Ambassador Rajiv Bhatia is Distinguished Fellow, Foreign Studies Programme at Gateway House. He is a member of CII’s International Advisory Council, Trade Policy Council and Africa Committee. He is theChair of FICCI’s Task Force on Blue Economy, and served as Chair of Core Group of Experts on BIMSTEC. He is a founding member of the Kalinga International Foundation and a member of the governing council of Asian Confluence. As Director General of the Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA) from 2012-15, he played a key role in strengthening India's Track-II research and outreach activities. During a 37-year innings in the Indian Foreign Service (IFS), he served as Ambassador to Myanmar and Mexico and as High Commissioner to Kenya, South Africa and Lesotho. He dealt with a part of South Asia, while posted as Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs. A prolific columnist, he is also a regular speaker on foreign policy and diplomacy in India and abroad. He was Senior Visiting Research Fellow during 2011-13 at the Institute of South East Asian Studies (ISEAS), Singapore. He holds a master’s degree in political science from Allahabad University.His first book India in Global Affairs: Perspectives from Sapru House(KW Publishers, 2015) presented a sober and insightful view of India’s contemporary foreign policy. His second book, India-Myanmar Relations: Changing contours(Routledge 2016) received critical acclaim. His third book, India-Africa Relations: Changing Horizons (Routledge 2022) has also been receiving positive reviews.
Expertise
Foreign Policy, Quad & Indo-Pacific, South & South-East Asia, Africa, Blue Economy
India’s rise as a global player is linked to the kind of relationship it enjoys with African countries, especially as the latter is undergoing demographic, political, and socioeconomic transitions. A new report on the India-Africa partnership recommends a resilient ‘Africa policy’ that will collectively enhance diplomatic, defense, cultural, and developmental collaboration between the two countries.
India's proposal to invite the African Union as a full member of the G20 comes three months before the Leaders’ Summit. The AU’s entry will make the grouping more representative and inclusive, thereby enhancing its moral credibility. For its part, the AU’S economic potential and mineral wealth can have a positive impact on decisions of global importance.
India’s year-long G20 Presidency completed six months at a time of global economic slowdown and sharpening geopolitical contestation. While India has done well in leveraging the Presidency to articulate its vital goals, the success of the upcoming Delhi Summit will depend on achieving consensus, additionality, and implementability.
On May 30, Rajiv Bhatia, Distinguished Fellow for Foreign Policy Studies, Gateway House, and Chair of the FICCI Task Force on Blue Economy spoke with Carl Jaison at the Takshashila Institution on India’s national efforts to harness the Blue Economy sectors. They discussed it the draft National Policy on Blue Economy developed by the NITI Aayong, the role of the private sector, the opportunities and challenges in the key and allied sectors, and potential areas of collaboration for the G20 countries.
After many early achievements, BRICS is now in gridlock, made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic, India-China border tensions, and the Ukraine conflict. Despite its apparent diplomatic bankruptcy, 19 countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America are eagerly waiting in line to join the grouping.
In this era of multiple crises eroding multilateral institutions, G20 needs to come out clearly in favour of an expanded, more democratic, more representative, and more accountable UNSC. Shifting from a bottom-up to a top-down approach, G20 leaders should consider incorporating a calibrated but forward-looking paragraph on UNSC reform in the Delhi Declaration.
India’s Northeast is developing and getting close to its goal of being part of the Indian mainstream in connectivity and business – which is also critical for the success of India’s Act East Policy. For both goals, Bangladesh and Japan are invaluable partners and friends. The troika’s collaboration can be a model in the region.
V. Srinivas’ survey of the G20 and India’s road to its presidency is a reader-friendly and informative work that bridges the information gap and offers an insightful scholarly analysis of the multilateral.
The G20 Foreign Ministers Meeting on March 1-2 concluded without a joint statement, much like the finance ministers meeting which preceded it. Nevertheless, the platform has made some progress. To maintain it, Indian diplomacy must now move into overdrive in the run-up to the Leaders’ Summit later this year.
Courtesy: United Nations Economic Commission for Africa
The Indo-Pacific is viewed by powers within and outside the region as both a strategy and policy to interpret the changing geopolitical dynamics in Asia and beyond. But the question of its geographical and geopolitical definition has varied. Opinions among governments and academics have traditionally differed, but over the years, a viable consensus for a wider definition of the concept seems to have emerged.