India and the World

Why PM Modi’s visit to UAE matters: Bridging the Gulf

- by India Writes Network

The 27th sojourn by Prime Minister Narendra Modi outside the country to United Arab Emirates August on 16-17 is significant and remarkable not only because he is the first prime minister to go to this country after Indira Gandhi’s visit 34 years ago. Nor also because he is visiting a country which contributes about 15% of the total inward remittances (USD 15.7 billion out of a total of USD 69 billion received by India from all over the world in 2014-15). Nor even for the fact that Indians constitute about 30% of the total population (2.6 million out of a total population that is a shade above 9 million, less than half the population of Delhi). The visit is exceptional because this will be the first visit by Prime Minister Modi to West Asia, to a Muslim country and to a Gulf Arab country. This is one region that Mr Modi has not visited so far, although he has straddled across hemispheres over the last 14 months of his tenure.

PM Modi’s choice of UAE to be the first country of his visit in the energy-rich but troubled region is as compelling and momentous as was his choice of Bhutan to be the country for his first bilateral visit after assuming power. PM Modi is giving the same importance to UAE as he gave to India’s neighbours like Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh by making this a single country tour and not combining it with other countries. This also sends out a clear message that UAE occupies the same importance and relevance in India’s foreign policy matrix as its immediate neighbours.

Read More

India-Iran ties set to fly high: Energy partnership, enhanced trade on agenda

- by Manish Chand

India’s multi-faceted ties with Iran are set to move into a higher trajectory, with a spate of significant outcomes emerging from Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif’s day-long visit to New Delhi. The proposals firmed up during the visit will scale up economic ties and transform the buyer-seller relationship to a genuine energy partnership.

Indian private investors got a shot in the arm with Mr Zarif announcing in New Delhi that Iran is open to Indian private companies investing in the Chabahar Port. Mr Zarif is on his first visit to India after the historic nuclear deal struck between Iran and the P5+1 member countries last month.

“Both India and Iran are eager to engage in this. I believe we will soon start serious work,” Mr Zarif said in New Delhi, adding that the two countries already have an agreement in place. The deal to develop the Chabahar Port was signed between India and Iran in May 2015.

India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met her Iranian counterpart and discussed a host of “forward-looking proposals” that are set the stage for accelerating bilateral relations across the spectrum, which suffered due to a spate of Western sanctions imposed on Tehran to curtail its nuclear programme suspected of developing atomic weapons.

Read More

Kerry intones song of India, lauds resilient democracy, innovation

- by India Writes Network

It’s a cheering and uplifting tribute from the US to the power of India in the world. In an Independence Day message to India on the eve of its 69th Independence Day, US Secretary of State John Kerry has underlined the ethos of India and what it represents in an evolving world order. “Since 1947, India has stood as a beacon for the world, as an economic power that prides innovation, as a resilient democracy in the face of terror and as a strategic power that upholds international norms.”

“As the world’s largest democracies, the US and India stand side by side in defending and promoting the freedoms and values we hold,” said Mr Kerry, in a message on behalf of US President Barack Obama.

“As was highlighted during President Obama’s visit for India’s Republic Day in January, the US takes pride in our indispensable partnership with India, a friendship built on our shared democratic values, the entrepreneurial spirit of our people, and our shared interests,” said the US diplomat, a robust backer of stronger India-US relations and an ardent supporter of the India-US nuclear rapprochement.

Alluding to the enduring legacy of India’s iconic figures associated with the freedom movement, Mr Kerry said that these leaders contributed to establishing a united, inclusive republic and inspired leaders from across the globe.

Read More

Sri Lanka polls: Tough choices and the way ahead

- by N Sathiya Moorthy

Come Monday, 17 August, and Sri Lanka would have gone to nation-wide elections for the second time in eight months. The result will determine if the January 8 presidential poll was a freak, or heralded a “change of political culture,” as claimed by the victorious combine at the time.

That combination of present-day President Maithripala Sirisena, the beneficiary of the January poll, and his Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who was among his benefactors at the time, could continue toddling along, in the name of ‘good governance’, their two-word passport to power at the time. Any reversal of the electoral fate for the unpredictable combine could usher in more unpredictability, what with President Sirisena declaring that post-poll, he would not invite his predecessor and fellow-party man, Percy Mahinda Rajapaksa, to become prime minister in Ranil’s place.

Therein is a hitch. The diluted 19th Amendment to the Constitution that the present duo piloted and passed through the Parliament, in which they did not command a majority, is clear that the President can invite only the leader of the single largest party or group to form a government – as is the case with any parliamentary democracy. Diluting, if not outright removing the powers of the ‘Executive President’ as promised by the duo, 19-A, has also taken away Sirisena’s powers to dissolve Parliament at the end of one year.

