India sees EU as major strategic partner: Ex-diplomat

India has a multifaceted relationship with the European Union which includes both soft and hard power. India also always wanted a greater element of hard power in the relationship with the EU because that is what we look at with our strategic partners particularly the United States, says former Indian diplomat Bhaswati Mukherjee while speaking to ETV Bharat's Chandrakala Choudhury.

New Delhi: Where on one hand India is dealing with the major military crisis on the border with China, the European Union is also looking to free itself from Chinese dependency.

Therefore, to tackle Beijing's unexpected rise in the region, India and the EU are ramping up efforts to strengthen their bilateral, strategic and trade partnership as a major push back to China and its growing hegemonic intentions and trajectory.

An expert opines that going ahead, the EU can be a crucial partner for India on several fronts.

Speaking to ETV Bharat, Bhaswati Mukherjee, a former Indian diplomat who headed the Indian Foreign Ministry’s department specialising in European Union Affairs said, “India has a multifaceted relationship with the European Union which includes both soft and hard power.

India has always wanted a greater element of hard power in the relationship with the EU because that is what we look at with our strategic partners particularly the United States".

Post-Brexit India-EU partnership

Because of our hostile neighbourhood and the fact that we have two nuclear-weapon states on the border-China, Pakistan, the European Union despite its best efforts before Brexit, was unable to transform itself into a Military alliance because of strong resistance by the United Kingdom, which saw efforts by the EU to militarize as a threat to NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) and the transatlantic partnership that Britain enjoyed at that time with the United States.

Now that Brexit is over, the expectation on the part of the major EU powers- particularly France and Germany and other major countries too is that they will be able to put forward a much better military force including Army and Navy, which would be inside and outside NATO, and the reason for that is because NATO has now turned hostile because of Turkey's membership.

That is precisely the reason why major EU countries including Germany and France have shown now great interest in joining the 'Quad' because they look at the Quad particularly the US and India as two countries that can check the militaristic aggressiveness of China.

On being asked if any progress can be expected on FTA or Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreement (BTIA) and how significant is the Indo-EU bilateral trade relationship is, Mukherjee said, “The negotiations have been stuck for a long time. The negotiations had reached a stage at one point when India and the EU were ready to sign, but unfortunately what happened was the meltdown of the banks in the US, followed by the Eurozone crisis. So the EU closed its walls and became protectionist, they were not in a position to make the necessary concession to India to sign a BTIA. After that when the EU came out of the Eurozone crisis, things changed and the kind of concession that we were prepared to give at that time, were no longer possible, so we had to re-negotiate the BTIA".

“In the meantime, the UK which in many ways has an economy quite similar to India-UK is the 6th largest economy and India is going to overtake very soon, were against any concession to be made by the EU because the UK feared that this would impact bilaterally on their economy. Now that the UK has left the EU, the negotiators of both India and the EU are much more confident that perhaps, a limited agreement would be possible. Not such an extensive BTIA because one of the problems with the BTIA was not just the trade part but the investment part too. Some of these issues need to be resolved between both sides. But certainly, a limited trade agreement in specific sectors with some concession given by the EU, considering that India is nowhere near the EU as far as economic might is a concern, seems to be much more hopeful now pre-Brexit”, ambassador Mukherjee pointed out.

Having said that, over the last few months, India and few member states of the European Union have been conducting meetings virtually to discuss in length the entire gamut of enhancing cooperation.

India along with few EU member countries are together working to create a new road map for the partnership and execute a plethora of initiatives on security, trade and investment, digital economy, infrastructure connectivity, coronavirus crisis response, and the climate crisis.

On Monday Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with Finland Prime Minister Sanna Marin held the first-ever virtual bilateral summit.

During the summit, the leaders reviewed the ongoing bilateral engagements and expressed their desire to further expand and diversify the relationship across sectors such as trade and investment, innovation, education, emerging technologies including Artificial Intelligence, 5G/6G, and quantum computing, the ministry of External Affairs said.

Prime Minister Modi appreciated Finland's leading role in clean and green technologies and noted the potential for Finnish companies to partner India's drive towards sustainable development.

In this context, he suggested enhanced cooperation in the areas like renewable and bio-energy, sustainability, edu-tech, pharma and digitization.

The leaders exchanged views on regional and global issues, including the India-EU partnership, cooperation in the Arctic region, WTO and UN reforms.

Both sides noted the potential for India and Finland to cooperate in undertaking developmental activities in Africa.

India invited Finland to join the International Solar Alliance (ISA) and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI).

The virtual summit was in line with forthcoming meetings during the India-EU Leaders’ Meeting in Porto and the India-Nordic Summit.

Later, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had a telephonic conversation with António Luís Santos da Costa, Prime Minister of the Portuguese Republic to review preparations for the first-ever India-EU Leaders’ Meeting, scheduled to take place under the Portuguese Presidency of the EU in Porto in May 2021.

Bhaswati Mukherjee further said that the relationship between India-EU goes far beyond trade.

“If the BTIA is still not progressed, it does not mean that the rest of the relationship should be ignored. We have made huge progress on climate change, solar alliance, military exercises with the EU countries. Therefore, India now look at the EU as a major strategic partner and it is going to be a defining relationship for India and the EU for the next decade”, she added.