An assessment of EU-India ties as Modi visits Europe: Sheer political will driving strategic convergence beyond differences

During a media conference last month in Washington post the 2+2 meeting, India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar was at the receiving end of one more question on India’s buying of Russian energy, prompting him to quip: “We do buy some energy which is necessary for our energy security. Europe’s Indo-Pacific envoy landed in India to say that the EU was “not pleased” by New Delhi’s abstentions at the UN. While Modi’s visit covers Germany and France, the commercial and strategic engines of Europe, he has recalibrated India’s foreign policy priorities, gone beyond New Delhi’s template focus on Europe’s traditional powers and reached out to the wider Nordic regions that enjoy high human development indices and are eager to partner with India in its development journey. India has realized that Europe can be an important partner in building India’s domestic resilience and capacities—s everal new partnership agreements with Europe have focused on increasing trade and investments, green partnerships for tackling climate change, new technologies, and defense manufacturing.” Worth noting that India is only the second country after the United States with which Nordic nations have entered summitry mechanism. It puts in perspective Von Der Leyen’s statement in New Delhi that “for the European Union, strengthening and energising its partnership with India is a priority in this upcoming decade.” India features prominently in the EU’s Indo-Pacific strategy “as an existing or potential partner in all the priority areas” and as one among the few ‘pilot’ countries in the defence and security arena with whom the EU envisages cooperation “on maritime security, counter-terrorism, cyber security, and crisis management” and seeks to “conduct more joint naval activities including exercises, port calls, and multilateral exercises with India to protect the freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific,” observes Mohan in another paper.