A day after the Sri Lanka government decided to operate the East Container Terminal (ECT) of Colombo Port locally after tremendous pressure from trade unions, India seems to see a Chinese hand in orchestrating and funding the protests against the ECT deal by the trade unions in Sri Lanka.

A report in Daily Mirror, citing Indian diplomatic sources, said India is of “strong view” that Chinese agencies were funding some protests against the ECT deal. Earlier also, several media reports speculated that these protests against the ECT deal were being orchestrated as the result of the rivalry between India and China for an increasing strategic foothold in the country.

In the MOC signed in 2019, it was agreed upon that India and Japan would jointly hold 49 percent stakes in the ECT in exchange for further developing the terminal. “The was also no opposition to the agreement at the time and Sri Lanka stood to greatly benefit from the deal,” the report quoted the unnamed source as saying.

But then things started changing late in 2019 soon after the change of government in Sri Lanka. For a long time, President Gotabaya Rajapakshe remained non-committal to the deal. Meanwhile, during the same period, trade unions stepped up their opposition to the deal. New Delhi pressed the Sri Lankan government when Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visit the country in early January this year.

A week after the visit, President Rajapakshe announced the proposal to give a 49 percent stake to India’ Adani Ports and SEZ Ltd and its allies. The announcement was soon followed by fierce protests and strike threats by trade unions in Sri Lanka, warning the government against going ahead with the deal. For a week, the Sri Lankan government seemed to assure the trade unions that the government wasn’t giving up or leasing the port to any foreign country.

On Monday, the Sri Lankan government backtracked after trade unions issued the threat of industrial actions. The report on Daily Mirror says India is likely to raise the issue at the political level soon.