 edition of a Slava today on Think Tech Hawaii. I'm your host, Hamza Rifat-San. Now, the G20 summit recently took place in New Delhi and India. There are lots of joint declarations which actually did take place, many informal in that regard. And India's status as a global power continues to be touted by international media. The question is, with glaring inequalities, challenges to inclusiveness, religious intolerance, can India actually claim to be a major economic power? It's very, very important to understand that India's weak profile needs to be highlighted before we come up with preconceived notions and conclusions. To discuss India's profile, I have with me author and policy analyst, Sayyed Hanan, and he is going to be discussing what India's flaws are actually all about, and how can India navigate through its difficult road ahead. Hanan, thank you so much for joining me on the show. Thank you for having me, Hamza. So, Hanan, let's start off with the basic question here. The G20 summit, as you know, 2023 took place in New Delhi and India. How do you consider India's profile emerging in the current circumstances? So, I think the G20 summit in India had, without misreactions, I think there were points of contention, for example, over the UK war, what countries want to agree on. But I think the most telling comment on India's approach to the G20 and multilateralism at large is how India kind of gave away an artificial perception, a projection about it being this prosperous all-inclusive society. I pointed to the fact that you had this multimillion, for example, dollar makeover of New Delhi, which was billed as a beautification campaign. But in essence, it was basically bringing down of shambhi towns, you know, illegally paying crookments as well. That was the arrest notice presented by the government to kind of sideline more office citizens towards into into poverty. I mean, critics have pointed out that that has been kind of a recipe to advance thousands more towards poverty. We've seen that there was a green sheet across many of these slums within New Delhi, which raises the question that the definition of a beautiful India under the current regime is kind of sideline its own citizens to keep them out of public eye, when the entire purpose should be to lead inclusive society from within. So I think with that kind of, I'd say, a sidestepping approach towards citizens about what India wants to project and keeping that away to give leaders a welcome that they would like is not exactly organic and not authentic to begin with. Okay, absolutely. And you mentioned the glaring inequalities. I mean, if you take a look at New Delhi in general, as you mentioned, billions of dollars were actually spent on making sure that you know, New Delhi can be pretty much ready for the G20 summit of 2023. But at the very same time, you do have slum areas and people who are actually residing in these slum areas complaining over the fact that they've actually been left behind by a BJP government, which is actually promised, you know, in India, it's called which basically means taking everybody on board and everyone is actually going to be prosperous. But that clearly has not materialized in the India 2023. Yeah, it hasn't. And I think when you when you look at much of the footage which was reported, of course, having a free independent president India has also challenged, we've seen, you know, government led riots on, for example, BBC offices, which was reported by Reuters, and also covered at large. So I think the space to kind of even highlight these things and reportable fact is also shrinking in this, you know, self-proclaimed largest democracy in the world. But I think when you look when you look a bit deeper into that, I mean, the footage that we saw from residents who were speaking said they could not have access to clean air. They were forced to kind of keep the basic means of survival several weeks in advance. And even many of these people you see are wager. They depend on going out regardless of what's happening or not to go out there on other sides of roads and to kind of make a living. And the fact that they couldn't come out with the kind of freedom according to their own confessions to media is quite a comment on what India says is it's appeal to kind of Boston resilient growth. That's something which the Indian issued G20 leader summit points towards that, you know, we want to develop in countries on board. But is that really an attractive call when the Spain kind of resilient growth, freedom, right, largely absent in the capital of, you know, the G20 chair from here? Yeah. All right. So let's talk about religious inclusiveness. And we're talking about religious intolerance. India obviously has the third largest Muslim population in the world after Indonesia and Pakistan. But we do notice for a fact that the Muslim population within India, under the ambit of a secular constitution has been witnessing, you know, modeling chains. You have vigilante violence, which is actually taking place. And vigilante is actually running a mock targeting Muslims within the country, which actually constitutes the 13.5% of the population of the second most populous country in the world. And on many accounts, it will actually overtake China as well. Now, when we talk about India in general, without the Muslim population actually being mainstreamed into the main professions that we're actually talking about. And actually, you know, their citizenship is being eroded to a large extent by the BJP government. You can't really see a shining India that Narendra Modi actually touts without actually making sure that, you know, Muslims, Christians and Dalits and Sikhs are actually, you know, part of the entire process. Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, from BJP's perspective, in order for them to guarantee that sense of freedom across the board for all minorities, including Muslims, and that would basically contradict, you know, its rise to power. So when you look to the fact that since 2014, there's been a drastic rise in attacks against minorities, specifically Muslims. The BJP government has made no secret of kind of leading a Hindu nationalist state. Of course, they've been talking with democratic and demographic changes and incitement and dispute of territory for long. But there's been a long projection to kind of even make sure that Muslims do not get the same kind of rights on many levels as Modi's core work back. I mean, you look to the fact that recent streams of violence have taken place, the ethnic VACS Muslims communal rights, we've seen, you know, footage within which leaders empowered by this specific servant government have come up and said, look, if you're going to have Muslim, you know, people working in your shop, take that as a warning from us. They're starting to take kind of action against those that allow basically Muslim the right to live. And you've heard it from confessions in specific districts as well, that, you know, Muslims leading families are just scared to go out and do what, you know, which any responsible person should do to go out and make a living out of hard and money. So I think that only starts with the surface of what the BJP government is doing. And I think the fact that India has kind of forced key allies, including on certain levels in the United States to have the discussions privately and not exactly visibility is one indicator of the extent to which India will go to keep this kind of spot on, you know, on the democratic projection away from public scrutiny. And the fact that, you know, free media, these international organizations have also been the public of scandals, journalists being arrested, Muslim activists, obviously, as pointed out with the lynching and everything, you know, these things picking up. And I think the fact that we don't see, we see a lot of promises. I mean, Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently came up when the ethnic, I think, violence took us all and said, look, we're going to go up and we're going to take a very, very hard stand. We're all about tolerance and, you know, going forward with that. But what do we have to show for it? I mean, how many people have been indicted? What kind of steps have been taken? Who's responsible? So I think the entire bureaucratic machinery in many of the states dominated by the BJP have very little space to kind of market the interests of Muslims and minorities at large, because one, it's not politically opportune. Second, when press freedom and key strategic partners are not allowed that space, it's basically a mirage, a dream to think that, you know, independent activists and space. So, yes, eight weeks have been on the rise, attack against minorities at large, and now that's threatening their base of livelihood. Well, no, let's talk about democratic backsliding. Obviously, that is a trend that's been witnessed as far as the Narendra Modi government is concerned. Talk about democratic backsliding. Many channels are actually being banned. You have journalists who have been incarcerated. You also have this trend of making sure that they can muzzle out the opposition. You don't really see Rahul Gandhi coming out from the Indian National Congress beyond, you know, these few Yathras that he does take place, or these pilgrimages that he takes place within India to try to unite the entire community. But even then, when we talk about Rahul Gandhi in general, you don't see the same sort of coverage being provided to the opposition. Many countries in the G20 Hanan are also democracies, not all of them, but you know, many of them are also democracies. When we talk about democracies in general, they would actually, you know, it's worth highlighting that India's controversial record as far as democracy is concerned, with backsliding take place. That is also something that actually weakens and dampens their profile in the G20 as well. It does. And that's one of many points of failure that I think for the G20, flatly put, I mean, you don't have to look for, for example, key gaps in how governance is being conducted in certain countries based on regimes of the autocracy, democracy metrics, you need to focus on whether or not existing democracies, who claim to have a very open and easy atmosphere, freedoms are actually living up to their expectations. I mean, India has dropped several points to, I think, what could be one of the record lows in the world, you know, press freedom index as well. And I think when you look to other metrics as well, for example, the fact that under the current government, and they haven't been that kind of an atmosphere where, you know, New Delhi has taken the initiative to say, look, we're all for democracy being together, the G20 represents a very powerful block. Here's what we have to show for us how we're going to deliver on it. Instead, what we see is that, you know, the declaration itself makes a lot of promises about economic integration, about resilient girls, about, you know, a bit of technology as well, and, you know, parking together and moving forward. But there's not a lot on how, you know, a country with such a huge population can basically take all colors of its social fabric together. You talked about opposition, follow this look. The Rahul Gandhi case was pretty straightforward one. He made remarks which were, you know, pretty controversial. But the fact that it was brought up and used to put him behind bars did not exactly have that kind of view process of fair trial expectation, which people would deserve. And I talked about this as well. But the fact that, you know, resentment to Modi right now, we do see the fact that Rahul Gandhi's, you know, party was part of the coalition called India as the abbreviation to kind of challenge it. But they basically don't have the muscle as well as the kind of corruption with this hard, you know, Hindu World Bank that would basically determine the backbone of BJP's electioneering. So I think we take all those things together. India's D20 leadership has been extremely silent on its own record and rights. So I think in some ways India is ill positioned to preach what democratic values should look like when we see them becoming a fading memory at home. