He never allowed himself to forget China’s “Note” of May 15, 1959.
What he told Prime Minister Nehru deserves to be quoted in extenso: “I pointed out that if China joined hands with Pakistan, the Soviet Union and the United States would also try to wean Pakistan from China and we would be somewhat isolated. Therefore, the suggestion was: ‘Keep your doors open in all directions; do not surrender anything – border problem – keep the talks going’. It was on that basis, I think, because he accepted this approach, that the P.M. agreed to my going to China in July 1961. That was the last dialogue between India and China which took place on the 12th July 1961. I came back with some proposals from the Chinese, which were good proposals from our viewpoint as a basis for further negotiations, or at least for the relaxation of tension.
“[B.R.] Nanda: When did you return?
“[R.K.] Nehru: 15th of July, from Peking. Of course, my visit was denounced in Parliament that I had sold the honour of the country etc. But what in effect they [the Chinese] had suggested was, I am not disclosing all the proposals, but I spoke about Kashmir and their relations with Pakistan. The clear hint they dropped was [ sic] repeated what they had said in 1959: ‘We regard you as a more important neighbour, we want to have friendly relations with you; the border problem should be settled peacefully and as for Kashmir where have we said that we do not r ecognise your rights etc?’ What was clearly implied was that as part of an overall settlement they would accept our sovereignty over Jammu & Kashmir. That is what I had got from Peking. They had put it in a negative way because it was bargaining. When I spoke to Chou En-lai at great length on Kashmir, I said that in fact the Soviet Union had recognised our sovereignty over Kashmir, while the Chinese had not. While we had recognised their sovereignty over Formosa, we did not think it was very friendly of them to have not done so in the case of Kashmir. Chou-En-lai said, ‘We have never said that we will not recognise your sovereignty; but then of course, we must have relations with Pakistan too. But we have never said: we would not. Show me a document.’ These were the words he used: ‘Show me any document in which we have said that we do not recognise your sovereignty.’ Negative. Well that is how [it is] when you are negotiating, these are the first steps. So, as regards the border problem there was a basis for a reasonable settlement. The basis was some exchange, etc. But the negotiations did not proceed because after I came back here, there as a violent denunciation in Parliament and the Prime Minister too said the visit was infructuous. Why? I had told him that you could not expect the Chinese to surrender everything. Our policy was that ‘they should accept our sovereignty over the eastern sector. So far as the western sector is concerned, Aksai Chin, they should withdraw. Give up the road. We would not advance further. Then the negotiations should be confined to Aksai Chin.’ While they were using NEFA [North East Frontier Agency] as a bargaining counter, so naturally…
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