Barak Obama in an interview last month during PM Modi’s US visit, had said that India might get divided if the rights of the ethnic minorities are not taken care of. This must have been like music to China, for whom an undivided and strong India is an obstacle to its desire of ruling in Asia.
Chinese Government media, Global Times has published an article saying Obama is right and that India’s development can’t go far without resolving issues.
Obama received strong backlash from Indian leaders
Nirmala Sitharaman accused Obama of being hypocritical. She said, she was shocked to hear such a comment by the former US president, while the prime minister is visiting the US. She said how will people believe these remarks coming from Obama, under whose tenure the country attacked 6 Muslim-majority countries with over 26,000 bombs.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh also hit out at Obama, saying that Obama Ji should not forget that India is the only country that considers all the people in the world as family and that he should think of how many Muslim countries he had attacked.
US Government does not coordinate with Obama’s statement
However, A senior official informed that there is no coordination between Obama’s statement to that of the US government. The former Commissioner of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, Johnnie Moore reacted to Obama’s comments and stated that, “Former President Barack Obama should spend his energy complimenting India more than criticising India” and that India is the most diverse country in human history.
The Chinese media says no matter how high the US touts India’s democracy, if the country’s various ethnic groups do not develop in tandem, enjoy the dividends of development, but remain divided along religious lines, its modernization will not be sustainable and will always face the possibility of division.
China since 2009 has been publishing multiple reports on the disintegration of the Indian Union. There were suggestions to the Chinese government by the Chinese think tank to break India into multiple countries. In fact, US had also responded to these reports wondering if India could possibly be disintegrated.
Communist China came into existence in 1949 and since then there has been much disintegration happening around China. Before 1991 USSR was the one dominating in Asia however post its disintegration many other central Asian countries were formed. This disintegration proved highly beneficial for China. The power equation changed and now Russia and other central countries were dependent on China. This is why China sees that if India disintegrated similarly to USSR it will be the greatest gain for China in Asia.
China very well knows that an undivided India will not let complete Chinese domination in the Indian subcontinent as well as the India ocean. It will not be afraid and bow down to China like other countries like Pakistan. India, the biggest democracy, is China’s biggest competitor in the region with its population surpassing that of China and that’s why China would love to see a disintegrated India.
