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India: Modi's ultra-nationalist supporters already saw themselves as a world power - then came Corona

2021-06-13T14:09:15.859Z


India's prime minister has pushed for a tough foreign policy, but his mishandling of the pandemic is a shameful step backwards.


India's prime minister has pushed for a tough foreign policy, but his mishandling of the pandemic is a shameful step backwards.

  • The Indians are currently facing a humanitarian catastrophe caused by Corona, which Modi himself caused.

  • The country's ambitions to become a world power have suffered a severe setback as a result.

  • The People's Republic of China is already using the situation to its own advantage.

  • This article is available in German for the first time - it was first published on May 3, 2021 by the magazine "Foreign Policy".

When an earthquake and tsunami struck Asia in December 2004, then Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh decided that it was high time for India to stop accepting help from other countries to cope with disasters and instead to rely on itself. "We believe we can handle the situation on our own," he said, "and we will accept your help if necessary." It was a pointed political statement about India's growing economic strength, and she wasn't the last. Singh's government offered aid to the United States after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and China after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. As a matter of national pride,an indicator of self-sufficiency and a reprimanding of curious aid agencies, this practice continued under Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi despite pressure to change course during the floods in southern Kerala in 2018.

Modi, who in the election campaign always relied on aggressive nationalism, which was summarized by the slogan "Atmanirbhar Bharat" (independent India), was now forced to an abrupt change of policy. Last week, as the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country, his government took offers of help in the face of pictures of people dying in the street without oxygen and crematoriums for domestic dogs used for burial of people from almost 40 other nations. The country's diplomats have campaigned with overseas governments for oxygen facilities and tankers, the arrival of medicines and other supplies that have been hailed on social media. "We gave help, now we get help," said Harsh Vardhan Shringla, the country's top diplomat.to justify the embarrassing U-turn. “It shows that we are a world that is interdependent. It shows that we are a world that works together. "

India's Prime Minister Modi: COVID-19 pandemic puts pressure on government

The world may work together, but when it comes to foreign policy, it doesn't work for Modi.

Instead, this is a moment of reckoning, triggered by the rampant coronavirus.

After seven years as prime minister, Modi's hyper-nationalist domestic agenda, including his ambition to make the country a “Vishwaguru” (master of the world), is now in tatters.

India, which has been the fulcrum of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue since the administration of former US President Donald Trump and has focused other efforts in the Indo-Pacific Strategy on countering China, will have to work harder to justify that role. Meanwhile, China has stepped up its efforts around India since the beginning of the second wave, cementing its existing ties with the South Asian countries and contrasting its strength and reliability with India's limitations.

New Delhi will undoubtedly regain some degree of normalcy in a few months' time, but the mishandling of the pandemic has given it a worse hand in ongoing informal channel talks with Islamabad and border negotiations with Beijing.

But the soft power of India, which was already battered under Modi's authoritarian regime, was permanently damaged.

This is a big problem for the government because it was soft power that enabled New Delhi to get involved in the world in the first place.

Corona in India: India's foreign minister busy rushing against Rihanna and Greta Thunberg

Cover images and video clips of pyre on fire and dying patients may fade into the background over time, but it will take more than months and years to rebuild India's diplomatic weight and geopolitical significance. It will take a concerted effort, and S. Jaishankar, Modi's chosen man to serve as Indian Foreign Minister, does not seem up to the task yet.

In March, as the second wave of the pandemic began to unfold in India, Jaishankar's ministry was busy making official statements and organizing social media campaigns against pop star Rihanna and climate activist Greta Thunberg. In late April, at the height of the health crisis, Jaishankar, at a meeting with all Indian ambassadors in various capitals around the world, focused on countering the so-called "one-sided" narrative in the international media that Modi's government had the country through theirs "Incompetent" handling of the second wave of the pandemic left in the lurch.

Until recently, Jaishankar was also the most enthusiastic sponsor of the government's Vaccine Maitri (Friendship Through Vaccination) program, under which New Delhi delivered around 66.4 million doses of AstraZeneca's Indian-made vaccine to 95 countries in Packaging emblazoned with large pictures of Modi. These vaccines were either commercially commissioned, given as bilateral aid, or given to poorer countries as part of the World Health Organization's COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) program. Meanwhile, India's own vaccination campaign has so far been rather disappointing. About 2 percent of Indians are fully vaccinated, despite the fact that the country is the largest vaccine manufacturer in the world - a misstep that has been found to be a major cause of India's uncontrolled second wave.

Modi exported corona vaccine - and is now waiting for deliveries from the USA and China himself

In search of personal honor, Modi exported vaccination doses and is now awaiting 20 million AstraZeneca vaccination doses from the United States after an abrupt U-turn from the 16-year anti-bilateral aid policy described in disaster management documents. It's bad enough that India is getting help from traditional partners like the US and Russia, but it is also accepting supplies from China, with India's relationship among Modi becoming increasingly strained. And it must have been particularly annoying to the Prime Minister that even Pakistan made an offer to help with medical supplies and equipment. The situation in India is so bad that the country has started 88 daily.Importing 000 pounds of medical oxygen from the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.