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, when we talk about Rahul Gandhi in general, I think it's also important to point out that you mentioned the press freedom index. I mean, I had Karan Thawar, one of India's prominent journalists on my show, and he basically claimed that India's actually ranked behind Sri Lanka, which has just recently witnessed the Rajapaksa regime being dethroned. And Pakistan, which is considered to be a hybrid democracy. So India's press freedom index, the fact that it's actually, you know, going down the doldrums clearly shows that even within the region, it just doesn't have that sort of profile. So coming towards when we talk about the status of Sikhs in India, now the Sikh community, which is predominantly Punjab, they contribute a considerable amount to the Indian GDP as far as agricultural growth is concerned. And also you have the Sikh diaspora abroad, you have them in the United Kingdom, you have an Australia, you have in the United States as well. One key fundamental point to becoming a major regional power is their ability to actually nullify and neutralize the sessionist movements. But we've witnessed Hanan since the BJP government has come into power, the Halestan movement for an independent state for the Sikhs in India has actually gained more traction, whether it's in Australia and the United Kingdom, it has a referendum in Australia in 2021. And you've seen it in the US as well as in the UK. So clearly the Halestan problem, which is economic, which deals with identity, which deals with religion, is another issue which is a glaring, you could say, blip on India's profile to become a G20 leader. Absolutely. And I think, you know, let's be clear to your audience as well. The facts are out. It's just that the government in power does not want you to emphasize that. So much of the stuff that we're talking about is not new knowledge. It's been there for a long time. The fact is that the level of emphasis being put on those from officials is next to enough. And I think when you talk about the Halestan movement, look, we've seen referendums in many Western capitals as well. I think the frustration on Nidala's part has been so much that rather than addressing the reservations, the underlying grievances would go back decades now. This is unfinished business and those reservations towards how the centre has treated the, you know, their quest for natural identity integration has basically been unfinished business. So those grievances have simmered over time. And now it has come to a point where it was put to shove. I think one of the prominent seek leaders, for example, the message from the centre was that we want to have a manhunt for this particular person. At the same time, Nidala was also engaged in signaling to key Western governments that, look, we don't want these kind of minority protest in front of our consulates. We don't want them to be organised. But the signal from key Western capitals was that, look, there's the freedom of expression, the freedom of assembly. But I think where the onus falls on India's democratic strategic partner, Canada, United States, UK, with the kind of machinery, the diversity at home, a greater record of minority tolerance, for example, regardless of the division coming forward, the onus falls on them to kind of come up with much more than just rhetoric and say, look, we're going to tighten the screws on India for a start. We're going to, we're going to, we're not going to shy away from engaging within the market and industrialisation, but telling them, look, human rights are fundamental values, which we want you to focus on and addressing them concerns our people. And I think that's where the audacity has lacked, even though such a stance would be principle when you look to the fact that it'd be admirable because they're aligned to democratic values, the human value. And I think the more India doesn't do that, look, India's the BJP approach to to resolving differences, be it, be it, you know, what it calls the session has been a very, very sweeping. For example, it's very easy to declare, you know, a particular movement that you don't want to address or even cater to a session, if India has used very liberally, and this is verifiable, you can look it up, the way it has kind of tried to stamp out that sense in Indian occupied nightmare by using the world of terms. So for example, Kashmir, Kashmiri independent, a human guaranteed right to self determination has been explained the way of her to the advantage of India's occupation. So I think that there's a common thread here that India does not want to engage or kind of come up with these delicate issues where one where we will be forced to kind of include these various segments into its national fabric or granting democratic freedoms, what does it do? It liberally uses the session as card, it liberally explains the way many forms of justifiable defense and terrorism and says, look, we want our partners to look the other way, that's the only way that we can engage in a long term path. So I think the honest hold on India's democratic partners who had a greater experience kind of working through these delicate negotiations and have made no secret of standing by democratic values, but those should also apply to India. Yeah, absolutely. It should apply to India. So Hanan, the G20 is all about economy. We're talking about the 20 largest economies in the world. They've had varying degrees of growth rates, but India's growth rate is actually very impressive. It's just behind China and in many different ways it actually overtakes China to a large extent. It's also the Indian economy is also larger than the UK by many metrics. But one of the key aspects of the economy is the health of the economy. And you know, I was actually watching the Dutch well, documentary the other day, and they actually claim that India's unemployment rate is amongst the highest in the developing world. You have fresh Indian graduates coming out of IIT, and we're talking about domestic graduates for that matter, IIT, and we're talking about JNU, Javlal Nehru University, and they just can't find jobs in the Indian job market. That actually contributes to greater social, you could say, social inability to actually integrate. You do see a considerable amount of unemployment