Modi will count G20 consensus as a win - but it shows how low the bar for success is

https://news.sky.com/story/modi-will-count-g20-consensus-as-a-win-b...


The Indian prime minister has secured a consensus on wording around the Ukraine war in the leaders' declaration - but it is a watered-down version of what was agreed last year in Bali.


By



Cordelia Lynch



https://news.sky.com/story/modi-will-count-g20-consensus-as-a-win-b...



Narendra Modi wanted to show he could bridge global divides at this G20 in Delhi.

The fact he's reached a consensus on the first day of this G20 is proof he can.





A PR supremo, he will no doubt cast it as a huge and early success. Ukraine was always going to be the sticking point.

What he's avoided is what would have been an unprecedented failure - coming out of this summit with no agreement.

But be in no doubt, the paragraph on the Ukraine war is a watered-down version of what was agreed in Bali last year.



It calls for "a comprehensive, just, and durable peace in Ukraine" and says "today's era must not be of war".

Critically, it doesn't mention Russia by name, and leaves out any direct mention of Russian aggression.



Intriguingly, it also urges member states not to "act against the territorial integrity of any state".

Those words could be seen as an attempt to appease Russia, which has complained about attacks on its territory.



We know that Mr Modi worked hard to encourage other G20 members to listen to Moscow and Beijing's viewpoint.

What is perhaps most revealing in the language of this declaration though is the assertion that "G20 is not the place to resolve geopolitical issues".

That is an overt acknowledgement of the limitations of this group. There is a new world order emerging.

Mr Modi is positioning himself at the heart of it. He's managed to walk a delicate political tightrope and position cast himself as a bridge builder in a divided world.





The United States, desperate to find a counterweight to Moscow, is courting him, willing to put aside concerns about his nationalism to find a strategic ally.

At the same time as embracing Joe Biden, Mr Modi has managed to keep good relations with Vladimir Putin. Russia is a Cold War ally Delhi isn't ready to shake yet and India continues to benefit from cheap Russian oil and gas.

As for China, its absence from the G20 gives Mr Modi the space to present India as a global superpower on the ascent, while Beijing struggles financially.

The addition of the African Union as a member will also help Mr Modi's portrayal of this as an inclusive summit that connects the developed and developing world.

This G20 is a golden chance for India's leader to kickstart his election campaign ahead of next year's vote. Today's declaration gives him something to sell to voters.

What this summit has also perhaps shown, however, is how low the bar for success now is in a deeply politically splintered planet.

#Modi’s #India no Friend of the West . Biggest aspect of #Hindutva is “xenophobia. It may be muted “when and where the military and political strength of the foreigner” is overwhelming but thrives on an “incessant campaign of slander and denigration" #G20

by Pankaj Mishra

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/09/11/modi-s-new-india...

India is, suddenly, Bharat, and it could be asked, as Shakespeare wrote, what’s in a name? But Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who embraced the Sanskrit name for his country in the same week that he played lavish host to the G-20 summit in New Delhi, is trying hard to project India as a “vishwaguru” (guru to the world). It is time to examine his claims more closely, and also to see the present and the future of his “New India” without comforting illusions.

Take, for instance, the booklet, “Bharat, the Mother of Democracy,” presented by Modi’s government to visiting dignitaries at the G-20. According to it, ancient Hindu sages and kings were partisans of equality, inclusivity, and harmony. Even modern feminism was anticipated by the 5,000-year-old bronze statue of an “independent and liberated” dancing girl.

Such claims are part of an elaborate narrative that is decisively shaping the outlook of many Indians today — one in which a once-dynamic Hindu civilization was ravaged by vicious Muslims and exploitative Westerners.


In Modi’s own account, Hindus were enslaved by Muslim invaders for 750 years and then for an additional 250 years by white British colonialists — a version of history used in India today to justify the degradation of Muslim and Christian minorities, the destruction of mosques and British-built buildings, the purging of textbooks, and now the unofficial renaming of India.

Modi’s own popularity, unconnected to his party’s variable fortunes, stems from what is a potent promise in a country full of humiliated peoples: to destroy the corrupt old political order and, as he put it in his Independence Day speech last month, to ensure a fully modernized New India enjoys a “golden” period “for the next 1,000 years.”

