PM PVN Rao's diplomacy ensured border peace with China for three decades, says Telangana CM KCR

At a time when the Indian forces are in a face-off with the Chinese troops along the LAC, and the Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping governments are battling to arrive at a peaceful resolution, Telangana Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao has credited former Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao for “the three-decade border peace with China.”

The Telangana Assembly has, on Tuesday, passed a resolution requesting the Modi government to confer Bharat Ratna posthumously on Rao.

CM KCR, who moved the resolution, said in his speech, "PV kept aside the border issues with China and intending to enhance the commerce (between the two countries), visited Beijing and clinched a deal. It was PV’s diplomacy that kept the Indo-China border peaceful for about three decades.”

KCR’s apparent reference was to PM Rao’s September 1993 visit to Beijing.

According to the Ministry of External Affairs, “It was during this visit that the landmark agreement on the Maintenance of Peace and Tranquility along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the India-China Border Area was signed, providing for both sides to respect the status quo on the border, clarify the LAC when there are doubts and undertake CBMs.”

Rao was followed by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee who visited Beijing a decade later, in June 2003. “(The) visit elevated the bilateral relationship to a new level of mutual understanding and expanded ties to full-scale cooperation,” the MEA website page on Prime Ministerial visits to China says.

The KCR government had flagged off PVN Rao’s birth centenary celebrations on 28 June 2020.

CM KCR further said that the “nation should honour itself by conferring the Bharat Ratna on Telangana’s dear son PV, who is a global intellectual, “Apara Chanakya,” a polyglot, and the builder of a prosperous India.”

“As we are celebrating PV’s centenary, it would be befitting if the announcement is made during the forthcoming Parliament session,” he said while observing that the highest civilian award on PV has been overdue.

The resolution unanimously passed by the assembly wants PVN Rao’s statue and portrait installed in Parliament premises. It also wants the Hyderabad central university named after Rao, who had also served as the union HRD minister.

Incidentally, PVN Rao was the first to head the HRD ministry formed under the then PM Rajiv Gandhi. The Ministry’s name was changed back to the Ministry of Education by the Modi government in July.