Colombo tries to strike a balance between India, China

"Sri Lanka is neither pro-India nor pro-China," Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had said.

A year ago, Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who had just returned to power after a gap of over 10 years, chose Guruvayur, a temple town in Kerala, to make a pertinent observation on his country’s ties with two big neighbours: “Sri Lanka is neither pro-India nor pro-China,” he said. His comments came at a time there were concerns in India about China’s rising involvement in Sri Lanka.

It was during the presidency of Mahinda Rajapaksa that Chinese presence in Sri Lanka became more perceptible through its involvement in big-ticket infrastructure projects such as the $1.4-billion Colombo Port City Project. Even though, in the run-up to the January 2015 presidential election, Mr. Wickremesinghe had campaigned against the project, the new government took a more pragmatic approach. A senior academician points out that the present dispensation appears to be more “objective and transparent” on the project than before.

In mid-2015, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, then the Defence Secretary, told a seminar in Colombo that India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval once asked him to halt the project, citing India’s security concerns.

The port city project has been proposed alongside the Colombo port, which has become a vital player in the Indian scheme of economic activity. This was why New Delhi had initially viewed the project with suspicion in view of reports of the Chinese project promoter getting land ownership rights.

Though India has not made its position public to Colombo’s renewed move to revive the project, what has comforted it is that Sri Lanka has made it clear that land will be provided on a long-term lease and not on free hold. Sugeeswara Senadhira, an aide of Mr. Sirisena, feels Sri Lanka has to keep in good humour both the powers by reviving the Port City project and going along with India for the Economic and Technical Cooperation Agreement.

While favouring deeper economic engagement with China, experts on foreign affairs argue that Sri Lanka should not do anything that will be perceived by India as a security threat.