On Saturday major newspapers across the globe flashed the news on their front pages that more than 100 have been exterminated by the Myanmar military and civilians there are in frantic search for safer places in neighbouring nations. As of now, the world has only watched the developments with faint vehement condemnation and 'intervention' that would stop the bloodshed. It's striking to note that India, like many others is maintaining a stoic silence. Not only that, India attended a military parade in Myanmar's capital on March 27 to mark the Tatmadaw Day, the official day of the country’s military establishment and expectedly this has raised eyebrows. Interestingly, the US, which has always been blamed as a frontline torch bearer of imperialism has taken its first action by suspending a trade deal with Myanmar until democracy is restored there. In the light of the Myanmar coup, it can be said that while the world’s largest democracy has been mum at the sight of cold-blooded murder of democracy, the oldest one, however, has not forgotten its responsibilities. The ‘comparison’ will be discussed at world fora as well as in the subcontinent as the crisis gets deeper.

It will not be an exaggeration to comment that over the decades, it’s the military of Myanmar that has always emerged as the biggest obstacle to the establishment of a sound and sustainable democracy. The history of courage of Nobel Prize-winning pro-democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi who was under detention since 1990, to be released only two decades later in 2011 and Myanmar’s tryst with democracy thereafter spearheaded by her National League for Democracy (NLD) needs no further detailing. The origin of the current volatility lies in the results of the 2020 election which was won by the NLD and thereafter rejected by the junta due to "irregularities" in polling. The real cause, however, is that of the 25 % of seats in the national parliament the military is allowed to contest as per Myanmar Constitution, it fared poorly in terms of results in the recent election, even poorer than the 2015 edition and hence the ire. Everything going on in the neighbouring nation can only be called the death of democracy and what is confounding is that while most of the democratic world has condemned the coup with several countries signing a letter criticising the daily bloodshed and calling for restoration of democracy, India has been a conspicuous absentee. It has neither signed the letter nor has condemned it in terms befitting of the world’s largest democracy.

It’s observable that India’s stand has been ‘cautious’. However, it’s explicable why it has been so despite the unending killing of peaceful protestors, students, workers and even children.