Such millenarian bombast — also echoed in the speeches of Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping — belongs to a longer tradition of anti-Western demagogues proclaiming themselves heirs to distinguished ancient civilizations, including the Germans and Italians who sought to build the Thousand-Year Reich and the Third Rome, respectively.

It is a common mistake to suppose that German and Italians Fascists rejected modernity in favor of an idealized past. On the contrary, they pursued, often with help of Western nations they derided as “decadent,” ultra-modern technologies, modernist architectural plans, advanced transport systems and awesome public works. Like Hindu nationalists today, they used mass media, sporting events, and scientific breakthroughs to raise the pitch of collective emotion and project the image of a united and resurgent people.

Of course, since technological and military power still clearly lay with Britain, France and the US, the peoples failing to catch up with the West tried to feel superior to it in the realm of culture and philosophy. Invoking their great ethnic or racial past even as they sought grandiosely to supervise the future of the modern world, they became exemplars of what the American historian Jeffrey Herf has called “reactionary modernism.”

Presenting ancient Indians as pioneering democrats and feminists (also, the world’s earliest plastic surgeons), Modi belongs to this extended family of catch-up nationalists. His nation, too, seeks to blend neo-traditionalism with modernization while measuring itself, with volatile feelings of insecurity and resentment, against a weakened but still superior West.

The eruption of war in Israel and Gaza is a dark reminder that buried conflicts – like India’s disputes with Pakistan and China – can erupt at any time.
By Chietigj Bajpaee


https://thediplomat.com/2023/10/the-israel-palestine-conflagration-...


the most recent developments in the Middle East show how unresolved disputes have a tendency to flare up. In this context, tensions with Pakistan (and to a lesser extent China) remain a constant thorn in India’s global ambitions.

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Claims of a “new Middle East” have been quashed as the “old Middle East” has returned with a vengeance: The devastating October 7 Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel have been followed by unprecedented Israeli attacks on Gaza and the resumption of prolonged Israel-Palestine hostilities. This has also called into question the future of diplomatic initiatives such as the Abraham Accords, which normalized relations between Israel and several Arab states, the Saudi-Iran resumption of diplomatic relations earlier this year, and efforts to facilitate a rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Israel.

What does this mean for India? Beyond the Modi government’s unequivocal support for Israel (which is arguably more equivocal at the level of public opinion, given India’s longstanding support for the Palestinian cause) the latest hostilities in the Middle East hold lessons for India’s global ambitions.

Recent years have seen India raise its voice on the world stage. India’s G-20 presidency strengthened the country’s credentials as the voice of the Global South. New Delhi is offering Indian solutions to global problems, ranging from climate change and sustainability to digital public infrastructure and global health. India has spearheaded new connectivity initiatives, from its rebranded “Act East” Policy in the East to the India-Middle East-Economic Corridor and I2U2 (India-Israel-UAE-U.S.) grouping in the West.

Despite the growing polarization of the international system following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, India has been courted by all major poles of influence. It is a member of both Western-led initiatives such as the Quad and non-Western initiatives such as the BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization.



Undergirding these developments are India’s impressive achievements, ranging from its space program marking a global first to surpassing the United Kingdom in GDP and surpassing China in population. Projections China in population. Projections hold that India will be the world’s fastest growing major economy in 2023; it is on course to surpass Germany and Japan to emerge as the world’s third-largest economy by the end of this decade. Meanwhile, the Indian government has just announced that it will submit a bid to host the 2036 Olympic games.



But the most recent developments in the Middle East show how unresolved disputes have a tendency to flare up. In this context, tensions with Pakistan (and to a lesser extent China) remain a constant thorn in India’s global ambitions.

All it would take is another high-profile terrorist attack on India, followed by the mobilization of both countries’ militaries, to erode investor confidence. This would undermine India’s ambitions to emerge as an engine of global growth, a global manufacturing hub and a beneficiary of the push to de-risk or decouple supply chains away from China. It would also challenge the government’s credentials as the “chowkidar” or watchman/protector of India’s interests, just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “Mr. Security” reputation has been tarnished by the recent Hamas attacks. As such, despite India’s success in de-hyphenating its relationship with Pakistan, the unresolved Kashmir dispute and relations with Pakistan remain a key challenge to India’s global ambitions.