India, July 6 -- Bangladesh Prime Minister (PM) Tarique Rahman made his maiden foreign tour two weeks ago, four months after taking office, to Malaysia followed by China. But he has not visited India yet. New Delhi's reaction to Rahman's Malaysia and China visit was swift, sharp, but dated - mostly a litany of complaints disguised as strategic analysis. That he had bypassed India, typically the first destination for a new Bangladeshi leader, showed how vulnerable India's eastern frontier is. Another neighbour has been lost to Beijing. All this talk brings back a sense of deja vu. In fact, we have watched this script play out before - with Male and with Kathmandu - and we will have to watch it again. So, do first foreign visits of newly elected leaders in our neighbourhood reallymatter? Should we care so much about where our neighbours travel, especially at a time when the number of tourists andstudents coming to India from ourneighbourhood is sharply declining? (Why they are not coming to India is a separate discussion altogether.) To be clear, where a neighbouring country's leader chooses to go first tells us very little about the state of a relationship, and we must stop treating itineraries as foreign policy outcomes. If we keep treating them as such, they tend to become foreign policy outcomes, at least in our mind. What may be more useful for us to analyse is what actually shapes such decisions in our neighbouring capitals. A newly-minted PM presiding over a struggling economy is likely to go where he/she thinks the money is. Rahman's first stop was Malaysia (not China, to be precise), to seek more jobs for Bangladeshi workers (who, for the record, we are not very keen on admitting into our country). Then came Beijing: An investment forum, meetings with Chinese lending institutions, and a reported request of around six billion dollars in infrastructure support. A close, neutral reading will show that the rationale behind Rahman's visit are more economicthan strategic. A leader in Rahman's position will naturally turn to whoever can write the cheque. India was not going to accept more Bangladeshi workers or write a fat cheque like China. Then, why take offence? Now, add the Hasina factor into this mix - a visit by the Bangladeshi PMto India will invariably revive questions regarding Sheikh Hasina's extradition.As a matter of fact, we want less of those questions, not more. A closer reading of our neighbours' post-election itineraries will, in fact, reveal a mixed record. Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake called on New Delhi before he went to Beijing. Some leaders go to neither India nor China first (the Maldives' Mohamed Muizzu, for instance) and prefer a third country. To treat these itineraries as incontrovertible evidence of how seriously our neighbours take us is to read to much into things. It merely spikes our strategic community's blood pressure. This is also the age of multi-alignment: If we practise it (which we do with great aplomb and pride), we must expect others to do so as well. We buy Russian oil despite western pressure, we trade with China while balancing against it, and court Washington while keeping Moscow close because we wish to maximise our options in a turbulent world. Yet when Bangladesh or Nepal does precisely the same between India and China, some of our pundits call it a betrayal. Aren't our neighbours practising vis-a-vis uswhat we practise vis-a-vis the great powers? We must learn to recognise multi-alignment as a fact of contemporary international life, and learn to live with it. Of course,no harm in trying to change it, but there is no point in complaining when we aren't able to do so. We must also recognise, even if we will not readily do so, another uncomfortable fact: China has become an important and, for most of our neighbours, an indispensable partner, even if it is much to our deep dislike. Look at the regional trade figures, the tourist flows, the students enrolled in Chinese universities, and the infrastructure credit. No amount of outrage on Delhi's social media will change that material reality. Insisting that our neighbours prefer India over China is, therefore, pointless; they will not, because they cannot. But why has China become so indispensable in South Asia? Deep pockets are the obvious answer; Beijing is willing to spend on the region to tilt the balance in itsfavour. But there is also a more complicated reason. China is a non-resident power in the Indian subcontinent. It's relationshipwith the region is not punctuated bycolonial memory, or religious, linguistic and ethnic entanglements. India, on the other hand, is woven into the region's historyand its associated anxieties. So, ourengagement of the region must be more patient and empathetic rather than one that seeks quick results. There is much India can do instead of fretting over our neighbours' itineraries. When the Lankan economy collapsed in 2022, New Delhi reached out with support worth billions while others, China most notably, hesitated. Physical proximity makes us the region's natural first responder, notwithstanding the itinerary. It isthe constant and consistent attention to the region and its complex needs that produces strategic outcomes rather than whogoes where first. In fact, taking offence at where our neighbours go first will onlyreaffirm the caricature of India as theoverbearing big brother. Yes, Rahman did go to Beijing before New Delhi, but he will come here in time, because geography, water, trade, and a long shared border ensure that Dhaka and New Delhi have no choice but engage each other. In the meantime, we can choose to check our neighbours' itineraries and take offence or focus on the more substantive outcomes....