In India, the Tibet issue and the Beijing Olympics are combining into a strange cocktail. They are creating a hitherto improbable alliance between hyper-nationalists -- many of whom are also cyber-nationalists, given their frenetic movements on the World Wide Web -- and the homegrown Trendy Left.

Both segments want a strong message sent to the Chinese on Tibet, but for different reasons. The hyper-nationalists are more honest, even if they are adhering to the ancient Hindu proclivity for obsessing with either tactics without strategy or strategy without tactics, but just never both together. They are fighting yesterday's wars. While their suspicion of China is correct and justified, their tool for checking it -- a rolling back of the People's Liberation Army's occupation of Lhasa -- is frozen in the 1950s.

It necessitates the re-writing of a history that, while regrettable, is now a fait accompli. There is admirable and heart-warming emotionalism and even idealism here -- anguish at the "cultural genocide" of Tibetans. However, it ignores the current and future battlegrounds, physical and intangible, where India must contest China. Tibet, alas, is not among these.

The Trendy Left has entirely different motivations. It is unbothered by turbulence in India's near neighbourhood, Tibet's historical role as a buffer between Chinese and Indian territories and cultural spaces, and with national security imperatives. It has jumped on to the Tibet cause simply because this is a fashion statement and popular with Liberal-Left groupies in Hollywood.

The torch relay is a case in point. Bhaichung Bhutia, India's foremost soccer player and a Buddhist of Tibetan descent, has dropped out in protest against the oppression in Tibet. On the other hand, Milkha Singh, perhaps India's greatest track star, has insisted he will run because sports and politics must not mix.

One can respect both views. In their own way, Bhutia and Milkha Singh are being equally honest and responding to an inner call. They are good people -- not for them the spurious sentiments of the Trendy Left, whose vacillation and inherent wishy-washy hypocrisy are best exemplified by Aamir Khan, movie star and publicity-seeker of unusual, perhaps unsurpassed skill.

In his blog, Aamir Khan has explained that he will "run with the torch", not in "support of China" but with "a prayer in my heart for the people of Tibet, and indeed for all people across the world who are victims of human rights violations". In his piece he defines those "victims": "I would like to state that I have the highest regard and respect for the struggle that the people of Tibet are going through. I completely empathise with them. Similarly, I have the highest respect and regard for the struggle that the people of Iraq, Kashmiri Pandits who have been displaced, Kashmiris in general, and the people of Palestine, are going through."

It is evident that any Indian who cheers Aamir Khan and the Trendy Left in their opposition to China's Olympics is playing with fire. Such polemical activism is selective, and can as easily be directed against India.

We are being told that it is fine to make a political statement in a sporting setting. Fair enough; but consider the contradictions. All through the 1990s, Mr Bal Thackeray -- and he may have a million faults -- asked a perfectly commonsensical question: Why should India play cricket with Pakistan when that country's Government is promoting terrorism in Jammu & Kashmir? Do remember what the Trendy Left said at that point. It certainly didn't indulge the Shiv Sena view with the understanding it grants Tibetan throngs.

There is a second message flowing from the calls to boycott the Beijing Olympic Games or at least the opening ceremony or, if nothing else, the torch relay. India will host the Commonwealth Games in 2010 and hopes to bid for the Olympics in 2020 or 2024 -- hopefully after ensuring it will win some medals! China's predicament is a warning of what could await India.

From Aamir Khan to Medha Patkar, from Arundhati Roy to human rights busybodies, a hundred issues -- Jammu & Kashmir, Gujarat, Maoism, Manipur -- could be used to coerce India and make it bleed political capital at a time when it is perceived as vulnerable. This is not to suggest India should not aspire to host mega-events -- after Seattle in 1999, even trade summits are held hostage by transnational New Left mobs, and WTO can only hope for uninterrupted meetings in well-policed cities like Doha -- but the costs and implications should be understood.

Finally, there is the matter of how much international sport can (or should) be used to push domestic reform. The debate is particularly sharp in the United States. California Democrats, traditionally the fringe left of American politics, argue that a symbolic protest must be made, that China must be shamed. More pragmatic, President George W Bush insists he's going for the opening ceremony.

A level-headed position is that while the regime in Beijing cannot be forgiven its sins and shortcomings, there is a difference between snubbing a Government and insulting a whole people. Public opinion in China sees the Olympic Games as a national achievement. If the Games are boycotted or otherwise insulted, it will not hasten internal change in China but, rather, delay it. The menacing face of Chinese nationalism, so apprehended by its neighbours, will be there for all to see, and deal with.

That apart, it would be futile to see Beijing 2008 as a replay of the Moscow Olympics boycott of 1980, which anticipated -- even if under a different American President -- a decade of unrelenting diplomacy vis-à-vis the East Bloc. Eventually, the Soviet empire crumbled.

Nobody would want that repeated with the surviving Communist superpower. China's economy is far more externally engaged than the Soviet Union's was. While no civilised mind will condone the demographic transformation of Tibet or even Xinjiang, any move to 'liberate' them and add to the turbulent political cartography of Central Asia will not leave India sleeping peacefully.

That is why it is best to hope for China to evolve into a Singapore-style bonsai democracy. It will not be a free society but it will still be one we can live with. Of course, a Plan B is necessary. If China chooses another route, it will be met and 'managed' by other, harsher means. Either way, the world must give China time to make up its mind. How the rest of the planet responds to the Beijing Olympics could be critical to that decision.

Courtesy: www.dailypioneer.com, April 04, 2008