actually increasing, and you also see a lot of inequality as well. So given that this is a trend within India, it cannot really tout itself as a very healthy economy despite impressive GDP growth rate figures. Yeah, totally. Look, when we talk about economics, I think fast and fast growing GDP draw, explain the entire story behind it. So I think that's the kind of distinction for which one needs to draw. So when you look deeper into the numbers, I think there's a broad consensus that India may not be able to sustain the same kind of growth rate. In the coming time, for example, in the next year, it's going to take a lot for them to do it. We talked about an employment rate that has a lingering concern. So for example, one of the backbones of the fuels of water was that this is going to be a dynamic, well-rounded economy. No doubt investors have been coming in, but the fact is that many young graduates that you pointed out about allegiance are not being able to find those kind of jobs upon two key reference points. So for example, when you had the COVID-19 pandemic kicking in, the government had basically built a post-COVID recovery plan as key to revitalizing the economy. What happened? It was catered to larger enterprises, middle and small-income enterprises were taken on. And if you look at the test cases of certain parts of India as well as big economies such as China, small and medium enterprises are a major point of focus. They weren't when that happened. So when you look towards how resources are being allocated with particular mediums of investments are being prioritized and how things are happening, the reality is far more grand than a single figure kind of risk conveying. And I think in order for India to kind of correct that, it's going to be a larger affair. So for example, when you have that kind of a growth rate coming in, our old provinces are also across kind of benefiting in the same way. Obviously, we've seen in recent days, many countries have made gains against poverty, but as India, the allocation and big questions surrounding how it's approaching poverty and the way the key funds have been utilized to bring enterprise, not the small or medium, raises questions about, okay, you're having access to education in some areas, but then a fork when you have a new fresh file coming in and you want to activate that as part of your labor force participation. What does a recurring absence of jobs for key talents indicate? In the case of there's a large room for improvement, and the fact that the BGP has been quick to point and celebrate investments coming from partners that would obviously invest in it based on certain market considerations and growth values. But the same BGP administration hasn't been very full coming when it comes to these economies and considered admission there as a form of weakness. So that is going to be a key test of leadership on how transparent India is about its economic authority, sure about the challenges that are underpinning. Absolutely. Now, let's talk about the global south. I mean, you know, you talk about Africa, you talk about South America as well. There are many countries within the global south which are looking forward to the prospect of the very fact that the G20 can play a constructive influence to try and make sure it's not about doling out money, but to try and make sure that they can, you know, build institutions in those countries, many of them which are actually flawed democracies. Some of them are also members of the G20 for that matter. India, on the other hand, has not really been playing a constructive influence in the region. We talk about disputes with neighboring Pakistan. Pakistan accuses India of fomenting terrorism within its territory. India's influence on Afghanistan has waned since the Taliban government has assumed power in 2021 in Kabul. And we also see negative, you could say, sentiments in countries such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and even Bhutan and Nepal for that matter, regarding India's role. So G20, or the G20 platform is to try and make sure that they can play a constructive role in global affairs, and also to make sure that they can resuscitate the global financial system. But India's regional profile, since the Narendra Modi government has assumed power, is actually very controversial. What do you have to say about that? I think that was absolutely on point. And I think if I was to build on that, I'd say that much of India's homework and its credibility starts from home. And I think the picture from there doesn't look so great. I mean, you looked at the fact that key organizations such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, which obviously does not have the best of records in cooperating, but that's part of it is due to India's, you know, implicit move besides that any form of meaningful economic and political engagement with its regional partners. I think the narrative about, you know, the activation that India heard were pocketed for longer by terrorism is something that many other countries have outgrown, have tested, have verified, and have simply, but I think the growing realization over there is that it should India try to engage in pocket funds. It will be confronted with a key challenge of addressing picking points, including India's sustained occupation on Kashmir, and how it is basically encroaching the same rights that it wants the world to guarantee developing power. So I think there's a conscious effort there to not engage on key areas. We talked about Nepal's reservations are there, are high over there, for example, to not present itself as this platform for great power showdown between India and China. Sri Lanka, of course, has been extremely skeptical of India. And I think it's important to inform your viewers that during the time when Sri Lanka faced the most bloody civil war at the hands of, you know, the Tamil Elan terrorists, India was known to harbor militant sanctuaries to kind of even lead and give the space, logistical space, train space to the terrorists who were again attacking Sri Lankan state. So I think when we talk about state-sponsored terrorism, many of those reservations