The following excerpt looks at India’s role in the domestic power struggle in Mauritius during Indira Gandhi’s tenure as the Indian prime minister.
The willing subordination of Mauritius
In many ways Mauritius is the ‘Little India’ of the Indian Ocean: a confidential U.S. diplomatic report judged that Mauritius has ‘willingly subordinated’ itself to India.[1]
During the colonial era, Mauritius was used by the Dutch, the French and then the British as a staging point for shipping between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. With no indigenous population, the European colonists imported slaves from Africa and indentured labour from India to work its sugar cane plantations. Today some 70% of the island’s population is of Indian descent, and the Indian diaspora clings tenaciously to Mother India. The remaining population is mostly of African descent, with a very small white French community.
India effectively assumed responsibility for the security of Mauritius after the departure of the Royal Navy in 1974, helping to establish the Coast Guard and providing equipment and training to security forces. New Delhi quickly came to consider Mauritius as one of its closest international partners and a safe haven in case of political troubles in India.[2] A turning point in India’s role in Mauritius occurred in the 1980s, when India secretly intervened to ensure the continuing political ascendancy of the majority Hindu community. Importantly, India appears to have acted more or less in cooperation with the United States. An examination of these events provides some important insights into India’s perceptions of its role in the region and its willingness to cooperate with others.
In the early 1980s, the southwest was the scene of great rivalry and intrigue when the Soviet Union and the United States jostled for influence over the small and politically weak Indian Ocean island states. Simultaneously, an embattled South African regime was actively destabilising governments that it considered hostile and suborning those that could be bought. This created considerable instability, and several island states, including the Seychelles, Comoros and Madagascar, were the subject of coups involving foreign powers or mercenaries. Mauritius struggled to maintain its parliamentary democracy in the face of this turmoil. As the Mauritius Times commented, ’Mauritius is the only important island left in the Indian Ocean that is not in the pocket of any superpower…It would be sheer folly to dismiss the likelihood of a coup in Mauritius’.[3]
In June 1982, Prime Minister Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, Mauritius’ leader from independence and a close friend of India, lost power to the main Mauritian opposition party, the MMM. The departure of Ramgoolam led to a period of instability and opened the door to other influences. Anerood Jugnauth, a London-trained barrister of Indian descent, became Prime Minister, and Paul Berenger, a firebrand socialist of (white) French descent, was appointed Finance Minister. Indira Gandhi swung her support behind Jugnauth and Berenger, hoping to earn their support for India and its policies in the Indian Ocean. Days after their election victory, Gandhi made a ‘triumphant’ visit to the island, showcasing India’s special relationship with Mauritius and New Delhi’s approval of the new government. Among other things, Mrs Gandhi granted Mauritius a special taxation treaty that has since allowed Mauritius to develop itself as an offshore financial centre and the primary route for foreign investment into India.
But ideological and personality differences surfaced in the new government within months. Many Hindus were unhappy about Berenger’s ties with Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, who was seen as an Arab radical and a fellow traveler of the Soviet Union.[4] There was also disquiet over symbolic attempts by the Berenger to promote French Creole as Mauritius’ national language over the English favoured by the Indian community, and this became a proxy for the increasing communal tensions. Hindu leaders were particularly frustrated that they had less economic and political power than the Franco-Mauritians despite their majority numbers. Some believed that Berenger intended to overthrow Jugnauth and establish a dictatorship in which high caste Hindus would be excluded from power. Berenger’s increasingly autocratic behaviour seemed to indicate that a coup was not too far away.
For New Delhi, Berenger’s growing power raised concerns about the position of the Indian community. Over the previous decades, there had been considerable discrimination against the Indian diaspora throughout the Indian Ocean region – at the hands of whites in South Africa and black Africans in East Africa. The entire Indian community had been expelled from Uganda in 1972 and in Sri Lanka the Tamil conflict was about to erupt into civil war. Beyond the Indian Ocean region, official discrimination occurred even where the Indian community represented a majority of the population. In Guyana, the majority Indian ethnic community had been excluded from power since independence. In Fiji, constitutional restrictions prevented a majority Indian ethnic community from gaining power. Against this backdrop, New Delhi was concerned that a Berenger-led government in Mauritius would favour the Creole and Muslim minorities, potentially provoking a refugee exodus of Hindus to India.[5]
Both New Delhi and Washington were also concerned about the geopolitical implications of Berenger taking power, if for different reasons. New Delhi was concerned that Berenger’s apparent ambitions for the social and political transformation of Mauritius would cause it to drift out of India’s sphere of influence and that it would lose its only unquestioning supporter in the Indian Ocean. The United States was worried that Berenger would give the Soviet Navy access to Port Louis and that he would aggressively prosecute Mauritius’ territorial claims over Diego Garcia. General Vernon Walters, the legendary Deputy Director of the CIA, took a close interest in Mauritius, cultivating personal links with key Hindu community leaders such as Harish Boodhoo.[6] Each of the CIA and RAW kept Jugnauth apprised of Berenger’s foreign links, including secret meetings between Berenger and Mikhail Orlov, the Soviet Ambassador to the Seychelles and regional representative of the KGB.[7] Although there is no publicly available evidence of active collusion between New Delhi and Washington, there does appear to be somewhat of an alignment of interests in relation to Mauritius. Since the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, Indira Gandhi had been making considerable efforts to improve relations with the United States, and, according to one commentator, by 1982 was downplaying Diego Garcia as a bilateral issue in private talks with Washington.[8]
In February 1983, when Jugnauth travelled to New Delhi to request assistance in the event of a coup led by Berenger, Mrs Gandhi assured him of Indian support, telling him that, ‘Within five hours a contingent of my air force will be in Mauritius’.[9] The power struggle came to a head a few weeks later. The government disintegrated with Berenger and most of the cabinet resigning, leaving Jugnauth with only a small number of mostly Hindu followers. The collapse of the government heightened communal tensions and Jugnauth feared for his safety amid reports of the formation of a workers’ militia. Hindu leaders exploited communal fears about Berenger, while Berenger’s supporters accused them of being in league with New Delhi.[10]
Indira Gandhi responded to the crisis by ordering the Indian Army and Navy to prepare an expeditionary force, to be called Operation Lal Dora, to stop a possible coup against Jugnauth.[11]
David Brewster is Senior Visiting Fellow, Maritime Studies Programme, Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.
This book excerpt has been republished with permission from the author.
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