Most Indians recognize that their country has been in an economic recession over the past year and that accepting bilateral aid is a compulsion rather than a choice. But how are they going to balance that with the fact that work on a $ 2 billion project to rebuild a government office complex in the national capital, including building a new residence for Modi, continues unabated as an "essential service" during the pandemic ?

Modi boasted that he made India the Vishwaguru and that he personally increased the national prestige through his numerous trips around the world.

Its ultra-nationalist supporters had begun to assume that India was already a world power in the same league as the United States and China.

This impression ties in with his domestic political positioning.

Hindutva, or homogenized Hindu nationalism, was offered as the ideology that made this supremacy possible.

Ultranationalist supporters of Modi already saw India as a world power - then came Corona

But now the world power dreams of Modi's supporters have burst. Instead, they have to face the harsh reality of being citizens of a so-called “third world country” that once again depends on the generosity of others. With the Indian economy continuing to be hit by the pandemic, there is little that Modi can economically offer its base. The structure of nationalistic pride, prestige and global respect that Modi built on his so-called foreign policy prowess has been demolished by the pandemic.

The pandemic has harmed India in other ways as well. Australia, a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (or "Quad"), has banned its citizens from returning once they have been in India and faces five years' imprisonment. At its first summit of leaders in March, the group decided to deliver 1 billion doses of the COVID-19 vaccine to the Indo-Pacific region by 2022. The vaccines were to be made in India, funded by the US and Japan, and distributed by Australia in what was seen as a showcase initiative to move the Quad Group away from its safety-centric approach and to soften its reputation as an anti-China alliance. With India struggling to get vaccines for its own,To produce pandemic-affected citizens, the quad group is unlikely to be able to carry out its program on schedule. The position of New Delhi as the fulcrum of the quad group is thereby considerably weakened. If India stumbles, the American dream of the quad group can never come true.

China is using India's precarious situation to strengthen relations with other South Asian countries

Beijing has already taken advantage of India's misfortune to strengthen its ties with other South Asian countries. Last Tuesday, the Chinese Foreign Minister met with his counterparts from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka to work together against COVID-19. India was not present at the meeting. And although Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka have received some vaccine shipments from India and are awaiting more, these countries are now turning to Beijing for vaccine doses after New Delhi has failed to deliver on its commercial and COVAX pledges. In the race to position itself as an attractive and reliable partner in South Asia, in which the two Asian giants are, India seems to end up behind China.

China has also benefited from its troubled border with India.

After an initial disengagement in Ladakh, India, China refused to withdraw further from other Indian-held areas that it invaded last summer.

The country has stalled attempts by India to discuss these areas in the final round of talks between the two sides, and it has established permanent military infrastructure and stationed troops near the disputed border.

Second corona wave hit India hard - the economy and country are currently devastated by the pandemic

If ever there was a time for India to show its strength, it would be now. But the second wave of COVID-19 forced the opposite. A similar impact is likely to be felt in New Delhi's ongoing talks through informal channels with Islamabad, in which Pakistan is likely to attempt to exploit every vulnerability in India's armaments. India cannot afford to get out of these talks as it was forced to get involved with Islamabad in the first place due to its own inability to deal with a two-front threat from China and Pakistan. An economy and a country devastated by the pandemic makes the dual threat an even bigger challenge for India and gives Pakistan an unexpected edge in the talks.

While Indian diplomats may still be able to contain the damage caused by negotiations with Beijing and Islamabad, there is little they can do to undo the damage to the country's soft power. India's reputation as a liberal democracy was already tarnished, but the country's ability to deal with all of its internal contradictions was still seen by developing countries as worth emulating. Thanks to his bumbling response to the second wave and the cancellation of vaccines promised to other countries in Asia and Africa - which were quotas they relied on - it will now be difficult to restore.

The Indians are currently facing a humanitarian disaster that Modi himself caused.

New Delhi's ambitions to be a world power have suffered a setback.

Under modes, Jaishankar once boasted, diplomacy means “having many balls in the air at the same time and showing the confidence and skill not to drop one.” Now that all the balls are on the ground, the country needs humility, honesty and extraordinary efforts to pick them up and start over.

From Sushant Singh

Sushant Singh

is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Policy Research in India.

He was previously a lecturer in political science at Yale University and assistant editor of the Indian Express, covering strategic affairs, national security and international affairs.

For his reporting in 2017 and 2018 he was awarded the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award.

Twitter: @SushantSin

This article was first published in English on May 3, 2021 in the magazine “ForeignPolicy.com” - as part of a cooperation, a translation is now also

 available to

Merkur.de

readers 

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Source: merkur

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