Read More

Ahead of Modi visit, India, US set to hold maiden Strategic and Commercial Dialogue

- by India Writes Network

Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US in September, Washington DC is all set to host the first ever India-US Strategic and Commercial Dialogue (SACD). According to Stefan M Selig, US Undersecretary for International Trade, Department of Commerce, it is scheduled to be held in September. This will be the first ever high level strategic and commercial dialogue between the world’s leading democracies and close strategic partners. With the intent to boost trade and investment five-fold to $500 billion annually, the meet would focus on areas such as ease of doing business and smart cities. Mr Selig is in India to meet Commerce secretary Rita Teaotia to discuss the details about the high level dialogue.

“The dialogue will have four pillars: ease of doing business, innovation and entrepreneurship, smart cities project in India and the harmonisation of standards to increase bilateral trade,” Mr Selig said at the press conference in the Indian capital. Mr Selig also added that he is due to meet Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman shortly to discuss about joint preparations for the upcoming dialogue.

The SACD is expected to be held days before Mr Modi goes on his second visit to the US to attend the United Nations General Assembly in the last week of September. He is also expected to engage US President Barack Obama in bilateral talks on the sidelines of the UNGA in New York.

Read More

Amid deluge of Sushma-Sonia vitriol, monsoon session of Parliament a wash-out

- by India Writes Network

It’s a complete wash-out, a criminal waste of the taxpayers’ money. The monsoon session of the Indian Parliament that ends on August 13saw a deluge of vitriol, with the BJP-led NDA government locked into an unending sparring match with the opposition Congress that tried to corner the ruling party on charges of corruption and impropriety involving its senior leaders and ministers. Trading barbs that degenerated into embittered personal attacks took a vicious turn on August 12 as two stalwart women leaders in the Lok Sabha, Sonia Gandhi of Congress party and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj launched invectives against each other.

The Parliament was expected to pass the long-pending Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill, which was touted as a game-changer in reforming the taxation system in the country. The GST has been discussed over the past decade, with no government able to pass it successfully in Parliament till date. The Congress party demanded the resignation of Sushma Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia for their controversial role in facilitating the visa for the ailing wife of the well-networked cricket impresario Lalit Modi.

Read More

Iran’s Foreign Minister to target India opportunity

- by India Writes Network

A month after Tehran struck a historic nuclear deal with the world’s major powers, Foreign Minister Javad Zarif will be in New Delhi for a day-long visit that signals Iran’s intent to scale up economic and energy ties with one of its key partners in Asia.

The suave Zarif, Tehran’s key interlocutor in the P5+1 nuclear deal and a trusted aide of President Hassan Rouhani, will be in India on August 14 to explore new opportunities that will flow from the expected lifting of Western sanctions on Iran by the end of the year.

The India trip is part of Mr Zarif’s regional visit. He will visit Pakistan on August 13 and is scheduled to meet the Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Foreign Affairs advisor Sartaj Aziz. He has been visiting many countries after the nuclear deal, especially in West Asia.

Mr Zarif is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari. The main focus during his visit would be on discussing increasing Indian imports of Iranian oil and boosting trade. India is one of the largest importers of Iranian oil in Asia, which is expected to rise substantially after the lifting of sanctions. Prior to the imposition of Western sanctions, Iran was the second largest supplier of India’s crude.

The Iranian foreign minister is expected to update the Indian leadership on the nitty-gritty of the nuclear deal and map out a plan for re-energizing India-Iran relations in a host of areas, including trade and investment, energy partnership and strategic areas like the prospects of cooperation amid unfolding transition in Afghanistan. India’s ongoing assistance for building the Chabahar port that will open direct access to Central Asia is also expected to come up for review.

Read More

Indian Soft Power: Modi strategy and home truths

- by India Writes Network

There is a lot of hype regarding Prime Minister Modi’s innovative and constructive approach to India’s foreign policy. Some have gone so far as to say Indian foreign policy has undergone a revolution under the Modi administration. While it is contentious whether there are more elements of change or continuity, a change is certainly being implemented with regard to India’s soft power that is being methodically and strategically deployed like never before.

Joseph Nye originally coined the term “soft power” in the late 1980s, which he describes as “the ability to get what you want through attraction rather than coercion, resulting in a more favourable public opinion and credibility abroad”. It has been emphasized by author Shashi Tharoor, also a former junior minister of external affairs, who states that “the associations and attitudes conjured up in the global imagination by the mere mention of a country’s name is often a more accurate gauge of its soft power than a dispassionate analysis of its foreign policies”. The events of the previous decade have espoused the limitations of the use of force, leading to a subsequent resurgence in the importance of soft power as a foreign policy tool.

The concept of soft power is not new to India. India’s Non-alignment Movement (NAM) developed in the explicit historical situation of India’s independence struggle and was an embodiment of the values and ideals, such as the Gandhian nonviolent legacy, that influenced it. Independent India’s elites attempted to pursue a leadership role for India based on its ideological soft power and diplomacy. Indeed, India’s first Prime Minister Nehru was a proponent of soft power and carved an international role for India based on its moral standing and its support of the developing world, thus attempting to play a normative role in international relations.

Read More