run deep. So I think putting all that together and then have found a slump back from, of course, India's desire not to integrate South Asia based on this, you know, a truly multilateral practice is something that is damaging its own credibility. I have two very quick reference points. So the fact that the sidelines of the G20, the Indian Middle Eastern European Corridor was announced, this is an ambitious project which was being, you know, hailed as a game changer and basically looks to connect two key corridors all the way from the Arabian Gulf to India and then of course from Europe to the Arabian Gulf. The problem over there is that when you talk about linking to South Asia, the corridor extends to India. And I would not reduce the credibility, the rights of South Asian integration to simply India. It needs to include Pakistan. It needs to include Afghanistan. Afghanistan is in dire need of integration. I mean, I'm no fan of the Taliban regime. I think, you know, we all know that the roots of that regime and the people who are basically running it, but the fact remains that there's a humanitarian crisis that has been sent to these corridors. So, I mean, to reduce the entire strategic value of a region to India and say this is South Asian integration when India benefits is the wrong signal and basically corroborates the impression that India is not serious about integration. So when you look at those platforms, India's ability to kind of go towards the larger Asia Pacific, go to a Southeast Asia, you know, kind of move towards the Middle East, but not give South Asia the kind of credibility that it deserves in order to kind of attach it in India's own case for G20 leadership is a big vacuum. We don't think no matter a restaurant or a photo op, but with key leaders can basically just explain a little. So no multilateral platform is actually devoid of politics. We've seen President Joe Biden trying to leverage the G20 for America's own political objectives. And many of the countries actually echo those, you know, those concerns over the exception of maybe China and Russia, for that matter. But India is often touted as a regional power that can be an integral part of America's, you know, Pacific shift. You talk about the Indo-Pacific strategy. Obviously, the Chinese would disagree. They would call it the Asia Pacific strategy or the Asia Pacific, you could say, prison, through which we are supposed to view things. But America's quest to try and, you know, make sure that India plays a more pronounced role in the Asia Pacific can actually be, can actually backfire on Washington DC because India also has very good relations with Russia. We're talking about oil deals. We're talking about cooperation. We're also talking about weaponry, which is actually exported by Russia to India. And the fact that Russia has actually engaged in an invasion of Ukraine also dents Russia's credibility and to a large extent India's credibility. But that's not really covered in the mainstream press. Yeah, it isn't. And I think I just decode that one by one. So when you talk about India and inclusion within the Indo-Pacific strategy, there's some elements of that strategy which qualify as relative strength. Some of them not so much. So I think within the trends, I think there's a stronger, I'd say, realization on Washington's part that it needs to make its brand of a rules-based order where it's not a principle that are expected, market practices are upheld, can resonate with key groupings such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. So I think there's a bit of an ideological credibility there to that strategy. But when you look at the metrics being employed, for example, India's inclusion, let's not fool ourselves of being in an imagined paradigm. India is in this first hold itself. It wants to attract a whole lot of investments to kind of build its manufacturing. We see it pivot towards smart and advanced technological development with microchips. Many of the key suppliers and manufacturers from telecom to technology are also looking to kind of build their basis and kind of bring India into a sphere of influence. So I think India wants to benefit technologically, diplomatically, and even in terms of, for example, what U.S. deadlines were, that, you know, for example, the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, I didn't want a lot of flexibility to kind of engage in financial transactions with Russia's default and its mechanisms for oil and everything. It would leave it an effort to convince Europe that, look, we're going to look to the Gulf, but you don't need to depend on Russia. And India seems to be doing all that. And the United States, when it has come to India's autonomy by doing all those things and projecting multiple Arctic words and invading power, you know, how the U.S. sees it, then, of course, you know, the kind of criticism that many other developing countries have said, India has been immune to it. So I think there's a clear impression of exceptionalism when it comes to India. And that does not sit well when you talk about India being a credible partner within the broader ambitions that U.S. was to fulfill within the Indo-Pacific. You talked about the global south. I think many countries, for example, the African Union's inclusion within the G20 was a welcome move, but this was being promoted by many other parties. I mean, China was a key partner to this initiative. We know that without Washington's principal lobbying for AU seats, this wouldn't have been possible. So many of the declaration made at the summit were not necessarily India's only imperative. They followed a larger process that's just come to fruition. So, yeah, India, I'd say, quest for engaging with every single power makes it less reliable to the United States to kind of come forward on specific objectives. Yeah. All right. Policy analyst and author, Hanan, thank you so much for joining me on the show. Later. So that's all that we have from Islamabad today on Think Tech Hawaii. You can follow us on our social media pages for all the latest feedback. Do provide us with your comments. We value them considerably and take very good care of ourselves.