How an Indian diplomat's affair in China cast shadow on Panchsheel agreement

The Sino-Indian Panchsheel Agreement signed in April 1954 came under fire in India immediately. It was branded "born in sin" by Congres leader and MP Acharya Kriplani. Experts label it "one of India's biggest post-Independence blunders". The agreement ended up trading Tibet's independence and made India share borders with China. It is also suspected that there could have been undue influence from Beijing as one of the key negotiators was having a "serious affair" with a Chinese woman. Honey-trapping has had a long history in the diplomatic and military history of the world.

China on June 29 marked the 70th anniversary of the signing of the Five Principlesof Peaceful Coexistence, or Panchsheel Agreement, with India staying away. Chinese President Xi Jinping lavished praise on the Five Principles.

Then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru hailed the Indo-China Agreement on Tibet of 1954, as an all-encompassing-ideal peace framework. But within a decade, China went against the principles of peaceful coexistence and respect for sovereignty by thrusting a war on India in 1962.

"The 1954 Panchsheel Agreement represented one of India's biggest post-Independence blunders," said geostrategist Brahma Chellaney, while commenting on China marking the Panchsheel anniversary.

Chellaney's criticism of the April 1954 treaty aiming to establish mutual cooperation and peaceful coexistence between India and China, could be understood as it had significant implications for Tibet, which was an independent nation before China annexed it in 1950. It also made China an immediate neighbour of India, by doing away with Tibet as a buffer.

WHAT PANCHSHEEL MEANT FOR TIBET

The 1954 India-China agreement meant India effectively recognised Chinese sovereignty over Tibet.

And it was in the run-up to this very agreement between India and China which saw a significant breach of diplomatic protocol, by one of the Foreign Office diplomats, Triloki Nath Kaul. The probable breach by Kaul's "serious affair" was notably amid a sensitive political negotiation with China.

India, which was deeply involved in Tibet before 1950, by signing the agreement had withdrawn its influence from the erstwhile Buddhist kingdom. It also failed to address the precise delineation of the Sino-Indian border, particularly in the western sector (Aksai Chin).

The historical accord, officially known as the Agreement on Trade and Intercourse between the Tibet Region of China and India, spelt out the Panchsheel, or the Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence.

The signatories of the Panchsheel Agreement were China's Vice Foreign Minister Chang Han Fu and India's Ambassador Nedyam Raghavan.

A 'SERIOUS AFFAIR', AMID PANCHSHEEL NEGOTIATIONS

The agreement between India and China which further sealed the fate of Tibet as a part of China, was the result of four months of intense negotiations between the two nations.

While Ambassador to China PS Raghavan led the Indian delegation, diplomat Triloki Nath Kaul and Dr Gopalachari, deputy director of the historical division of Delhi's foreign office, were the other members who flew to Beijing.

TN Kaul, who played a crucial role in the negotiations leading to the Panchsheel Agreement, his personal life during this period was shrouded in controversy, with allegations of a "serious affair", noted French author and Tibetologist Claude Arpi in a 2018 dailyO piece.

(From left to right) Amb N Raghavan, Premier Zhou Enlai, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Chairman Mao Zedong, Zhu De, Liu Shaoqi and Song Qingling in Beijing, October 19, 1954. (Image: Ministry of External Affarirs)

The "serious affair" with the Chinese woman raised questions about his objectivity and potential vulnerability to Chinese influence.

The allegations found further ground when the former head of India's foreign office's Historical Division Avtar Singh Bhasin's book - Nehru, Tibet and China - talked about an "affair" involving TN Kaul and a Chinese woman.

"He was having an affair with a Chinese woman while being engaged in political and important sensitive discussions [before the 1954 agreement], in breach of all norms of behaviour expected of an officer of his rank," wrote Bhasin in his book.

TN KAUL'S MARRIAGE PROPOSAL IRKED NEHRU

The glamourous Indian Chargé d'affaires in Beijing, Kaul, even wanted to marry the Chinese woman, write both Bhasin and tibetologist Claude Arpi.

Avtar Singh Bhasin, in his book, adds, "He[Kaul] was audacious enough to seek permission to marry her, when already married, and even asked for two months' ex-India leave for his honeymoon, at the end of the negotiations".

The affair was even brought to the attention of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru by NT Pillai, the secretary general of the Indian Foreign ministry, who wrote to Nehru about Kaul's personal life.

"An upset Prime Minister in a top-secret telegram asked him 'to return to India as soon as possible without waiting for the end of Tibetan talks'," wrote Bhasin.

In the face of the opposition from PM Nehru, Kaul, who was already married and had two children, had to abandon the plan of marrying the Chinese woman.

Although he did not go ahead with the marriage, he did not go back to New Delhi immediately, as Prime Minister Nehru had ordered.

"From his [TN Kaul's] point of view, Beijing was perhaps a party, a holiday which he enjoyed thoroughly, and did not mind the delay and absence from Delhi for four months," wrote Bhasin in his book Nehru, Tibet and China.

Despite Kaul claiming the accord to be the "quickest negotiated agreement signed by any Chinese Government past or present", AS Bhasin held, "it was India which compromised all the way to clinch the agreement".

"The sensitive points on which India had to compromise were never revealed to the public then or later," he added in his book.

Perhaps that is why an angry Nehru did not seemingly agree with Kaul's assessment of the agreement being the "quickest negotiated" one. As the former Prime Minister remarked, "any future negotiations with the Peking Government should be in Delhi and not in Peking".

Yet somehow, Triloki Nath Kaul, in years to come, continued as a diplomat and served in the Soviet Union, and the United States. He also served as the Foreign Secretary of India twice and had a role to play through the Cold War era, despite the word of his affair reaching every corner of the South Block.

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