Abdul Wasey on the need to engage Beijing pragmatically & insist on verifiable ground rules
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s trip to China for the SCO summit, and his sideline meeting with President Xi Jinping, marked the most serious attempt since Galwan to put the relationship back on a workable footing. The leaders agreed to restart bilateral trade and air links and “underline peace and tranquillity” on the boundary — language that would have sounded routine before 2020 but now carries real weight. Five years after the Ladakh clashes, and months after India’s Operation Sindoor against Pakistan (a moment when Beijing signalled political sympathy for Islamabad), New Delhi and Beijing have chosen to test whether limited normalisation can coexist with unresolved differences.
Can India normalise ties without first settling the boundary? History suggests it already did once. In 1988, Rajiv Gandhi and Deng Xiaoping put in place a compartmentalised approach: expand engagement where possible while managing the border through confidence-building measures. Through the 1990s that formula worked well enough: both sides talked peace and tranquillity along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) even as trade and contacts grew. Galwan ruptured that tacit contract. It demonstrated that unilateral moves on the ground could erase years of painstaking routine in a single night. Since then, rounds of diplomatic and military talks have sought to stitch back a version of the old architecture — buffer zones, disengagement, patrol protocols.
This year’s reported Border Patrol Agreement has been an ice-breaker of sorts. Indian interlocutors frame it as a partial restoration of patrolling rights — crucial at friction points such as Depsang and Demchok — while Chinese sources stress that the understandings concern patrolling mechanics, not sovereignty. That asymmetry in political messaging is familiar. It is also a reminder that “stability” is being rebuilt at the operational edge, not resolved at the political level.
Two realities should temper any exuberance. First, in India’s strategic community, China is now viewed — rightly — as the principal, long-term challenge. Beijing’s sustained infrastructure build-up on the Tibetan Plateau has a clear purpose: to compress India’s reaction time and raise the cost of holding the LAC year-round. Matching that posture requires capital outlays on roads, rail, ISR, and warm-line logistics, not just more forward troops. Second, there is little evidence that Beijing is in a hurry to settle the boundary. Special representatives can meet; the machinery can whirr; but the record of three decades suggests China is content to keep the line elastic while pressing advantages elsewhere.
What changed in 2020 from the Chinese viewpoint? Chinese commentary has offered a menu of motives: anger at the dilution of Article 370; anxiety that India might exploit U.S.–China decoupling to siphon supply chains; and, more broadly, a reassessment of India’s economic trajectory and demographic heft at a moment when China faces slowing growth and population decline. That re-rating feeds a harder line: calls to curb Chinese investment in India, tighten export controls on critical inputs, and damp India’s rise as a competitor. It also bleeds into Beijing’s South Asia diplomacy — more trilaterals (Pakistan–China–Bangladesh; Afghanistan–Pakistan–China), more regional convening without India, more pressure at the periphery.
Against that backdrop, Modi’s reset is best read as pragmatism, not amnesia. India cannot wish away the boundary; nor can it afford frozen ties with its largest neighbour and a manufacturing superpower. The task is to build a layered policy that extracts value and reduces risk — normalisation with guardrails, not normalisation by denial.
What might such a framework look like?
First, harden the border management architecture. The goal is not theatrical gestures but fewer surprises. That means codified patrolling calendars, shared coordinates for temporary buffer zones, routine commander-level hotlines that actually get used, and agreed verification tools (from UAV protocols to body-cam evidence at face-off points). India should continue to insist on restoration of pre-April 2020 patrolling rights, while recognising that stabilisation — however imperfect — reduces the odds of a “Galwan-2”.
Second, deter by capability, not rhetoric. Accelerate all-weather logistics, habitat, and mobility on our side of the LAC; invest in surveillance, EW and counter-UAS; and close the “last-mile” gaps that determine tactical outcomes in hours, not months. A credible defensive posture reduces temptation for misadventure and buys space for diplomacy.
Third, de-risk the economic relationship. Reopening flights and trade links is sensible, but the flows should be triaged. Keep non-sensitive trade moving; screen and condition investment in critical minerals, power electronics, telecoms, ports and data infrastructure; and pursue active substitution and diversification in strategic supply chains (electronics, APIs, EV components). Use positive lists to signal what India welcomes; use negative lists and CFIUS-style scrutiny where security concerns are material.
Fourth, play offence in the neighbourhood. China’s South Asia play has shifted from bilateral chequebook diplomacy to mini-lateral convening. India’s answer is not boycott but bandwidth: more financing options with trusted partners (Japan, EU, Gulf funds), faster execution on connectivity and energy, and flexible, transparent terms that survive domestic politics in smaller states. Where Beijing invites trilaterals designed to exclude India, New Delhi should convene its own — issue-specific, open to all, grounded in delivery rather than symbolism.
Fifth, practise purposeful multi-alignment. Use BRICS and the SCO to keep channels open with Beijing; use the Quad and technology coalitions to raise the quality of our economic security. India’s value rises when it is a rule-maker in standards, trusted in supply chains, and credible in security. That requires tight coordination at home — finance, commerce, defence, external affairs — and a clear communication strategy abroad.
Sixth, manage expectations at home. Public diplomacy matters. Small operational gains should not be spun as grand strategic victories; setbacks should be explained without grandstanding. A steady, realistic narrative deprives external actors of the ability to play on domestic polarisation.
Seventh, build a crisis playbook. Wargame border incidents, cyber and maritime friction, and economic coercion. Pre-agree escalation ladders, authorisations, and sanctions responses with key partners where interests align. When a crisis breaks, days matter; pre-baked options convert resolve into outcomes.
Normalising with guardrails is not capitulation; it is statecraft. It says: we remember Galwan and will not repeat the 1990s naïveté; we will build power patiently; and we will use engagement to advance our interests, not mask our vulnerabilities. It also says something else that both capitals would do well to internalise: differences need not become disputes, but only if discipline holds at the boundary. On that line — literal and political — the next chapter of India–China relations will turn.
Abdul Wasey- Editor-in-Chief The Financial World,The views are personal.
