- Prelims: Current events of international importance, G20, Global south, Inflation etc.
- Mains GS Paper II & III: Significance of G20 countries, Bilateral, regional and global grouping and agreements involving India or affecting India’s interests.
ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS
- India is presiding over a year-long G-20, and leadership of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO).
INSIGHTS ON THE ISSUE
Context
G20:
- The G20 is an informal group:19 countries and the European Union, with representatives of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
- The G20 Presidency rotates annually: according to a system that ensures a regional balance over time.
- For the selection of the presidency: 19 countries are divided into 5 groups, each having no more than 4 countries.
- The presidency rotates between each group.
- Every year the G20 selects a country from another group to be president.
- India is in Group 2 which also has Russia, South Africa, and Turkey.
- The G20 does not have a permanent secretariat or Headquarters.
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO):
- SCO is a permanent intergovernmental international organization.
- It’s a Eurasian political, economic and military organization aiming to maintain peace, security and stability in the region.
- India and Pakistan became members in 2017.
Objectives:
Challenges associated with G20:
- Global peace: everything points to a further deterioration in the geo-political climate, and to a distinct possibility of impending conflict.
- Priorities listed by India as signifying its presidency, viz., climate change, clean energy, sustainable developmental programmes and reform of multilateral institutions
- They are likely to take a back seat, given the deteriorating global situation.
- The hopes of reaping a rich dividend from the summitry may be misplaced.
- The importance of the G-20 appears to be declining in today’s world.
- The SCO seems to have somewhat greater traction.
- Distrust between the two camps led by the United States and China/Russia,
- It leaves little scope for countries such as India — that have not declared their allegiance to either camp.
Issues of China for India:
- Major diplomatic-cum-strategic offensive across Asia, especially West Asia.
- Display of its naval prowess in the seas around much of East and Southeast Asia
- Flexing of its military muscle in the Ladakh and Arunachal sectors of the Sino-Indian border.
Recent meeting of the Defence Minister with his Chinese counterpart:
- Improvement in ties with China would depend on ‘peace on the border’.
- This will reduce room for maneuver on India’s part, at a time when China is launching several other regional initiatives to checkmate India in the Indian Ocean region.
- The China-Indian Ocean Region Forum participation by an overwhelming majority of Indian Ocean states.
China’s role and its implications on India:
- China is seeking to widen the arc of conflict with India.
- China is actively engaged in seeking new friends in India’s extended neighborhood, in a bid to limit India’s influence in this region.
- West Asia appears to be fast yielding to China’s muscular and diplomatic offensive.
- Notwithstanding India’s attempts to reach out to erstwhile friends such as Egypt: India seems to have been sidelined, given the major churn in West Asia, much of it on China’s initiative.
- The new China brokered Iran-Saudi Arabia entente is setting the stage for major diplomatic shifts across the region, marginalizing India and certain other nations.
- China’s ability to embark on hybrid warfare, including the adoption of cyber tactics, engage in the ‘politics of water’ by redirecting the Himalayan rivers.
- Adapting to modern conditions the tactics popularized by the Fifth Century BCE Chinese Strategist
- Sun Tzu, of ‘winning wars without fighting through avoiding the enemy’s strength and attacking his weaknesses’.
India’s relations with Russia:
- They appear to be entering a prolonged phase of uncertainty.
- Russian ties are not necessarily anchored in defense cooperation
- Russia has been a key factor in cementing their relations.
- India looks more to the West, specially the U.S., for state-of-the-art weaponry
- The inevitability of the relationship with Russia can no longer be guaranteed.
- With the Russia-China strategic relationship getting stronger and both countries openly giving vent to their belief in the utility of such a relationship
- The strains are inevitable in India-Russia relations.
- Russia’s unequivocal attack on the Quad during the SCO Defence Ministers meeting in New Delhi.
- Pacts involving Russia, such as the Tripartite Russia-India-China platform and BRICS, have lost much of their dynamism.
- The economic content of the bilateral relationship is limited, and for the present linked to trading in oil, imparting little dynamism to the relationship.
Way Forward
- During its presidency of the two institutions, India may well be called upon to chart a course that balances the contradictory demands of the G-20 and the SCO — and even more so that of the Global South.
- Turmoil in India’s immediate neighborhood in South Asia, compounds India’s problems.
- The situation in Afghanistan appears to be steadily worsening.
- India has almost lost all traction with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
- Pakistan and Sri Lanka, to different degrees, represent ‘worst case’ scenarios.
- India is one of the few countries in the world which has managed to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic and the resultant economic crisis without much damage, and is widely seen as a prospective global power.
- It has much to do before it attains this pinnacle.
- There are many obstacles that have to be overcome before India can achieve its predetermined goal.
- Notwithstanding its fortuitous position of helming both the G-20 and SCO simultaneously, India should not claim to have attained its goal.
QUESTION FOR PRACTICE
The long sustained image of India as a leader of the oppressed and marginalized nations has disappeared on account of its new found role in the emerging global order.’ Elaborate(UPSC 2019) (200 WORDS, 10 MARKS)
