After closing hostilities with Pakistan, India has turned its attention on Bangladesh, which is fast moving from being India’s “close friend” to an undefined status. Last week, it took two significant steps to warn the Mohammad Yunus government in Dhaka that it has had enough of its anti-India rhetoric and cosying up with India’s known enemies.

First came the Teesta Prahar exercise in India’s Siliguri, or “chicken neck”, corridor along the border with Bangladesh, and then, on Saturday night, New Delhi announced fresh restrictions on its eastern neighbour’s garment exports.

The Teesta Prahar Exercise, a battlefield live drill involving air power, electronic warfare, infantry, armour, artillery and special forces, was played out soon after hostilities with Pakistan ended in a provocative message to the Yunus government.

Yunus’s advisors and aides and Yunus himself have, at times, spoken of India’s “vulnerable” Siliguri corridor and about joining hands with China in case war breaks out with China and being the guardian of the Indian Ocean.

The Prahar (Strike) exercise by India’s Trishakti Corps brought in more of the Indian Army’s latest weaponry and gadgetry this time round in an attempt to instil shock and awe on its would-be enemies and was clearly more of a diplomatic warning than just a routine exercise.

To rub in the message, within days of the drill ending, New Delhi imposed restrictions on the import of Bangladeshi garments, allowing their entry only through the seaports of........

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