Indian Council of World Affairs

Natural calamities have left an impact on the political landscape in the Bay of Bengal region. Over the years, natural disasters have resulted in the formation of a new country in these waters as well as resolving some of the internal political unrest in the region. 

The waters of the Bay of Bengal and its littoral hinterland have a history of calamities. This history, in terms of contemporary politics, dates back more than a century and has shaped the internal and regional dynamics of the Indian subcontinent. At the same time, these calamities have left a lasting impact that has reset the political and geopolitical contours of the Bay of Bengal region.

A Colonial Legacy

Of the many unfortunate events, the first major calamity of the past century to have left a lasting political impact is the Bengal Famine of 1943. While the cause of this famine owes to a host of issues, it was the geopolitical backdrop of the Second World War that can be said to have accentuated the cost paid in innocent Indian lives. The fall of then Burma, modern-day Myanmar, to Imperial Japan cut off one of the sources of much-needed food grains to the British Province of Bengal. With the momentum of the war firmly in the hands of the Axis, Britain, much like the Russians, adopted the scorched earth tactic and implemented a ‘denial policy’ to stall the Japanese advance into India. The denial policy, in light of the prevailing agrarian situation, further contributed to the crisis. However, the human toll of the 1943–44 famine can be attributed to the utter indifference and contempt of the wartime Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, whose policy had made the agrarian crisis into an untenable crisis of inhuman order.

Despite repeated requests for assistance by the British authorities in the province, London, under Churchill, was more focused on the war preparations nearer home. This included buffing up the stockpile of food and ensuring that logistical assets like ships were not diverted from the European theatre. But to add insult to injury, Churchill has gone on record to say –

“I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits.”[i] 

It was this attitude that resulted in the death of an estimated three million people in Bengal, which is more than six times the British casualties in World War Two.[ii]

The famine in the backdrop of the heightened political environment of the secular, non-violent Indian Freedom Movement ended up creating a climate of communal unrest and violence in the province that eventually resulted in the partition of India.

In less than a quarter of a century, post-independence, Bengal was to be partitioned once again. Since its formation, the rift over the national language, and stemming from that, the question of the cultural identity of the newly formed Pakistan was brewing issue. While the genesis of the Liberation War of Bangladesh in 1971 was solely driven by the identity politics of Pakistan based on the Bengali language and culture, the 1967 cyclone is to be seen as a catalyst. This is so as the perceived indifference towards the Bengalis by West Pakistan in providing humanitarian assistance consolidated the political landscape of East Pakistan, which in turn germinated into a call for an independent Bangladesh in 1971.

A Tsunami and Thereafter

While both nature and manmade catastrophes were common in the Bay of Bengal region, the Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004, or the Asian Tsunami, which was triggered by an undersea earthquake, was a turning point for more reasons than one. In the immediate aftermath, India had taken the lead in extending humanitarian assistance by first initiating a search and rescue operation in the most affected parts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka and the Maldives, even while coming to terms with the enormity of the disaster at home.

However, the immediate political fallout of the tsunami was felt in Indonesia and Sri Lanka. In the case of Indonesia, the devastation, especially in the Aceh province, which is close to the epicentre of the natural disaster, played a critical role in ending the multidecade secessionist insurgency of the Gerakan Aceh Merdeka (GAM) or the Free Aceh Movement. To reach aid and assistance by agencies, both domestic and foreign, to the affected population in Aceh, Indonesia relaxed and lifted restrictions that were imposed as part of its counter-insurgency strategy. This relaxation did pave the way for creating a sense of confidence between the two conflicting parties, which eventually paved the way for a negotiated settlement in August of 2005 to the internal conflict in Indonesia.[iii] 

In a dissimilar manner, the tsunami can be considered to have accelerated the end of the multidecade ethnic strife in Sri Lanka. Unlike in the case of Aceh, where the relief work and the political sagacity led to a peaceful resolution of the conflict, in the case of Sri Lanka, it was the damage to the combat infrastructure and assets of the secessionist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) that changed the tide in favour of the island state.[iv] While the Emerald Island as a whole had to deal with the adverse impact of the tsunami, the Sri Lankan state was in an advantageous position to deal with the aftermath of the natural catastrophe, unlike the LTTE. This difference was visible during the final phase of the conflict on the island, Eelam War IV.

However, the real political fallout of the Asian tsunami was in shaping the geopolitics of Asia. The ad hoc relief coordination between the Core Group of India, Japan, Australia and the United States set the stage for the formation of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (the Quad) among them in 2007.[v] It was Quad that had also paved the way for the christening of the region between the Indian and the Pacific Oceans as the Indo-Pacific Region. What can be considered the primary factor that resulted in the formation of the Quad and the Indo-Pacific as a regional concept was the humanitarian assistance that India extended immediately in the aftermath of this tragedy. Since then, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) have become an integral part of India’s statecraft. This is now also reflected in a larger canvas like the Quad with its ‘Quad Partnership on Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) in the Indo-Pacific’ effort that was formalised in September 2022.[vi]

Myanmar and Its Enduring Saga

Myanmar has long been in the cross-eyes of the international community for its history of oppressive military rule and a legacy of multiple ethnically motivated insurgencies that are collectively referred to by the euphemism of Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs). Before the onset of Cyclone Nargis in 2008, the junta in Myanmar had initiated a seven-step road map to democracy, which was welcomed with great scepticism by the international community. When Cyclone Nargis made landfall, Myanmar was subject to global censure for its poorer handling of rescue, relief and rehabilitation efforts apart from other legacy issues.

