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Showcasing independence

While there were no major announcements of the sort that could have turned the French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s recent two-day visit to India into a special event, the long-term gains from this interaction at the highest political level should not be minimised. There was probably not enough time for much groundwork to be done in the period between Mr. Sarkozy’s assumption of office in May 2007 and his arrival as the chief guest for the 2008 Republic Day parad e. Nevertheless, it became evident during the course of the visit that New Delhi and Paris share commonalities in their strategic approach to the world of today. Mr. Sarkozy might be less critical than some of his immediate predecessors were about the foreign policy of the United States. However, there is little reason to think the French will ever become camp followers of the Americans, the way the British under both Labour and Tory dispensations have proved to be. The settling of a frozen text of a bilateral agreement on cooperation in the civilian nuclear field before the Nuclear Suppliers Group has amended its guidelines is testimony to Paris’s independent course. It bears recall that France refused to impose sanctions after the 1974 and 1998 nuclear explosions in Pokhran. After failing to sign an agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation with Russia, presumably out of fear of displeasing Washington, the Indian government had no choice but to settle for a frozen text with France, which certainly has much to offer India in this field. Showcasing the French connection on Rajpath provided a useful validation of the arguments put forward by those who have pressed for an independent course in international affairs that recognises that the world today is not unipolar but multipolar.

Two other areas in the bilateral relationship came into focus during Mr. Sarkozy’s visit. The first is France as a major military supplier. French-supplied equipment has served the Indian armed forces well and Paris is pushing actively for diversification of India’s defence acquisitions. It has had to swallow its bitter disappointment over the abrupt cancellation of the Eurocopter deal. Dassault, the French aviation major, is one of six contenders for a $10 billion contract to supply the Air Force with 126 fighter planes. With technologies developing rapidly in different parts of the world, diversification will help India’s military sharpen its cutting edge. The second area is intelligence sharing to combat terrorism. Not only are the French intelligence services among the most competent in the world, they can draw on resources that cannot be as easily accessed by agencies with an Anglophone orientation.

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