JOIN USPrime Minister Narendra Modi, in his just-concluded nine day tour of three key western nations – France, Germany and Canada - has used his “Make in India” initiative to encourage investment from there. Defence, energy and infrastructure took the centrestage in Paris as Modi went on a boat rise with the French president on the Seine and interacted with French business leaders. In Germany, the real European powerhouse, Modi met Chancellor Angela Merkel and inaugurated the Hannover Messe, considered one of the world’s largest congregations of industry gurus, in which India is a partner country this year.
Modi’s unabashed selling of India as an investment destination is the most striking aspect of his outreach to the West. Unlike his predecessors, India now has a prime minister who is more in tune with global diplomacy than most of the Indian foreign policy bureaucracy and commentariat in Delhi. One of the most important roles that leaders of major
economies are expected to play in today’s day and age is that of a salesman.
From Barack Obama to Xi Jinping, David Cameron to Angela Merkel, the first order of business for most governments today is to sell their countries as welcoming places for doing business. And Modi is a salesman par excellence. Pledging a stable and transparent tax regime, Modi has been busy wooing global investors. He has also been underlining that his government means business.
In France, Modi’s ‘can-do’ attitude and pragmatic instincts were unleashed as he tried to move forward on projects that have been stuck for a long time. The Rafale deal has been in limbo for the past three years over terms of procedures and pricing negotiations even as the Indian Air Force has been worried about meeting its “critical operational necessity.” Modi managed to break the deadlock with his out of the box approach when he signed a government-to-government deal with France for the supply of 36 Rafale fighter jets in “fly-away” condition “as quickly as possible.”
Though this goes against his ‘Make in India’ pitch, he understood the urgency of IAF demands. In some ways, this was compensated by the support Modi’s ‘Make in India’ campaign received from Airbus which declared that the company was “ready to manufacture in India, for India and the world.”
The Airbus Group is likely to increase its sourcing of aerospace parts from Indian companies to $2 billion in the next five years. India and France also inked deals aimed at early operationalisation of civil nuclear cooperation agreement. The Jaitapur project had been struck because of differences over the cost of electricity generation. With the new pacts, there is likely to be swift movement on this front as well.
Modi’s ability to effectively link India’s past with the nation’s future in furthering Indian aspiration was underscored when he talked about New Delhi’s move for a permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council. Where previous Indian governments had been diffident in highlighting the contribution of Indians to the two World Wars, Modi paid a tribute to about 10,000 Indians who had died fighting alongside their French counterparts in World War I, underlining the fact that Indians have been sacrificing their lives for world peace and stability for over a century.
As such, India’s place on the UNSC is the nation’s right. This is an argument that should have been made long back but Congress-led governments have been reluctant to take this up for ideological reasons.
With Canada, Modi secured a landmark nuclear energy deal, which will supply India with 3.2 million kilos of uranium over a five-year period, formally ending a long-standing moratorium on Canadian exports of nuclear materials to India. In the 1970s, India used Canadian technology towards development of a nuclear bomb. Supplying uranium will be Canadian producer Cameco Corporation, which says India is the second-fastest market for nuclear fuel.
Hard reality
Modi has done well during his trip but behind the warm welcome that he has received also lies the hard reality of the shifting global balance of economic power. India is at the heart of this recalibration. Modi’s election has changed perceptions about India and there are hopes that the leading democracy might be finally getting its act together. At a time when the West is struggling economically and the larger western world is jittery about China’s growing global heft, strong ties with India are now a cornerstone of the foreign policies of most western nations and support for strong bilateral ties with India cuts across party political divide.
It is now Modi’s job to sell India effectively to an audience waiting to hear a positive story. Modi’s critics at home may crib about his foreign policy ventures being full of hype, but a large part of global diplomacy today is about selling a narrative about your nation that inspires confidence in your interlocutors about your future. If any political leader in India can do that effectively today, it is Modi. Indian story is much more attractive today than it was a year ago and Modi is best positioned to narrate it to a largely receptive audience.
India and the West will not always agree but it's a sign of mature partnerships when partners can gracefully agree to disagree. New Delhi stands to benefit from leveraging partnerships rather than shunning them. Today, India is well positioned to define its bilateral partnerships on its own terms and would do well to continue engaging more closely with those countries that can facilitate its rise in regional and global prominence. Modi seems to understand this much better than most of his critics.
(The writer is Professor of International Relations, Department of Defence Studies, King’s College, London)