India looks beyond successful `Look East' policy

Endy M. Bayuni, The Jakarta Post, New Delhi

Hearing Indian diplomats touting last year's inaugural India- ASEAN car rally as a milestone in New Delhi's foreign policy, it was hard to avoid the impression at first that sports, particularly one involving fast cars, have become an important dimension in the overall relations between India and the Southeast Asian regional organization.

That may be so, but it was not the chief reason why the rally, an initiative first mooted by then Indian prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2003 and taken up by his successor Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, was held.

Rather, the rally -- 60 cars traveling a distance of more than 8,000 kilometers and covering India and eight of the 10 member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- culminated 10 years of New Delhi's "Look East" policy.

Given their lifestyle, some diplomats may have a penchant for fast cars, but the grueling rally was held as part of New Delhi's conscious policy of building ties with countries to the east, most particularly with ASEAN countries.

The rally, covering India, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and the Indonesian island of Batam, was an important symbolic opening up of land routes, and hence trade and economic routes, as well as a chance for more cultural contacts between India and its Southeast Asian neighbors.

"It brings out a rather dramatic scene of how close we are and of what is the potential for cooperation, of how we leverage our geography, our history, our cultural relationships," Rajiv Sikri, the Secretary for East Asia at the Ministry of External Affairs, says.

Launched in 1994, the Look East policy was part of an overall and timely change in India's policy of opening up its economy to partake in the economic globalization at that time. With the end of the Cold War, trade and economics have since become the driving force of India's foreign policy, replacing Third World non-alignment ideology, tinged with anti-imperialism overtones, of the past.

India has since joined the various ASEAN meetings; it now participates in the group's annual summit, along with China, Japan, and South Korea, to discuss ways of enhancing regional cooperation; it also takes part in the annual ASEAN Regional Forum, which also involves the United States and Russia, to discuss Asian-wide regional security.

Along with the rapid rise of India's economy and its overall international relations, trade with ASEAN countries has boomed in the last decade. Two-way trade between India and ASEAN now totals US$12 billion a year, almost equal to India's trade with China. Apart from a free trade agreement with the regional group, India is also looking at similar arrangements with individual member countries, starting with Singapore and Thailand.

No wonder New Delhi feels vindicated by its Look East policy 10 years after its launching.

"It is to the great satisfaction of all Southeast Asian countries and India that our relations have developed very satisfactorily," Sikri said in an interview at his office.

It had not been that difficult to build these relations with ASEAN countries, since historically, India had never had any conflict with the region, he pointed out.

"We have always had peaceful relationships with Southeast Asian countries. We have had trade, cultural and peaceful interactions," Sikri said. "Our comfort level is much greater (compared with India's other neighboring countries) on which to build these ties in the 21st century."

Looking beyond, a more confident India is already pushing the idea of a long term vision of a broader Asian economic community, involving initially ASEAN countries, India, China, Japan and South Korea.

Again both prime ministers Manmohan Singh and his predecessor Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in spite of coming from ideologically different political parties, have been selling the idea of an Asian community at the ASEAN summits.

There is a good reason why ASEAN and the rest of Asia should pay heed to India.

India is today one of the world's fastest growing economies second only to China. With a growth rate of 6 percent to 7 percent a year, the Indian economy has already doubled in the last decade, and will double again in the next 10 years. With this rapid growth, naturally comes political and economic weight.

India is fast becoming an economic and political power, not only of Asia, but also of the world.

ASEAN is currently looking at the idea of an Asian community but it has not decided whether or not to include India in such discussions.

One forum for this would be the inaugural East Asian Summit, planned in Kuala Lumpur at the end of 2005. ASEAN has yet to agree on the countries to be included besides ASEAN, China, Japan and South Korea.

Indonesia, for one, wants to include India, Australia and New Zealand.

Sikri recalls that ASEAN had brought India into its conferences and summits for strategic balance reasons, and believes that the same reasoning should now be used in any talks about moving toward an Asian economic community.

"Perhaps it would be a good idea if India is invited to the first East Asian summit," he said.