To understand India’s foreign policy direction one should ignore Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi’s statements and focus on his actions and their results. The government’s deeds in contrast to its words indicate the sweetest deal for Beijing. India is fast sliding into China’s camp.

After last month’s visit to China by a BJP youth delegation to study the Chinese system and to strengthen relations between both nations now another BJP delegation comprising members of parliament will visit China “to understand the internal party structure, political functioning and China’s role in establishing a welfare society”. BJP General Secretary Mr. Ram Madhav described it as a “good will” visit aimed at building relations between two powerful countries in Asia. BJP efforts to study and perhaps emulate China should cause little surprise. China has been Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi’s role model of development for the past one decade when he was Gujarat Chief Minister and made four visits to Beijing.

When Mr. Modi invited all SAARC heads of state to his swearing in ceremony he created hopes about a future South Asian Union. His subsequent actions reversed that policy. On a spurious last minute excuse to justify a decision taken earlier for undisclosed reasons Mr. Modi scuttled the Indo-Pakistan peace dialogue which had been initiated by his government. Neither security agencies nor the National Security Advisor were consulted or informed of the decision taken jointly by Mr. Modi and Mrs. Sushma Swaraj to scuttle the dialogue. Was this belated decision on spurious grounds taken under some foreign advice?

In the SAARC summit at Kathmandu Mr. Modi initially snubbed Mr. Sharif by excluding him from talks he held with all other heads of state. Mr. Sharif’s plea for India to renew the derailed pace dialogue was treated with contempt. Mr. Modi went so far as to suggest that Pakistan could exclude itself from South Asian connectivity that may be established among the other SAARC nations. This must have sounded like sweet music to Beijing which has armed Pakistan to counter India and is doing everything to prevent Indo-Pakistan consolidation. Mr. Modi has not a word about China nuclear arming Pakistan with missiles. Instead, by spurning Pakistan he strengthens Beijing’s designs to perpetuate the Indo-Pakistan divide. At the same time he welcomes enhanced trade and investment from China. His policy in Bengal and Northeast dovetails with Beijing’s aims to create road connectivity through east India to help integrate South Asia with China.

In this regard even the CPI-M Chief Minister of Tripura is defying ideology by inviting Mr. Modi to address his cabinet on good governance. Apart from China what other common link exists between Mr. Modi and the CPI-M? Pathetic CPI-M leaders describe the world’s most intense capitalist economy as socialism with Chinese characteristics. Earlier this writer had sarcastically written that they may also hail Mr. Modi as the creator of secularism with Gujarati characteristics. The Tripura Chief Minister has proved that the sarcasm was not necessary.