Why India Should Seek Closer Ties With China: Amitabh Kant Explains

NDTV

a day ago

New Delhi:
India should maintain good relation with all nations including China, former Niti Aayog chief and G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant has said. "If India wishes to enhance her manufacturing capacity, then good relation with Beijing is essential "because they are a major manufacturing partner," Mr Kant told NDTV in an exclusive interview this evening.
"We need to get inputs, we need to get components, we need to work with some of these companies to become a global manufacturer for the future," he said.
Amitabh Kant's comments come ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Beijing for the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) Summit -- the first since the Galwan clash.
The visit comes amid the imposition of stiff tariffs from US President Donald Trump and increasing pressure on India regarding oil purchase from Russia. There is expectation that under the circumstances, a recalibration of ties with China is expected to act as a balancing factor for the US.
Mr Kant, though, indicated that even without the leverage factor, closer ties with China will contribute to India's development.
"I think it's important to look at the global GDP," Mr Kant said. The US has about 26 per cent of the global GDP. China is close to about 18 to 19 per cent and Europe, which had about 30 per cent, has slid to 17 per cent.
The US remains the only nation that has retained the 26 per cent GDP, has been a beneficiary of free trade, has a market capitalization of 46 percent, with just a population of 4 per cent. But even this post-industrial society has consciously outsourced its manufacturing China.
"All its top companies, if you look at the top 20 manufacturing companies of the United States, more than 90 to 95 percent of their manufacturing was outsourced by them to China," he said.
"If we need to work with the United States, because they are a big global market, we need to work with China, because they're a major manufacturing partner... We need to get inputs, we need to get components, we need to work with some of these companies to become a global manufacturer for the future," he added.
China is Pakistan's all-weather friend, and its support for India following the Pahalgam attack had been dubious.
In June, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh had refused to sign a joint statement at a defence minister's meet under SCO because it skipped any mention of the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack that claimed 26 lives and instead, mentioned Balochistan, tacitly accusing India of creating unrest there.
The exclusion of Pahalgam was apparently made at the behest of Pakistan.
The next month, though, China issued a strong statement against terror as the US designated The Resistance Front, a proxy of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba, as a foreign terrorist organisation for its involvement in the Pahalgam attack.
There is also the history of clashes with Chinese troops at the border in Ladakh and Arunachal that had culminated with the Galwan clash in 2020 -- heavily fraying ties between New Delhi and Beijing.