Stating that India’s reputation has changed globally, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on May 26 that the success of New Delhi’s foreign policy is a manifestation of its domestic policy. He also emphasized that today India is the world’s fastest growing economy and the world wants to open operations and ventures here.
The EAM was speaking at an event ‘Bharat’s Rise in Global Diplomacy’ in Benares Club in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh on Sunday.
Addressing the event, Jaishankar said, “If we look at the major economies, our growth rate of 7 per cent is the highest in the world. Today the world is interested in India, so many joint venture proposals come here, so many companies want to start their operations, and our trade, and exports are rising. We all should accept that there has been a lot of progress in this…the growth rate has increased and inflation has reduced.”
Speaking on India’s foreign policy, the Foreign Minister said that India lacked confidence in the past, but has displayed a “confident” foreign policy under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership. He added that while earlier India was reluctant to have relations with countries, today it is working to keep everyone close.
“You must have sometimes heard the Prime Minister also say what was the difference between the foreign policy of earlier times and today’s foreign policy…Earlier, we wanted to maintain relations with other countries, but we lacked confidence…we felt to keep everyone at some distance. Keeping distance and balancing distance,” the EAM said.
He added, “After 2014, you can see a very different foreign policy. The confidence increases, when a very confident leader comes, who has an understanding of the world, who has faith in the country. You see that the same foreign policy, you keep everyone together, keep them so close. So now the balance is not about keeping distance, the balance is how close we keep everyone, and how many relationships we build together.”
Elaborating on it further, the EAM said today India maintains healthy relations with several major powers of competing interests, ranging from the US and Russia, to Iran and Israel and it is part of organisations like the SCO and BRICS.
He said India’s image and reputation changed in the world, adding that New Delhi’s success in foreign policy is a manifestation of its domestic policy. “Today, we can say that we have good relations with America, not just good, but the best relations since independence…we are good with Russia, we have maintained relations with Israel as well. The relationship with Iran is also good. We have a big connectivity proposal to build a corridor through Saudi Arabia and also a corridor through Iran and Russia…We are also a member of SCO with Russia and other countries. We have just seen the extension of BRICS,” Jaishankar said.
“So you must understand that today India’s position, India’s reputation, India’s image in the world is different and India’s situation is also different. So for us, whatever success of foreign policy happens is a manifestation of domestic policy…So the first thing I said is that there is tension in the world, there is conflict in the world, there is war in the world, there is instability in the world, but India’s position is very strong in this,” he added.
Drawing a comparison from the past, the Foreign Minister highlighted the massive strides made in in the field of infrastructure in the last 10 years, with railways, metros and highways.
“Today it is about infrastructure…There was a time when people used to say that India has talent, but regarding production here, they said ‘Who will go there, extraction is very difficult, and sending raw material there is very difficult.’ In the same India, today, 28 kilometres of highway is built every day, 14 kilometres of railway track is built every day, 8 new airports are built every year, every year new metro systems are built in 2 new metro cities,” he added.
He also highlighted a ‘positive exception’ in India referring to PM Modi’s popularity, stating that the other global leaders find it difficult to get re-elected for a second or third term.
“You can also see that there is a lot of instability in the political field all over the world. You will rarely see a country like this where democracy is so difficult. The first re-election of the Prime Minister or President is very difficult, let alone the second. So, we should first recognise that India is an exception, a positive exception in this world environment,” Jaishankar further said. (With Inputs from ANI)
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