However, in the immediate aftermath of the cyclone, with considerable parts of the country being inundated, the junta had gone with the planned referendum on its new constitution, which was a first step before the introduction of electoral democracy with Myanmarese characteristics. It was this referendum that paved the way for a short-lived electoral process of 2010 in the country prior to the military takeover of February 2021.

Nonetheless, in the context of the March 28, 2025 earthquake, which has left considerable destruction in the insurgency/militancy-ravaged country, the junta seems to stick to its game plan. For instance, the ceasefire to the internal unrest declared in the aftermath of the earthquake so as to facilitate relief operations has not deterred the junta from carrying out airstrikes in regions that are dominated and controlled by some of the EAOs and some of these groups on their part have worked to take advantage of the natural disaster.

The second aspect is that the junta is keen on going ahead with its planned elections, which is seen by the international community to be anything but an all-embracing and inclusive process that is scheduled for early December 2025 or January 2026.[vii] If experience during Cyclone Nargis is any yardstick, in all probability, the military administration would be going ahead with its poll plans post-March 2025 earthquake even while trying to recapture territories that it has lost to the EAOs over the past year and a half.

Third, it is not just Myanmar that is myopic in approach, but so are some of its neighbours, even when the larger international community, such as India under Operation Brahma, have been extending humanitarian assistance. China, which has considerable commercial and strategic interests in the country, has brokered a deal between the Myanmar National Democratic Alliances Army (MNDAA) and the junta for the transfer of the Lashio township, with another EAO, the United Wa State Army, acting as a guarantor of the deal. As part of the deal, the Lashio, which was under the control of the MNDAA, was transferred back to the junta in the last week of April 2025. The timing of the transfer of Lashio- so close on the heels of the earthquake has exposed Chian’s cold business-like behaviour.

For China, which has been working overtime with respect to Lashio, an important hub for its overland trade and commercial investments in Myanmar, this development may have been a coincidence. All that can be inferred from this development is that narrow geopolitical imperatives take precedence over anything else.

The case of the Bengal Famine, the 1967 Cyclone and the Asian Tsunami establish that natural disasters and calamities have the potential to alter the course of geopolitics in shaping and reshaping the political landscape. The Bay of Bengal region has a special significance in this regard. While cyclones originating in the Bay of Bengal have adversely impacted the coastal areas in India for long, the impact that disasters in this region have on the politics and human life of India’s immediate and extended neighbourhood is lost on no one and has further come to light with the recent earthquake in Myanmar.  

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*Dr. Sripathi Narayanan, Research Fellow, Indian Council of World Affairs, New Delhi.
Disclaimer: The views expressed are personal.

Endnotes

[i] 5 of the worst atrocities carried out by British Empire, after 'historical amnesia' claims, Independent, March 5, 2017, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/worst-atrocities-british-empire-amritsar-boer-war-concentration-camp-mau-mau-a7612176.html, accessed on April 17, 2025.

[ii] Churchill's legacy leaves Indians questioning his hero status, BBC, July 21, 2020, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-53405121, accessed on April 17, 2025.  

[iii] Aceh redux: The tsunami that helped stop a war, ReliefWeb, December 23, 2014, https://reliefweb.int/report/indonesia/aceh-redux-tsunami-helped-stop-war, accessed on April 21, 2025.

[iv] The Tsunami & the LTTE, Observer Research Foundation, January 11, 2005,  https://www.orfonline.org/research/the-tsunami-the-ltte#:~:text=Independent%20reports%20from%20the%20Northern,insurgency%20and%20keeping%20it%20sustained, accessed on April 21, 2025.

[v] Defining the Diamond: The Past, Present, and Future of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, Centre for Strategic and International Studies, March 16, 2020, https://www.csis.org/analysis/defining-diamond-past-present-and-future-quadrilateral-security-dialogue, accessed on April 22, 2025. 

[vi] Guidelines for Quad Partnership on Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) in the Indo-Pacific, Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, September 23, 2022, https://www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/35745/Guidelines_for_Quad_Partnership_on_Humanitarian_Assistance_and_Disaster_Relief_HADR_in_the_IndoPacific, accessed on April 22, 2025.

[vii] Myanmar junta chief announces election for December or January, Reuters, March 8, 2025

 https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/myanmar-junta-chief-announces-election-december-2025-or-january-2026-2025-03-08/, accessed on April 23, 2025.