PM's India visit: To sign or not to sign?

From the social media to the mainstream media, television talk-shows to newspaper opinion pieces --- the unending tittle-tattle surrounding our PM's today's tour to India appears to have been now focused just on a single issue --- whether Bangladesh will sign the defence deal or not? The talk of the town is not any longer about ensuring our fare share of the Teesta Transboundray River.
It's one of those rare occasions when a big power is in need to ink a deal with one of its smaller neighbour, given the latter's growing geographical, economic and military importance. Drawing lessons from all previous bilateral pacts and agreements, the country is gripped with suspense how Bangladesh would play its ball. Thinking the other way round, what would have happened if it was not India but Bangladesh to have initiated the defence agreement according to its own conveniences? What would have been Delhi's response to that?
More than India --- now it is we, who in reality have an opportunity to alter , experiment and if necessary, even cause a convenient delay from signing the defence agreement. The message is simple --- we have to remove all potential threats that may not only harm our sovereign existence, but may harm other important bilateral relations, especially the one with China.
Reality says, in recent times Bangladesh, has addressed a wide range of India's concerns on security and connectivity issues. It has probably prohibited Indian insurgents from its troubled north eastern states to operate in clandestine by using Bangladeshi grounds; allowed the transit and transportation of Indian goods and passengers through road, railway, and river ports, while connecting the Chittagong and Mongla ports to India's north eastern states. Moreover, it has granted India access of the river port at Ashuganj to transport heavy duty equipments for an under construction power company at Tripura. Even the unsettled Teesta issue---the huge trade deficit, is getting even wider.
Our political leadership must comprehend the fact, for both present and future, Bangladesh shouldn't anyhow become a part of the China-India rivalry by catering to military and geo-political needs to either China or India. In fact, it should maintain a safe distance while preserve a non-aligned stance. Understandably, Beijing is going to closely monitor the bi-lateral developments taking place in Delhi, and not to forget that despite a big trade deficit --- Bangladesh is the third largest trade partner of China among the South Asian countries following a steady and significant growth. As of now, Bangladesh has little threat perception from any of the quarters. Till late 2015 Bangladesh literally didn't have a full-fledged demarcated sea map. Now it does, so shouldn't the country fittingly arm itself to defend its waters?
It isn't that Bangladesh will not benefit at all but haven't our defence pacts with other countries helped us in many ways already? Pointedly, the thinly veiled defence agreement has strong potentials to be included with two marked conditions. First, the condition which would enable the Indian military to enable Indian troops movement into its North-eastern states by using Bangladesh territory, and second, marketing of Indian arms.    
Both issues are politically as well as militarily sensitive, and are likely to be taken very seriously by Beijing. Concerning the first, movement of any military hardware through Bangladesh is a clear threat to its internal security and sovereignty and deployment of military hardware to eastern-most Indian region --- being within close proximity to Chinese territories - can indisputably heighten geopolitical tensions.
Particularly, Arunachal Pradesh, a state in the North-eastern tip of India, which is also claimed by China as South Tibet. Granting the access to use Bangladesh as a military route may severely damage Bangladesh-China relations.
Regarding the second topic, being long among the world's top importers of weapons, Modi's India now wants to turn its military related trade into a two-way affair under its much hyped 'make in India' scheme. Indian diplomacy has not only been pro-active but re-oriented its strategies toward securing weapons contracts for major indigenously-developed systems under the aegis of the government's "Strategy for Defence Exports" (SDE). In this regard, Bangladesh's increasing defence cooperation engagements with china is not a new threat, but with increased defence expenditures Bangladesh has all possibilities for becoming an impending market for Indian arms.  
Then again, when one goes about shopping for weapons, price does not always become the indispensable overruling factor that determines one's choice. There are even more crucial factors like quality, guarantee, precision, viability and etc. It's right here where China once more takes the upper hand by trading and cooperating in military hardware with Bangladesh for decades now.  
The point to understand, how much do the Indians rely to their own home-grown defence systems while being the number one defence importer in the world ? Despite several joint defence cooperation ventures with a number of Asian and African countries, why cannot the country cut its growing arms import expenditures?  
Lastly, from a political perspective the PM's upcoming Delhi visit is also an opportunity for coming out of the Awami regime's long-standing pro-India stigma. At a personal level, I right away disagree with those who believe that an external force has always played a crucial part in electing and sustaining our heads-of-state. The strength of the government rests on popular support and not on external help.
Not the 'India card' or 'China card', Bangladesh will have to play its 'Bangladesh card' to decide whether to sign or not to sign the India's proposed defence deal. We don't have to wait too long for that. 
The writer is a journalist