- India – Uzbekistan relations are deeply rooted and go back far beyond the centuries.
- This served as a solid foundation for the development and strengthening of bilateral cooperation in the political, economic, cultural and humanitarian spheres.
- India was one of the first countries to recognize the state sovereignty of Uzbekistan
Bilateral Relations
- Indian companies in Uzbekistan operate in a wide range of sectors, from wholesale, retail and manufacturing to petroleum, chemicals textiles, leather, agriculture, construction and service industries.
- In the last six months, trade turnover between the two countries has reached USD 135 million.
- Uzbekistan consider India as one of the most important partners in Asia.
- For India, which is hoping to find firm allies in Central Asia, Uzbekistan can serve as an important foothold as the country shares its border with Afghanistan.
- Uzbekistan is militarily very strong and is therefore very important from the security point of view for India.
- Both countries are strategic partners and is important for India’s security, connectivity and counter terrorism efforts.
- Uzbekistan has large reserves of gas, uranium and gold.
- It is one of the biggest uranium exporter in the world; it will be a key player in India’s plan to procure nuclear fuel to create a strategic uranium reserve.
- A large number of Hindi speaking people are present in Uzbekistan
- In Tashkent there is a school named after Lal Bahadur Shastri, and also there are streets of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru.
- There is sharp increase of number of the Indian tourists to Uzbekistan. Monuments of Samarkand, Bukhara, Khiva and Shakhrizyabs are listed in the cultural heritage of UNESCO.
Mutual Cooperation
- Both countries share similar positions on many key regional and international issues.
- In the political sphere, they closely cooperate in struggling against international terrorism, religious extremism, organized crime, drug trafficking, and other challenges and threats to security.
- Both actively cooperate within the framework of international organizations, such as the UN, SCO and others.
- Also support each other’s initiatives.
- Uzbekistan supports the permanent membership of India in the UN Security Council.
- It cooperates with India in addressing the Afghan crisis.
- Both have great interest in close cooperation between our parliaments.
- Uzbekistan want to study India’s experience in parliamentarism.
- Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) provides good opportunity to further develop bilateral cooperation.
Uzbekistan President Visit to India
- Recently Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s made his first ever state visit to India.
- India and Uzbekistan inked 17 agreements including military cooperation, people-to-people ties, and business.
- India and Uzbekistan have set a bilateral trade target of $1 billion by 2020.
- India will also provide a Line of Credit of $200 million for low cost homes and other such social infrastructure projects in Uzbekistan.
- Both India and Uzbekistan have announced that they will jointly work together and strive for a stable, prosperous and peaceful Afghanistan.
Concerns / Challenges
- The volume of trade and investment between Uzbekistan and India does not correspond to the potential of both countries.
- There is lot of untapped reserves.
- India has not improved air links with the country.
- China has already built a strong presence in Central Asia.
Way Forwar
- Expanding cooperation in areas as information technology, programming, automobile industry, metallurgy, pharmaceutics, chemical, light industry, banking system etc.
- Signing an Agreement on preferential trade regime between both countries.
- India can exchange best practices in various fields of economics and technical cooperation.
- Given the huge number of unique historical and cultural monuments in Uzbekistan and India as well as India’s potential in medicine, great opportunities exist in cooperation in the fields of tourism and medical tourism.
- Need to intensify cooperation between our universities and exchange of students.
- Further expansion of the mutually advantageous interaction in the field of air transport.
- Joint efforts of Uzbekistan and India on use of Iranian ports will have positive effect on mutual trade turnover and correspond to the interests of both countries.
