Friday, 17 May, 2024
By: Anshul Vipat
A whopping 90 percent of the respondents positively while a mere 10 percent said New Delhi should tone down its aggression with Beijing
India and China relations has been undergoing severe stress. Its been two years since the violent clash at Galwan which resulted in the death of 20 Indian army personnel and countless Chinese soldiers happened. Tensions along the border remain real and the future course of bilateral relations is uncertain, at best.
Not just borders, both the countries has seen a diplomatic standoff on other fronts as well. On Friday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) took a major action against Chinese mobile giant Vivo. It raided at least 44 places across India under sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The agency has frozen Vivo’s bank accounts after a money laundering probe revealed that the Chinese firm had siphoned a substantial sum of money out of the company through a web of companies to dodge taxes. Vivo has denied the charge.
The raids fumed Beijing which issued a statement saying that such activities are damaging the confidence of foreign entities. "The frequent investigations by the Indian side into Chinese enterprises not only disrupt the enterprises’ normal business activities and damage the goodwill of the enterprises, but also impedes the improvement of business environment in India and chills the confidence and willingness of market entities from other countries, including Chinese enterprises to invest and operate in India."
In the past two years, there has been a growing anger among Indians towards his eastern neighbour. C Voter-India Tracker's recent survey resonates the sentiments. During the survey, respondents were asked should India adopt a more aggressive stand towards China. A whopping 90 percent of the respondents positively while a mere 10 percent said New Delhi should tone down its aggression with Beijing.
As the accompanying chart shows, Indians across age, gender, educational, income, religious and ethnic backgrounds backed India's aggressive stand against China. While 85 percent of youth (18-24 age group) said India should be more aggressive, over 90 percent of senior citizens (55+ age group) supported the idea. The same was seen among people with different education groups as well. 87 percent of those belonging to lower education group and 95 percent from higher education responded positively. Around 90 percent of the urban as well as rural respondents wanted India to adopt a more aggressive stand towards China. More women compared to men are reportedly in the anti-China mood, with 94 per cent of the women voting in favour, compared to 87 percent of men.
The same sentiment was shared by respondents across party lines as well. Over 85 percent of UPA supporters and 95 percent of NDA voters responded in favour.
Clearly, the data suggests that the strained relations between the two Asian giants in the past of couple of years has led to an anti-China sentiment in India. The boundary crisis, together with the coronavirus pandemic and its health and economic consequences has already had an effect on Indian perceptions. And looking at this survey responses, the future does not seems good.
